Dell XPS M1330 - nVidia GeForce 8400M GS - Copper Mod

You can set how many test iterations of 3dmark you want to run if you purchase it. Just set it to run a few times

 

The idle temps were never a concern. I seem to idle at 57C which is perfectly fine (11C down from without the mod). The mod really shines with load temperatures.

In fact, there is a school of thought that says larger, sudden temperature increases are a bigger concern than temperature itself. With that in mind, a temperature change from 57C to 73C (which is what I get playing UT3) is preferable to (for example) 39C to 73C, especially since 57C is a perfectly normal, safe temperature.

 

It's not that. In real gaming the processor is under a fair load adding a lot of heat to the heatsink while 3dmark 2005 onwards are very GPU intensive. My GPU when running 3D mark 05 only reaces 70 while it reaches 73 on lost coast.

 

Regular heat cycling is the issue you seem to be referring to. Having the GPU running at 40C the majority of the time then getting to 73C once every 3 days for 2 hours is much better than 57C for all that time. the laptop is heat cycled every day when you boot it up from 21C (room temp) to your idle temp anyway.

 

Hey guys I've been reading around this forum and the surrogate idle temperature poll forum and I've been thinking that my idle temperatures (after the mod, of course) are a bit too high. Right now my GPU is at 62 and maxes at 80. Do you guys think the folded copper heat sink that I created isn't sufficient?

Should I either: make a thicker (and bigger) folded copper shim or actually get a thick(er) piece of copper (that will be very hard and I'm running out of time here at home since I'm going to school in a week)?

And if you're in Calgary, where would you reccomend I get some one piece copper shims?

 

One thing so many people don't realise about Arctic Silver 5 is that less is more. You reallly want to apply enough to coat the area and nothing more, as thin as possible. Just a tip because many people don't seem to realise this.

 

And a lot of people don't realise that even if you but a bit too much on it will eventually spread thinly through heatcycling and pressure so don't worry too much. You really don't want to put too little on in this situation as the gap and angle of the heatsink varies a lot between different heatsinks.

 

Folded copper isn't great. You should use 2 separate pieces with AS5 between layers if you have to but on piece will be a lot better. metaloffcuts.co.uk will post a ready cut polished piece of 99.9% copper anywhere via airmail.

 

I'll take a look at metaloffcuts.co.uk but I guess I won't be able to mod my laptop until i return from school in around December (unless i get them to mail it to my dorm hahaha. Now that's not a bad idea...)

I'm getting a quote right now. Thanks, Kreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

 

No problem mate.

I now get 51C idle and 74C peak load (for some reason Counterstrike source makes my GPU 3C hotter that 3Dmark). Does this sound right to you guys?

 

Sounds about right, Kree, although your temps should actually be reported as a range (e.g. 50C - 56C), rather than as one temperature.

 

No, it's one temperature as the fan is always on lowest setting. With a thermal pad it's actually 49c idle

 

Always on? Yuck. That would severely irritate me, but to each his own!

If I unplug everything but the AC adaptor, I get 47C - 53C. Fan on low for the cycle down once it hits 53C, which takes about 15 minutes.

 

Can't hear it at all with the fan on low and it only lowers battery life by 15 minutes and the lack of temperature fluctuation is brilliant for GPU lifespan

Are you measuring your temps with HWMonitor and the official drivers? I have the newest heatsink so maybe that's why my fans are quieter but I wonder why my GPU only goes down to 49C. I do get 68C playing games with a notebook cooler though

 

Yep, HWMonitor, 175.97 driver and A12 BIOS.

Don't get me wrong, my fan on low is about the quietest laptop fan I've experienced, but I prefer silence when working. I'm prepared to put up with the slight temperature fluctuation for that - I have 4 years complete care, anyway, and I'm sure I'll buy a new laptop before that.

 

Just finished my mod, temps have dropped about 5 degrees while idle, im sitting at 57 now
One thing to note, that blue pad is really soft, so I kinda tore it up when taking it off

 

What driver version are you using ?
51C idle seems to be a bit lower than expected.
I get an idle of ~58C and peaks of ~84

 

Hi everyone,

I am not a person that usually posts in forums but I had to thank you all for this mod.

Bought this laptop about 2 months ago’ I didn’t really have any issues with the laptop except I realized the temperatures would spike for no reason once in a while.

Here are the before and after results:

Before:
CPU: idle 55 load 80c-90c fan high
Gpu: idle 48 load 80+ even got to 120c fan high , a couple of times playing some games but most of the time during load it kept at the rage of 80c.
Mem: idle 55 load 65 fan high
Chipset: idle 57 load 70+ fan high

After copper mod – fan never reaches high
CPU: idle 40- load 72c-
Gpu: idle 42 load 65-
Mem: idle 55 load 64
Chipset: idle 42 load 66

Well as you can see the temperatures have dropped drastically and the fan is never on high.
If I set the fan to high manually the temperatures are really good even in load for long time.
I except once the a/c mx2 compound will settle it will drop a couple of Celsius more.

