X220 fan constantly runs even a low power settings

Until recently I rarely heard my fan, other than it briefly coming on.  After hearing the fan run pretty much all the time now over the last few days, I changed power setting to balanced power and optimized fan control - balanced in Lenovo Power manager.  Ran the hardware diagnostics in Lenovo and Cores at 74 and 76 degrees. Fan still runs even after lowering these power consumption settings. 
Have the latest BIOS and all other updates installed.  No grinding or weird noises - just constant fan running on low speed and a little higher when docked.
I don't know that there is anything wrong and did a search for ideas on how to check that a fan on a laptop is running commiserate with the power and temperature of the laptop.
For Lenovo or laptops in general, how do you check and see that the fan noise you hear is the noise you should hear?  I have mine plugged into a mini dock, not blocking any fan exhaust, etc.  AC outlet power via mini dock.  90W 20V adapter plugged into the mini dock.
I saw that one user went into the BIOS and changed the Adaptive Thermal Management setting to Balanced from the default of Maximum.   Have not tried that as I already have the power scheme to balanced and not sure what setting it - also - in the BIOS will do.
Any experiences with diagnosing whether the X220 fan is operating as it should?  Saw many concerns recorded early on but after BIOS updates most excessive problems seemed to resolve. 
Funny things is that when I pop the X220 out of the mini dock, the fan noise pretty much disappears.  Like right now, within a minute of undocking the laptop, the fan is not longer audible.  Power settings for battery and plugged in are both set to balanced so that should not be a factor.
Txs 

Are you sure there are no trojans or viruses on laptop? Also lounch the task manager and check out the service or application with deranged CPU loading while the laptop is in the idle mode. What is the power usage in the idle mode?
x220 | i5-2520m | Intel ssd 320 series | Gobi 2000 3G GPS | WiFi
x220 | i5-2520m | hdd 320 | Intel msata ssd 310 series | 3G GPS | WiFi
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