HP Pavilion Slimline s3137c TV PC Shutdown problems
I had received an HP Pavilion s3137c PC in for repair. The machine was doing some pretty funny things. The machine after about 3-6 minutes of use would just start rebooting. I originally thought it was to do with either RAM, Power supply or something was over heating. When ever I see this I always put on more thermal grease on the processor. First thing to do is to clean the processor and the underside of the heat sink with lint free material that is soaked with rubbing alcohol. This helped but the machine still seemed to reboot now every about 8-10 minutes.
Next I went on to test the other components. They all came back fine. This had me puzzled. I went back and triple checked all the capacitors looking for one to have a slight bulge. Still nothing.
I talked to the client and they said they had absolutely no luck with this machine. It was sent back during the warranty period twice.
I went back and looked at the machine and I noticed that the south bridge heat sink was getting really hot. I wondered if the heat sink on the processor could be turned around to blow air across the processor and the south bright. Turns out you can! Originally the heat sink fan was near the rear of the machine. I turned it 90 degrees and re-installed it.
The machine is now been running for almost 48 hours with no shutdowns! I wonder if this was a flaw in the design of the HP Pavilion Slimline s3137c? I am wondering during the warranty period did the heatsink get install incorrectly? I will have to check too see if I can see a hardware manual of the machine. I will post pictures how I installed the heat sink soon.
*Update* – Sorry – Here are the pictures:
The fins should be pointing away from the power supply. When I looked at the computer they were facing to the back of the machine where those holes are. The fan should be close to the power supply. By doing this the fan for the processor is doing two more things. Removing the hot air from the power supply, (It’s still cooling the processor) and then the air goes over the south bridge helping to cool it as well.
You should clean up the thermal grease off the processor and the heat sink. The main thing you need is rubbing alchohol and some kind of cloth/rag that is lint free and clean. You will most likely never be able to use the cloth again. I use this product to clean the processor and it works great!
You will need to re-apply the thermal past to the processor. I recommend using ceramique. Your local computer store will sell this for around 8 or 9 dollars Canadian.
Put a little blob directly on the processor. You don’t need very much. Then place the heat sink down like you saw in the first picture. Re-screw in the heatsink making sure not to wiggle it.
The Machine has now been running for 4 days straight now! 
Good luck!
*Update 2* Official Repair manual – HP Pavilion Slimline s3137c Repair Manual
Hello sir ! I have the same problem with my parent computer… Can you send me some picture of your work please…? Cloutier.N@hotmail.com
It will be really appreciate !! My english is bad, I’m sorry !
Thank you very much
I posted the pictures and explainations. Hope it helps.
Thanks for the post, same thing happened to my slimline and it just died, after doing lots of research, I found that it was a very simple thing to take care of, (reset CMOS/BIOS) I took my slimline to Futureshop and later to Staples Business Depot, first thing they said, Motherboard is dead, without even investigating or any diagnostics, but i didn t gave up, come across your post and very happy to know that changing the fan direction can make a significant impact on the heat of the tower.
Keep doing the good job.
But my big concern is that there is a serious issues with its overheating, I researched of USB powered fan for the outer case (ebay/Youtube) and I am planing to install one, not to take another risk.
You want to make sure that the machine is in a well vented area. I think an external fan is overkill personally. Let me know how it goes.
Hi,
I have a Slim line s3137c and that has developed the sme problem as you described. I was wondering how did you remove the heat sink. I see there are 4 screws that hold the heat sink in place but when I try to remove them they just keep spinning around.
Thanks
Gerry
You just have to make sure that the processor heatsink holes match up with the holes on the Motherboard. There are springs in front of the screws that help keep things from becoming loose. Maybe you just aren’t pushing hard enough?
I have the same problem. I took off the out shell portion and it hasn’t died on me yet. That makes you believe mine is a heat problem. The fan is in the inner part and it looks like the heat sink points to the back (where there are holes for ventilation). Do I just turn the heat sink around or the entire piece with the fan in the back?
Sorry —- the above is Dave Bush not Dave Bus…. lol
I don’t mean to hijack the thread, but I felt that this is an appropriate place to post this response.
I just wanted to mention that I have been working for days on a WIN 7 upgraded s3137c with a shutdown problem, and found the solution!!
It was the TV tuner card that was freezing the system on shutdown, and I wanted to share this. Unfortunately, there seems to be no driver update at this time to solve the freeze, so you need to disable the tuner.
The model of the tuner of which I speak is the ViSX PureTV-U48A3 (NTSC/ATSC Combo)
I hope this helps some frustrated tech trying to work this out…It took an awfully long time on my end!
Thanks all for the advice! I have an older version of this computer at work, and the fan is facing the right direction. I had pulled the TV tuner out of that computer thinking it would help cool it, plus I put in a case fan at the bottom. That computer has been running not stop for days!!!
Now a workmate bought this computer. I followed the suggestion to rotate the fan. Also I pulled the TV tuner card since he is having me install Windows 7.
THANKS!!!
Matthew