[Alienware 17R4 / 15R3] - Disassembly + Repaste Guide + Results

Anything older like MX4 or Arctic Silver Ceramique will do for learning. Kryonaut is expensive.
What's your room temp?

 

I figured. Good thing I have an old MX4.

Room temp is around 24°C.

 

Put the syringe in a plastic bag and put it in a cup with hot water (60-65c) before applying.

 

Thanks. I’ll do this in a bit while I practice spreading with the MX4.

EDIT:
First trial is here. Looks like the top part of both dies aren’t in contact properly. Right, @Vasudev?

EDIT 2: It seems like the third trial was the best.

EDIT 3: Still got the nagging core differential. LOL. I'm gonna rest.

 

I gave the syringe a good shake few times and placed in a more cool room for sometime and used it.
See Result 2 Thermal Paste application on GPU its perfect and try to do the same on CPU.
Your heatsink needs lapping because I saw some imperfection on copper HSF. I used 800-1000 grit sand paper as @judal57 suggested and that got rid of core differntials by big amount. Don't overdo the lapping, just one to three strokes in either direction until you feel somewhat smoother surface than non-lapped HSF. Afterwards wipe the HSF with alcohol prep pad to get rid of skin oil and other micro particles.
Even your thermal pads looks worn out.

 

Gelid GP-Extreme thermal pads behave more like gum or clay unlike the other pads. They have good thermal conductivity and they stick on the heatsink. But they are very easy to tear off/apart.

 

Thanks I didn't know that.

 

I’ll try lapping over the weekend. The thermal pads are... new. I think it’s because my finger was holding one side at one point. Also, the crack seen at the GPU thermal pad was from my nail when I marked it too hard. Should I just replace them again? It wasn’t a deep break/cut, so I didn’t think it mattered.

OT: Even when softened, Kryonaut was a pain to spread.

EDIT: How much pressure do I need to use when lapping? I’m asking because I’m only getting three times at most. Also, how much of a difference is the 800 grit over the 1000 grit?

 

Guys, I am having the thermal throttling issue with a huge core variation in temps, so now they are sending a heatsink kit thry dispatching, below are the parts:

1 FRPY8 ASSY,HTSNK,W/FAN,G3,K,NEW,AW17
1 W6CFD PAD,CLG,PSX,33X12X0.2,CPU,PORT
1 06335 PAD,THRM INTFC CLNG,SINGLE

I have a Aliwanre R4 2017 with 7820HK and a GTX 1070.

VGA temps are fine, doesnt go below 67, but CPU reaches 96-98 easily, I am running with a -0,160 of undervolt to reach 91 at most, but the clocks doest go under 3.6Ghz, its the workaround until I resolve this problem.

 

Kryonaut should spread extremely easily, although will take work to get a thin even coating, so it's best to use a little too much than too little, on a tripod bad fitting heatsink.
You may have a bad tube. I've seen reports of people who had tubes where it was almost as hard to spread as IC7. Mine is as fluid as MX-4 (and I have both in front of me).

 

Yeah, it's probably the 1g tube then. I had to heat it up (thanks again, @Papusan) before every use just to even come close to the consistency of MX-4, and it just was recently bought. I only heated up the MX-4 once, and that tube's been with me for over two years now.

You're right about using more to spread it though, but it was really difficult to get an even coating on the dies. I struggle a lot more on the CPU.

In any case, I bought extra (the 11g one) for future use.

 

I bought the 11g tube. Actually have two of them. Both were fine.

 

Here's hoping that my 11g will fare better than the 1g. I guess I just have to wait.

 

Hey guys, I already read this thread one year ago, because I ordered an AW 17 R4 skylake.
But I decided to ship it back and go for another Notebook.

Now one year later I am back here with a brand new AW 15 R3 (7820HK/GTX1080/FHD120Gsync)

I ordered some stuff for LM repaste and will go for it this weekend.
Hopefully I can do a positive feed back with 1-2 pictures for you.

 

Less the better, if you scrape off too much copper it might end up worse than current temps.

Don't go LM first time. Use traditional Paste like Kryonaut or Phobya and you can observe massive temps reduction than stock paste.

 

I ordered both, I will try it with kryonaut first. I also bought some thermal pads from grizzly.

 

I had this internal debate with LM vs paste for a while. I figure LM since I don’t want to do it again. I used to put dell computers together at the dell plant in NC before it closed. But when you spend 2700 on a laptop, your confidence lowers a bit I guess.

 

What’re your results? Did you just do a repaste?

 

Doing a repaste and thermal pads. I saw the HS mod and I’m debating that. I’m waiting for amazon to deliver my LM. Then I’m going to give it a try!

 

Good luck. Which thermal pads did you buy? I’m still waiting for the aluminum heatsinks that I bought.

