Newbie Question-Motherboard Identification

Hi guys,

Apologies if this is in the wrong section. I just purchased an MSI GE76 11-UH and I'd like to find information about how to identify the motherboard components on these new Tiger Lake laptops. I tried researching motherboard component identification but all the info online is from motherboards from like 10 years ago. I know the basics like where the CPU/GPU/RAM/M.2/WiFi and those things are located, I just don't know what all the other components surrounding them are. Thank you.

 

What is it that you are trying to determine? Like the capacitors, vrm's and mosfets?

 

https://www.msi.com/Laptop/support/GE76-Raider-11UX?sub_product=GE76-Raider-11UH#down-manual

5:58 shows the MOBO




Just some of the basics I can identify w/o having one in front of me to pull apart. Most of the other items you can see make it so they can communicate with each other. I couldn't find a "service manual" for this particular model but, working on these is pretty intuitive if you've ever built a PC.

 

Yes to all lol. I suppose I'd say I am most interested in the parts that are visible and have a direct performance/thermal impact. I think I know what the PCH looks like and I know that can get hot, but I'm not sure what the VRM's and MOSFETS look like and not sure if there are any other components that get messed with when it comes to adding thermal paste/pads/mini-heatsinks etc. I'm also a little confused on overclocking/undervolting capabilities on my i7-11800h. I'm watching some videos that say the H-series boards by Intel are unable to be overclocked, but I know other people are doing it. Is that possible due simply to having access to an unlocked BIOS, such as what I can do with the MSI? Thank you @Reciever for your help.

 

Thank you @Tech Junky , I'm pretty good with being able to identify all of those components, it's the smaller integrated components I'm trying to identify. And its funny you mentioned the service manual, I asked MSI support and they said they don't release those to the public, whereas I was always able to get a service manual for my Clevo's so I'd love to get my hands on that if ever possible.

 

I'm not sure how you are embedding the photos into your posts, I'm kinda slow, but this link shows a TigerLake i9 from the Legion 7i and I'm trying to identify those different components around the CPU/GPU you can see in the pictures.
https://www.reddit.com/r/GamingLapt...ting_liquid_metal_on_legion_7i_2021/?sort=new

 

All of that is under the heatsink. Pull the screws and you'll see them and their pads.

 

It's possible that they don't release them. It's easy enough to reference another one like Clevo to decipher what's what on another brand. They didn't redesign the wheel to make it work. Providing photos of your actual MOBO that are high res can help in identifying things if needed.

 

Embedding photos...
I capture what I'm looking for and edit if needed and then upload to: https://imgur.com/upload / right click and copy image address

Come back here and click the photo icon and paste the URL

 

Ok thank you for image instructions. I just hopped on Tapatalk app and added a photo of my exact motherboard. All those components with thermal paste (besides CPU/GPU) are what I'm trying to identify, as well as any other components you guys think should be covered with some type of thermal protection. I don't see the PCH in this pic so I'm assuming it's not covered by the CPU/GPU heatsink.

Sent from my SM-G970U using Tapatalk

 

NP.

Turn on some better lighting to get better exposure so the board is readable. I tried zooming and rotating but, it's not quite crisp enough. Also, if you scrape the paste off it's easier to orientate which is which and uncover what some of them are.

Here's a pic of my MOBO and you can zoom in on things / decipher the board printing to an extent.

 

Oh that photo isn't my motherboard, sorry for confusion. It's a photo from @Porter who has the same laptop as me, the GE76 11th gen Intel.

Sent from my SM-G970U using Tapatalk

 

The PCH is not contacting any heatsink. I covered half the board up with the heatsink unfortunately. I didn't know someone was going to use it to identify components lol.

This is the only other picture I have, and I have to make it super low res to upload it here and stay under the limit.

Found another out of the box picture!

 

@Porter

That's certainly more clear and high res than the other version.

I can see NVIDIA peeking through the paste on one die

Being that the NVDIA is on the Left / Square those are memory controllers around the BGA and the CPU on the right would mean your VRM's are around it.

In general though @ SierraFan07 if it has paste when you pull off the HS then it's going to be a heat producer. If it has pads it's more to direct airflow from the fans and provide some conductivity to the copper to draw heat away.

