cleaning my area 51 m15x, need expert help

good day to all, can anybody tell me how to safely clean the underside of my m15x from dust? here are my questions:

1. when using compressed air, do i still have to open up the laptop's underside?
or blasting the grills with compressed air enough?
2. must i turn off the laptop while i use the can of compressed air? or leave it on so that the dust that the compressed air dislodges gets sucked out by the fan?
3. is it easy to open the underside of my m15x and have no problems putting it back?
4. if i can open it, are there any sensitive parts that i must avoid?

 

Hi wardoink,

I dont really have an answer to 1 or 2, I've never tried to clean the m15x from the outside. If you wanted to clean the dust off the vents on the outside, you'd probrably do ok without opening it up. But for me there was quite a build up of dust on the heatsink itself, which you can only acess by opening up the back and removing the heatsinks for the graphics card and processor. As for 2, I'd reccomend not spraying compressed air through the fans when its on - you wouldnt want to damage the fan motors.

As for 3 and 4. It really depends what you want to clean. If you only want to clean the vents in the 'service cover' then you can just unscrew it and blast some air through - the guide to removing it is here here.

If you wanted to clean the heatsinks it becomes a bit more complex, you need to remove the heatsink for the graphics card and CPU and spray them with some compressed air. Before you reseat the GPU/CPU heatsinks you will need to remove the old thermal paste between the heatsink and the CPU/GPU, and apply some more. (Guides for everything but applying thermal paste are on the AW support site).
I wouldn't think this would void your waranty, but its probrably best to check.

It isn't too difficult, and as long as you follow the walk-throughs on AW support site (recomend printing them/opening them on another computer nearby), it should be fine. Last summer I cleaned everything out and replaced the GPU, I'd never opened up a laptop before and it was relativly staight forward.

Instead of those two, you could just remove the service cover, remove the fans (they're only held down by two screws) and spray compressed air through the heatsinks whilst they are still attached. I have never tried this - but I would imagine it would work fine, the only danger is knocking clumps of dust onto the pcb under the cpu heatsink. I think this may be the simplist way to clean it all through.

4) As for sensitive parts, all of it is fairly sensitive so be careful when handling any insides of a computer. The most important precaution is to electrostatically ground yourself - its described and explained all over this forum and the internet, so I wont bother explaining it here, just search for it. Also, be sure you have turned the computer off, it is unplugged from everything and the battery is removed before you open it up - also mentioned in AW's guides.

Good luck!

 

5. is it okey to use vacuum cleaners to suck the dusts inside?

 

One of the best ways to clean the radiators is to do

http://4help.alienware.com/cgi-bin/...iZwX3NlYXJjaF90ZXh0PW0xNXg*&p_li=&p_topview=1

and this

http://4help.alienware.com/cgi-bin/...iZwX3NlYXJjaF90ZXh0PW0xNXg*&p_li=&p_topview=1

Its enough to take out the actual fans and leave the radiators on. Just remove any dust clogs there are. Try not to use compressed air, as the dust can get stuck inside the radiators making everything worse.

 

+1
compressed air is better than nothing, but it does not clean the hard dust bunnies...
once you open it you can thoroughly clean it.
I do it with all my laptops at least once in a month (or at least i try).
It's the best way to keep your beast cool.