Here is my situation, I like to lay in bed at night and surf and play games. I have an Acer Aspire 5100 (which I think is a well designed laptop). I noticed a tiny spot on the top panel by the space bar, just above the power supply where the plastic had actually softened and began to melt a little. Yikes!!! Obviously it was from setting the laptop on the covers and blocking the air intakes. I think my solution will be to buy both the aluminum model for home use and the thin plastic model to carry in my bag. I also have fabricated a very thin an lightweight 1/8" piece of birch wood to set the cooling pads on. This should solve it. Now I just gotta go look around and find them and buy them.