Now! Should I mod the chipset too? Or are these temps ok?

Thank you so much again

 

@omega31: I strongly suspect the driver version you're using is reporting the wrong temperatures - an idle temp of 42C for the GPU is more or less unheard of. 156.xx drivers definitely under-report the temperatures, and others may do the same.

 

The guide needs to be revised to state that people who have modded the chipset as well got worse results.

 

HI,

Just to make things clear I made sure:

Details:
Latest driver from dell’s web site.
Latest A12 Bios upgraded.

All windows and office updates installed.

Using “I8kfanGUI” to read the temperatures.

So far looks really good and the fact that the fan never reaches high is great.
This is a new machine maybe Dell did some improvements.

Laptop details:
XPS M1330 | C2D T8300 2.4GHz | 4GB RAM | 250 GB | LCS Display | NVIDIA 8400M GS | Vista Home Premium

I have added a snap shot of my system in idle for a couple of minutes with all the details.

You can see fan spead is 3000 RPM stable and cpu temp is even lower:

(btw it is a really hot summer here and I have no air con, so room temp is around 25c)

 

use HWMonitor to read temp

i8kfan doesnt read it properly, u have to config it a bit <-- did u do it?

 

Ok, ran HW monitor too,

The gpu temps were slightly higher running at idle at 50c when I8kfanGUI was showing 43c which is not bad too.

CPU was stable at 37 –

I will run a stress test again running both monitors just to make sure the results are correct.
Thanks
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ok, I ran stress test for 25 min and MAX temps were:

Hwmonitor CPU 71
I8kfanGUI CPU 69

Hwmonitor GPU 70
I8kfanGUI GPU 61

Hwmonitor acpi 55

I8kfanGUI MEM 60

Hwmonitor hdd 42

I8kfanGUI chipset 69

this is still much better before the mod, although i keep thinking what would happen if I mod the chipset too.

 

Latest official drivers (correct temps) and HWMonitor. I get an idle of 48-50C now the ambient temp is down to 22C and I get 63C when running 3DMark 05 (Scoring 3785, is that about right?).

No driver changes:

Min/Max after mod:
CPU1: 28 48
CPU2: 28 51
GPU: 48 63

Min/Max before mod:
CPU1: 29 ??
CPU2: 28 ??
GPU: 64 102

 

I didn't mod yet, but I just ordered everything I need in order to mod my m1330, even before the actual laptop arrived.

Great guide, really, it's awesome.

I can always hope my m1330 works nicely anyway, if not I might take the chance and voiding my guaranty or simply wait a year before applying the mod. The downside of waiting a year is that the GPU would have been suffering for a year already before I fix it, which wouldn't be good either.

 

You can completely reverse the mod mate

 

True. The m1330 doesn't come with some kind of warranty sticker over any of the screws? Lot's of stuff come like that, which sucks.

Did anyone try sending in a m1330 that has been opened/tampered with and then returned to original state? Dell didn't notice anything? Just wondering if there's any noticeable way to notice that I have actually voided the warranty if I did open it.

 

I had a technician repair mine after I had attempted the mod with the wrong size copper and put the original thermal pad back.

there is no warranty sticker on the heatsink, screws or processor.

 

Awesome, thanks for the info mate .

Could I safely use some kind of credit card/any piece of plastic card as a thermal compound spreader? I didn't read more than half of the pages of this thread so I hope it hasn't already been asked a hundred times. And the optimal amount of half a grain of rice, does that apply to both sides of the copper sheet? I guess, but just to be sure.

 

Half a grain of rice seems to be enough for the tiny gpu.
And yes, a plastic card/old air miles/void credit card does the trick. It's easier to use when its cut into a smaller piece because there isn't much room in there to maneuver a big credit card.

 

also, check out the undervolting guide for CPU.. it helps keep the temp down

(for eg, if i stressed out my CPU only, CPU goes from 45-> 68.. GPU originally idling at 62 goes to 70+.....)

now my CPU goes to 60.... GPu doesnt rise that much

(i didnt do the copper mod)

 

I am a bit confused about undervolting.
Doesn't undervolting reduce the clock speed of the CPU/GPU?

 

No, as processors are designed with a bit of overhead with the voltage to ensure the processor always works properly. All you are doing is removing that overhead.