 

hi iunlock..i have the 17 r4.. whats your location? can you do a repasting for me? i live in north vancouver BC.. tnx..

 

Hello there,

it took me about 4 hours to get done with repaste and repad my AW15 R3 7820HK/GTX1080.

Firestrike before and after 14.000
Temp before and after ~85°C CPU, 67°C GPU

Literally nothing happend. It even got slightly worse, but this also could come through higher room temp after repaste.

 

Hey. I used this guide and got good temps on my alienware but now every time I get thermal thrutteling when playing games but the temps is fine both the cpu and gpu at around 61 degrees centigrade. Anyone knows what I have to do to get it fixed?

I have used the liquid metal on my gtx 1070
Alienware 17 r4
Intel 7700hq

 

Your temps are 61°C while playing?

 

Those are very good temps. Do you have HWINFO screenie while playing any game to see max and avg temps of cpu and gpu?

 

Yes

 

No use the intel extreme utility

 

post that.

 

Hello again,

now I opened my AW15 R3 a second time.

Here are 2 pics how it looks right now:


It seems not that bad for me, any ideas why the temps are still the same as before ?

 

From the looks of it, you have quite a serious CPU core differential problem. 2 of your CPU cores are over 10-20C hotter than the other 2 cores. GPU side looks not balanced as well with only the lower side getting most of the contact. You might wanna try reducing the thickness of the pads you use above the GPU, especially on the chokes, but make sure the VRMs are well in contact with the heatsink. as for the CPU, the only thing i can tell you is your heatsink is not balanced which is fairly obvious from the thermal paste imprint. yes, thermal paste can act as a cheap man's contact pressure indicator. good luck

 

Well I got everything back together now and its still exact the same.

I tried to tighten the heatsink better than before. For me it looks like
the "sunon" HS in my AW just doesnt fit properly.

But Im fine with it. Im happy everything works and no screw is left.
I would be really glad if I could have reached better temps, but this
is also OK for me, because I just use it for some LAN party gaming...

Is there anything to control my fanspeeds?

 

here you go. i can send an other one if this is not enuff https://imgur.com/a/cYCb0

 

Where is your post from HWinfo64 for the CPU core temps, or at least, Throttlestop 8.48?
We can't see your temps at all.

 

Here are 5min Intel XTU stress test


Why are temps jumping from 64° to 84°C during the test?

 

Because XTU stress test is cyclic workload. Try Aida64 as the guide. Expect temp will instead keep up to max all the time.

 

*Still waiting for HWinfo64 CPU cores 1-4 temp screenshots as I just said last post.....*

 

Here are some screenshots just finished:

 

You do need to repaste for optimal performance of 7820HK.

 

Well I already done that and nothing happened. I used Kryonaut and Grizzly thermal pads 1/0.5mm
and temps are the same as before.

These pics are from the first opening and repaste/-pad:

Spoiler

And here second opening, after repaste/pad:

 

There's more paste than actually needed. Look at the image of stock Dell Paste that looked like stamp you need to replicate that much thin layer of kryonaut or any traditional paste on CPU and for GPU a little more will do.
For refernece use this *OFFICIAL* Alienware 15 R1/R2 Owner's Lounge
See pic #4.

 

Do you really think I could get much better temps with little less paste?

Because every time I open my AW15 its also a risk to damage anything.
If I can lower just like 5°C, I wouldnt do it.

 

I think someone mentioned on the previous post that the contact between your heatsink and cpu die is not even which is the main culprit of your problem. I don't have any experience with the new models but from the picture you have posted it's quite obvious that the contact is not even. All I can suggest is observe again you 2nd repaste and look which part is not even and go back reading the OP.

 

I just bought an AW 15 R3 7700HQ 1070.
I started Playing fallout 4 on Ultra my cpu is sitting at 187F with a .120v undervolt and the gpu is sitting around 164F This is ridiculous for the CPU to be running so hot. I repasted with AS Ceramique 2 the day I bought it too. Never thought I'd see the day when GPUS run cooler than cpus.

Also, running Prime95 without the .120V undervolt my cpu will spike to 203F

I just sold my MSI GT72VR with the 6700HQ and 1070 and that thing ran cool as ice.

 

Imbalanced heatsink and overall bad design will get you those temps.

 

Too little or too much paste. Doesn't matter in this case. The problem is uneven pressure. It's the Tripod.

 

Then undervolt to greater value like 150 or 170 to reduce the temps.

 

just via offset?

 

yes.

 

-0.100V seems to be stable after hours of gaming and some benchmarks.
-0.200V caused instant freeze.

Temps are a little better, its enough for me. Maybe I try to get towards -0.150V


I also had some thoughts about the gap between CPU and HS...
What happens if I put a Grizzly Thermal Pad under CPU HS (0.5mm) ?

 

Hi!!!

-0.100V with or without overclocking?