Though the left side smaller / slightly away from the GPU are labeled CHOKE which should be power related

Right side I'm guessing mosfet / vrm. From a 2D image it's hard to tell exactly and the paste covering markings of course.

 

@Porter Thank you for the photos, your original photo is still great because it shows me more of the components hidden below the heatsinks.

@techjunkie Thank you for the identification, I've started looking up those components online to get other examples. I've certainly fell down the rabbit hole but I love it! I figure I just spent $3400 on a new laptop, not counting a new laptop cooler/stand, Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut thermal paste, 99% isopropyl alcohol, Fujipoly Extreme thermal pads, Kapton tape, 3M Super 33+ electric tape, a 200+ piece set of assorted copper squares and heatsink fins, thermal glue, MG Silicon conformal coating, and Thermal Grizzly Conductonaut liquid metal.

And no, I am not about to throw Conductonaut liquid metal onto my CPU/GPU. Those items are for down the road if ever I feel comfortable and actually need to get the temps lower than what I can get with the Kryonaut.

Sent from my SM-G970U using Tapatalk

 

Wow~ That's what I call preparation!

LM is a bit of a double edged sword for laptops though with all of the movement there's a good chance of beads of it moving where you don't want it. I looked into the idea at the beginning of the year when I was testing out different pastes but, I just couldn't bring myself to mess with it. I did however ponder picking up a couple more graphite pads like I use in my server for the cooling tower / CPU. I might still do that though just out of curiosity how they would perform in a laptop environment vs paste.

 

Yeah I've done all kinds of research on the liquid metal and using a foam dam as a barrier along with putting conformal coating on all open contacts on the die as well as whatever parts around the die you want to coat, however it's not something I will do for awhile as I have no experience, plus my stock temps and/or Kryonaut temps may be perfectly satisfactory. I'm a big tinkerer (like yourself from what I can tell) so I love learning through research and application, but fortunately I'm a little older and a little wiser than I was when I was younger and I would jump in feet first with little regard for potential consequences

Sent from my SM-G970U using Tapatalk

 

FYI

I got the pads in today and installed them a little while ago. The fans seem to be running at lower RPM's since it's not as hot. I trimmed less then a 1/4 of the pad size for each CPU / GPU and slapped the heat sink back on and put it back together. I didn't bother cleaning it as well as I have in the past and simply took a paper towel to the die's and got as much off as possible. The Antec was still tacky after 11 months of use which is a good indicator of the quality but, the pad option so far seems to be running cooler or more efficiently.



Of course this has bitten me in the @$$ praising something soon after applying it to the laptop but, having used them in the server for a few years now I have some more certainty about these working in this application. I ordered the 40x40 2 pack since the LGA1700 for the server rebuild is bigger than the LGA1151. Since these things are so thin it's easy to mark them around the die with your finger nail and then cut them w/ scissors to size. Could probably get away being a little less exact about it and just cut them into 1/4's and stick them on top of each die.

Not that my laptop is loud but, Chrome seems to peg the CPU @ 25% or so and keeps the fans running most of the time for the past few months and I'm sitting in the range where they would normally be running 50-80% and it's silent ATM. It's kind of nice not having the fans making much noise again.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08BL3SCWH

 

Those idle temps seem high, would two layers fix that?

 

It's not really "idle" per say. I have Chrome open with tons of tabs. Idle would be the lower ~40C number.

 

Yeah, we're seeing the same high-temperature idle numbers.

 

Here's under load though transcoding video files which normally spins up the fans to an obnoxious level. The fans right now are running at a medium noise level that's even less than normal before the switch from paste to pad.



If anything is going to peg the utilization on this laptop it's video files normally. I would say this is probably a 10C improvement on the top end temps. "idle" w/ chrome open seems to be functioning better as the fans aren't buzzing as much.

 

Still would be interesting to see two of the pads used. And if it would smooth out those core variances in the other thread you mentioned.

 

Might be a possibility. I'll give it a week before wrangling this laptop again for temps.

Since these things are feather light and slick as h3ll they might have moved a smidge when putting the HS on top of the die's. When messing around with the server cooler I've noticed them move around a little bit while placing the cooler on. When trying to put them into place I moved the laptop slightly and it slid under the RAM across the board. I figured a little residue from the paste might tac them into place but, they're still a bit wild w/o holding a finger tip on them.