XPS M1210 Merom Upgrade/Review! (With Pics)

Before I start...my funny story of what happened. I picked got a call from the receiving room from my condo saying that I had a FedEx package. I knew it was the processor. I picked it up during my lunch break and planned to install it during or after work at my desk, since I was going to play poker and had an hour to kill. While picking it up, I got the screwdrivers and the AS5 from home...BUT, I forgot to pick up the rubbing alcohol and q-tips. :blushing:
...now the funny part. I'm stupid, and stubborn. Because I didn't have any alcohol, I planned to disassemble the laptop and then go to CVS to pick up some alcohol and q-tips. About midway through after I got most of the screws loose, I stripped on of the screws that is deep in one of the holes that is under the keyboard area. My screwdriver sucks...so I packed up my laptop (that was in pieces) and went on my way. I stopped by a Home Depot and picked up a "Precision" screw driver kit (a must have for techies) which worked awesome and was even able to get the stripped screw out. I then stopped by the drug store to get the alcohol and q-tip and finished my install in my car...in the parking lot of a Walgreens!! :lol:

...then to make matters worse, I dropped one of the small screws in between my car seat and thought I was screwed. I was sure that I would never find that screw again.

Now on to the Upgrade process:
I followed the steps in These Dell Support Manuals Starting with the Hinge Cover Removal, then Keyboard, then palmrest, etc... until you get to the processor module.

Here is the pictures in order:
Removal of Hinge Cover:



Don't forget to umplug these WiFi antenna cables before you remove your LCD Lid:


Keyboard removal is self-explanatory...Be careful with the LCD removal:


The palmrest removal is pretty easy too, just make sure that you've removed all the screws and unplugged everything (including the bluetooth module from below the battery):

...then you have to slide out the Optical drive (without taking this off, it will be tough to remove the heatsink:

...the heatsink looks OK from this side, but it's very poorly designed.
Here is the system in all it's glory...with everything off:


Before the alcohol/cleaning job. Look how much crap is on the processor! The thermal pad was overwhelming. Also, there was weird hard crap on the GPU, and nothing on the chipset.


Here is the heatsink:


This is why it's such a crappy design. The CPU makes contact perfectly. Then, instead of "customizing" the chipset and GPU sides, they fill the "void" or gap by stuffing a very thick blue thermal pad and a thermal pad/copper plate combo. I wouldn't be surprised if these actually make the temps worse. I actually thought of just scraping this crap off and trying it out without the chipset of GPU making any contact...but I left it alone. I scraped the hard crap off (This is VERY tricky as the blue thermal pad is very fragile) and replaced it along with the thermal pad on the CPU with AS5. Not sure if it helped, since I forgot to take any temperature measurements before the upgrade.

Here is the heatsink portion that comes in contact with the GPU:

...there is a drop of rubbing alcohol on there. And notice how there is a screw only on one of the sides? The other side is a weird clip design that clips onto a ped that's under the Optical drive. that's why you have to remove the drive before you can remove the heatsink.

Here's the heatsink part that cools the CPU:


...that's about it. You then put everything back in place in reverse order.

and the result?





....I haven't done MUCH testing, and haven't had very much time to play around with it. I'll try to post some benchmarks later, but a quick benchmark indicates that it's a pretty big improvement from my 1.86ghz yonah. I think it took me 1m 22s or something around there for a 2m SuperPi...and now it takes 58s.

Hope you guys find this useful.

 

All you did was drop the CPU in and it worked? You didn't have to flash the bios or anything?

Also, if you have the integrated webcam, does it get really hot for you (even when not in use)? The little plastic things that attach it to the screen are beginning to show some discoloration on my m1210.

 

wow, cool post. Where did you get the chip? $?

 

I flashed it to the A03 bios before installing. I don't have the webcaem and I've never had any heat related issues.

 

I traded my PSP + games and cash for it from a seller on Anandtech. He gets several ES chips shipped from Taiwan from time to time.

 

Wonderful post. Hope you can do those benchmarks asap.

 

im guessing the Warranty is voided

 

Anyone know for certain if the M1210 will take the T2700?

 

Great review with very detailed pics.