I recently aquired a new laptop that works fine in all but one respect: its internal fan is worth crap. so, what would be an easy fix? both internal and external cooling solutions would be valuable.

Well...you could work in the freezer.

I would suggest creating some sort of heatsink on the bottom, something that holds the computer up above the floor, preferably made of metal, with lots of surface area, that would hopefully drain heat away from the computer. That's the only thing I can think of, unless you can get an external fan which works too. Or you could replace the internal one, but I don't think that counts as easy

I have two of these: http://www.walmart.com/ip/Onn-Laptop-Cooling-Pad/16794998 and they work very well with the laptops I've used them for.

DShiznit, That looks great. found it on amazon, btw:
http://waa.ai/srm

rogue, im not against opening my laptop up, i just dont want to do something that requires all sorts of changes like having to make a new case for more space (Although i may end up doing that anyway, just not right now).