GTX 680M thermal pads dimensions

I have an Alienware M17x R4 with the Nvidia GTX 675m and the appropriate heatsink, and i want to upgrade to the GTX 680m/780m but i have just one hitch in the process.

I'm on a budget, and the good thermal pads are expensive, on top of that i do not know the required thicknesses or other dimensions (lengths and widths) i need to apply on the GPU to ensure proper contact for all its components.

Can anyone provide me with a picture of the location and dimensions where thermal pads are required on both these cards please? (also considering the laptop model and heatsink design)

Side question: Is Fujipoly extreme and Fujipoly/ModRight the same thing???, and is it electrically conductive?

 

I do have these. One is placement but I don't have the text that speaks to the circles noted. The actual heatsink is as it arrived from Dell. The colors relate to different thicknesses and appear to be due to differing thicknesses of parts of the heatsink. Those thin strips at the edge are the thickest bits, around 3.5mm at a guess but they are made from some sort of thermal putty that is shapeable. Never found any of this available and from what I see the builders that offer kits double up on 'normal' pads. Others are 1.5mm and 2mm IIRC.

Assemble with a very small amount of paste on each pad and the core. Open up and look for the dents in the pads and spread pattern. This should show you if you have used correct thicknesses?

Good luck.

 

Thanks for the reply, but i was really hoping to get some precise thicknesses and dimensions, because good thermal pads are expensive and i can't afford buying 6 different thicknesses of it.

Also i don't think that applying both pads AND paste on the same component is good practice, so i'll just use the pads where needed except on the die where i'll use paste.

Edit: my 675m doesn't have those putty things, as stock and for the following 2 gpu replacements they used those thick purple thermal pads, could be a regional thing?

Edit 2: If you can confirm that the thicknesses are exactly the same as the 675m i could get a more accurate idea of the thicknesses i need.

 

It was different for the 680m, the VRM's are larger and differently positioned but the sizes looked the same thickness.

You misunderstood what I meant about the small amount of paste. You open it up after to see the contact area and then clean it off. It also gives you a good idea of how much to use on the core. No spread or poor spread and you need thicker padding. Big dent (1mm+) in a pad and it could be too thick?

I've seen that putty stuff on three heatsinks from dell but I know aftermarket use the thicker pads. You can safely double up so you can get away with just a couple of thinner sizes. It usually comes as a sheet that you cut up and one sheet of each will be enough.

 

So you mean do a test pad and paste assemblage to see if the thickness of the pads and amount of paste is correct or not.

This still leaves the problem of potentially wasting thermal pads though, how big and which thickness pads should i purchase? (Cuz you know, three or four 150*100 thermal pad sheets can be really expensive)

 

Yes re the test. They are fully reusable so no wastage. If you get 1mm, 1.5mm and 2mm you should be able to make up whatever you need. You could even use 2x1mm and save on the 2mm sheet.

The way to actually see exactly what you need is to use putty and talc. You put a 3mm ball of putty on each contact area (NOT the core!) and a dash of talc on the heatsink to stop it sticking, assemble and then open up and the putty will be the exact clearance. Add .5mm to 1mm to the thickness of the putty. Of course clean it all off before padding and assembly.

Since they are soft you just need to make sure they get a little compressed, and the paste method will show that.

 

Hmm, sounds like it'll be 3 months before i get the whole deal over with.

Still didnt even buy the card yet

Thanks for the info and tips, i'd rather not stack pads (air gaps) so i'll look around more and hopefully find what i need.

Btw, i had found a guide on padding of the 780m with thicknesses, if the 680m has the same thickness pads that'd be awesome.

 

You can always stack .5mm or 1mm.
If 1mm is too thick, you can press/roll it took it is thinner. Vram isn't really that hot anyways.

Sent from my 306SH

 

what i can conclude from the above is to buy:
~100*150*0.5mm sheet
~100*150*1mm sheet
~60*50*2mm sheet

Would that be good??

Can someone also recommend me a thermal pad brand that isn't as expensive as fujipoly but still quite good??

 

I would say that is fine. The stacking is not a problem as contact is not critical like it is on the core. Those components at the edge are the VRM's and do get hot, but unlike the core that fluctuates greatly, they remain fairly constant. And from what I could see the 780m was very similar to the 680m in component layout and size.

No help with the paste, I use whatever I can find usually. It's only going to make a difference if you are looking to overvolt and overclock to the extreme. Otherwise it's like 2c or 3c better with the expensive ones.

 

I already got a good paste, i know nothing about thermal pad brands though

 

Here are some on Amazon and they seem to be cheaper than fujipoly w/ about half the performance (5W/mk vs 11W/mk). Are you going to be reusing the 675M heatsink or getting a 100W model? If you have one with thermal pads on it you could always reuse them assuming they aren't dried or ripped.

My 780M used all 1MM thick thermal pads BTW.

 

The 675m is a 100w card, therefore its heatsink should fit either the 680m or 780m perfectly.

My heatsink part number is 0MT1DN

 

I should have realized it would have been a 100W heatsink. I would try to just reuse the thermal pads you already have, according to several people on the site the one from Dell are pretty high quality. If you take the heatsink off slowly and without twisting it you shouldn't rip any of them.