About to repaste my G73jh, need advice on thermal pads

I've never done this before. My hands are too shaky to do it myself, so I'm probably going to have to find someone else to do it. Aside from the thermal paste, will I need to replace the thermal pads? If so, what pads do I get? I know I'm supposed to get 1mm, but which ones specifically? Does it not matter as long as they're 1mm? Would this work? Amazon.com: Gino 2 Pcs 15mm x 15mm x 1mm Heatsink Thermal Copper Pad for Laptop GPU: Computers & Accessories . Where do the pads go, exactly? I've never done this before.

I sent my laptop in to ASUS to fix something and have them clean it and reapply thermal paste like 6 months ago, and today I decided to run furmark and noticed my temperature after 3 minutes was over 105 in the diode and memio, and around 70-80 in the other two. I blew into the vent with compressed air until dust stopped coming out and there's no difference at all in temperature. Idle temps are 65-67.

EDIT: Found something else. http://www.amazon.com/Thermal-Pad-U...99&sr=1-5&keywords=1mm+thermal+pad&tag=01u-20

Will that one work?

 

The pads in there can be reused. They are very flexible and conforming. The aftermarket ones tend to be hard and you have to get the thickness as close as possible or you will make problems with core contact or with RAM contact.

I'm not sure what you will gain from all the effort. It may not help at all. But with my g73jh I found that the thermal pads were preventing even contact between the heatsink and the GPU die. I stretched the pads a bit to thin them slightly and this fixed that problem. But I can still break 100C with Furmark after a time. It is a power virus basically and is simply not representstive of games.

 

Number one thing is to make sure that the person doing it reads the guides, and watches the video. Make sure you look at a guide that has close up in focus pictures of the audio plug. That is the bit most likely to snap. Good news is that since ASUS managed to open it (even if they didn't manage to repaste it well!) it should be easier, as long as they didn't re-double side tape the keyboard!

The best guides are in the "read this first" section of the forum, under repasting.

I agree with swaaye and would just leave the pads as they are, as they are squishy they usually allow appropriate contact with the heatsink and GPU die. Mine are still original and work fine. Unless there is a physical issue with the card/heatsink etc not sitting properly they shouldn't interfere with contact, I suspect swaaye might have got an unlucky combination of card and heatsink.

If you do a good paste job with ICD7, an old school silver one, or similar quality paste Furmark should top out at 78-82C with ambient under 30C. I did my g73JH at least 6 months ago, maybe a year, and still doesn't go over 81C on Furmark (gets there in a few minutes, then stays indefinitely). I aircan the vents every couple of months, and use a pipe-cleaner to dislodge any resistant dust.

It is a shame that there seems to be some sort of inability to train manufacturer computer techs to apply paste correctly at time of assembly, but then it is probably a depressing computer sweat shop where one person applies the splodge then another slaps the video card in. If they actually made an effort at production, and used a good paste, it would be a real selling point for the computers!

 

What I don't understand is how wide a variance in temps I see reported. There is no way my G73JH will top out at 82C with Furmark. It always gets to 100C eventually. My paste application is fine. And as said paste type has limited effect on temps as long as the paste is not the worst generic gunk available. I think the heatsink/heatpipe assembly quality varies and maybe fan speed as well. There is also always some variability in the power output of GPU dies (they are all unique).

 

Is Antec Nano Diamond 7 as good as IC D7? I'm asking because that's what Best Buy carries and I would rather buy it right there than have to wait for Amazon.
Thermal Compound - Best Buy

Basically I have these 3 compounds to choose from.

 

It barely matters which paste you use. In fact paying more for the diamond stuff is really just a waste overall. You are almost paying for placebo the difference is so small.

For example
80-way Thermal Interface Material Performance Test

 

Get a reasonable paste like MX-4 and I always found Phobya 5w/mk easy to use and good performance.