 

I used a credit card to remove the blue pad without damaging it and used the finger in a plastic bag method for the CPU and the GPU-shim join. I used a blob about twice the normal size for the shim-heatsink join to ensure a proper connection. You should really use the plastic bag spreading method when there is no heat spreader on the processor and I used arctic cooling MX-2 so that if any spilled it wouldn't blowthe laptop like as5 would.

Hope that helps.

 

I am using 177.70, and the temps I quoted were using hwmonitor.
Also, I used MX-2 instead of AS5
The ambient temperature is ~28
Also, before the mod I used to idle at ~68.
The only reason for my higher temps could be that the copper sheet is maybe not making proper contact.
But, I am too lazy to do it again
Cpu temps dropped by only ~4C after the mod

 

So there must be some disadvantage?
But if not, what are the programs to use and what are the numbers to try for undervolting

 

Follow this guide http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=235824

no downsides to undervolting

 

^* besides the first BSOD u'll encounter if u go too low.... no damages to the hardware or anything.... unless ur doing ur major research paper WHILE attempting undervolting

 

Sounds too good to be true.
I notice that guide deals exclusively with CPU undervolting but is it possible to do the same with the GPU?

 

Instability if you go too low, but that's it mate!

 

Undervolting the GPU is a lot more difficult and you risk bricking the card (and in the case of the XPS M1330, the whole computer). It's mainly because you have to do it by flashing the BIOS.

 

Hi all,
sorry if this is already asked & answered...
If the proposed mod is properly applied on 1330 which does not have any GPU problems yet, so that the GPU temperature drop (as people report here), does this ensure that the damaging of the laptop due to the GPU faulty die/packaging will not happen, or the mod only delays the crash for, let's say, 6 months?

In other words: do XPS notebooks get damaged only because of GPU becomes too hot (in which case Dell replaces the MB, as people say...)? Or the GPU will eventually get broken no matter if overheated or not..?

Thanks for the nice tutor and greetings to all!

 

Hey guys,

I've just did the mod by using 1/2" copper hanging straps (slightly thinner than suggested) and here's my idle temp:



So, what do you think? Would I get better temps if I use the copper from metaloffcuts? Or perhaps fine silver sheet instead? TIA

 

what are your load temps?

 

You've got a lot lower idle temps than me, though when I say idle, I mean computer has been sitting on a desk for 3 hours being used lightly.

 

i did the mod about a week ago and have had great success.
used the metaloffcuts copper and mx2 compound - alcohol to clean.
after longer then three hours with the use of Internet surfing and applications running in the background my idle temps have been stable at 37 for cpu and 51 for gpu hdd at 38 thm at 38 too.

i am sure the temps will continue going down some more once the compound will fully settle.

on load i never get passed 69 for gpu and 69 for cpu which i think is great.

got 7 c lower with the voltmod but was not sure if it affected the cpu speed so left it alone.

 

The temperature was taken after ~2hrs doing ppt and web surfing (nothing graphically intense). Haven't had a chance to stress the gpu under load, but I'll do that and report back after my midterm next week

@omega31: Those are great gpu temp What version of driver and bios are u running? Also, which software are u using to monitor your gpu temp?

 

he is likely running drivers which report the 10 degrees less than actual for the GPU, I can't imagine 61C.

 

So the question is, has anyone who has thusfar completed the mod encountered a recurrence of the dead gpu? Would make for an interesting comparison

 

As i wrote before i am running latest drivers from dell's web site and latest a12 bios.
bios a12:
http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R191967&SystemID=XPS_M1330&servicetag=&os=WLH&osl=en&deviceid=14178&devlib=0&typecnt=0&vercnt=7&catid=-1&impid=-1&formatcnt=1&libid=1&fileid=263515#2Win

gpu driver 175.97 V32, A08:
http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=gen&releaseid=R190091&SystemID=XPS_M1330&servicetag=&os=WLH&osl=en&deviceid=13475&devlib=0&typecnt=0&vercnt=3&catid=-1&impid=-1&formatcnt=1&libid=6&fileid=261031

make sure you clean everything really well, wait sometime to let the alcoholol fully evaporate.

i put the mx2 compound on paper and did a little mix and then laid a thin layer on the cpu, gpu and chipset did the same on the Thermal Cooling.

i do the stress test using:
3dmark06
rthdribl_1_2
ORTHOS CPU Loader
and playing counter strike source for arround 30+ min.

monitoring with hwmonitor 1.10.0

my gpu maxes at 69 not 61 i made a mistake due to a volt mod running,

will add the results of the test i did today without the volt mod.

idle temp after playing a game for 30 min then computer stands idle for 1 hour:

stress running rthdribl_1_2 for 30 min.

fan never reaches high and computer is silent, much better then before the mod i think fan goes high at 73 but it never reaches that.

if i set fan max to high manually the gpu is stable at 63 and cpu at 65.