HP dv6t-7xxx (and probably dv7-7xxx) fan/temperature mods!

Hi, guys.

So I've been figuring out ways on how to reduce my temps in my laptop. I haven't seen any consolidated efforts to do the same, so here goes...

1. Rear vent fan mod (originally by animenick541 in this thread)

So animenick541 didn't really elaborate on this, or figure out if other users are having the same issue. Apparently, his dv7-7XXX has an issue where the rear vent doesn't blow out air. Now when I checked mine, it seems that the vent does really not blow air out. Now this might explain the high CPU temps for some people since the dedicated copper tubing coming from the CPU to the rear vent. Here's a photo (also c/o animenick541)

Spoiler

So as you can see, the main copper tube is on the rear side. If you can see the lines that animenick541 scribbled, the black ones represent the "walls" of the fan. It blocks the air and that's why the rear vent doesn't have air coming out of it. With mine, I removed it by slicing the inner side clear until the bottom part, and just snapping it off from the outer side. Hope I'm being clear, because I wasn't able to take pictures of mine.

Basically what I did was take out the four screws (tiny tiny screws) on the bottom side of the fan, and tear out (and set aside) the silver metallic tapes linking the fan assembly and the heatsinks. Then I was able to do the cutting.

This mod made my temps about at most 10C lower when gaming. That's how well it works. Apparently, this is a design flaw since the fans they used were the fans they used on the previous line.

2. RAM copper heatsink mod (did this myself)

For those who have copper RAM heatsinks lying around somewhere (I bought Cosmos heatsinks) I checked clearances for the entire heatsink assembly and figured out in which places they would fit:

Spoiler

Except for the rightmost heatsink (the one on the copper tube's curve) these places are clear to accommodate these heatsinks. I didn't really notice how low it made idles, but it shaved off a good 2-3C from my peaks, so it's kind of worth doing if you have some lying around.

How about you guys? Any mods you'd like to share?

 

Hi kisetsu17, I'm looking at doing this mod myself. I actually examined the fan myself after noticing that the back vent was not exhausting and saw that it was blocked off. I did a double take and somehow convinced myself that the back vent was supposed to be an intake instead of an exhaust, however it doesn't seem to be very effective as an intake at all. I was wondering that if you lost air pressure on your side vent once you opened up the back vent. It looks like there are some pretty sizeable gaps that need to be sealed in order for air not to leak all over the place, did you use tape to seal them all off?

Also, what kind of tool did you use to make the cut? I had a pair of wire cutters that was just too crude to make clean cuts. Did you use a penknife or a scalpel to do the job?

About the mods i did myself, i replaced the gpu and cpu thermal paste with Arctic Cooling MX-4. I initially tried using Antec Formula 7 nano diamond but that was just way too thick and viscous to spread easily. I prefer using the line/dot/cross method and using heatsink-on-die compression to eliminate air pockets instead of manually spreading paste by hand. The MX-4 was thin like melted butter so it was easier to work with in spite of similar performance ratings.

As for the mosfet and vram thermal pads, i replaced them with 0.5 mm fujipoly thermal pads from frozencpu (the 11 W/mk white ones). I also tried using 1.0 mm pads but those were too thick. In fact it raised my gpu temperatures because it was increasing the spacing between the gpu core and the heatsink. In all, those mods resulted in a drop of 5-6 C at least when gaming. It will be a miracle if I get another 10c from cutting open that back fan opening.

Lastly I added a 64gb Msata SSD to enable Intel RST acceleration and my laptop now feels lighting quick. The drawback is that the location of the ssd gets toasty under my left palm when I'm doing large file downloads and writes. I'm wondering if there's any way to keep that area cooler?

 

This is a copy of my post from another thread about this mod:

I did the mod. Max temps fell by 2-3 degrees, enough not to throttle the CPU. I am with 3720, and Intel burn would make it hit 105C with boost on. Now it stays at 100 - 101 with same conditions. There is a side effect though: the rear left part of the laptop gets worm/hot due to the exhaust on the back. The laptop is not so convenient as before to keep on you lap now.

 

1. The big gap on the right side of the fan when looking at it right after you take the top cover off, it actually doesn't do anything. Air's blowing the other way so it's not letting air escape needlessly. And the air pressure isn't actually impaired. I even think it blows more now or something. Don't take my word for it tho. All I know is that it improved my temps bigtime.

2. I used nail clippers to start the cut. And used an exacto knife to finish it off. Any old sharp cutter will do, tho.

3. Not anything I see right now. Unless you find a way to at least link the chips to the copper tubings )

 

I don't seem to be getting this issue too much. I notice the LCD bezel on that part does get hot, but not too much to raise caution. Still better than struggling with high temps. That's what alarms me more

 

Looking at doing this. My dv6t runs fairly cool most of the time (mid 40s to low 50s), but most of the time I'm not doing anything high-stress on it. When I do high-stress stuff, it jumps to the 80s or so.

Anybody have data on how it affects the temps to replace the stock thermal paste with high performance stuff? (Arctic Silver or some such)

 

Modifying the fan and replacing the thermal paste and thermal pads brought my temp down ~12 degrees C when running 3dmarks tops out around 65 - 70 C from 80s. I don't have any screen shots of a before and after but I could take a screen shot to show you current temps.

 

i drilled now copper mod and 2620m to replace 2450m

 

Well, for me who's staying at a rather hot country, it just reduced my temps less than 10C. When I'm in an AC'd room, though, I notice the temps more. But the laptop still reaches high temps. Idk if it's just me, but it feels like the fan isn't living up to it's speed or something. Planning on buying a new heatsink assembly just so I could test. You guys know of any way to run the fan 100% even if the temps are low?

 

Hey kisetsu what adhesive are you using for the copper heatsinks you've installed in your system?

 

Didn't realize I got asked: abs0lutezer0 it seems to be the black thermal double-sided adhesive. Forgot the brand but it's some kind of thermal tape--it's already fitted to the heatsinks.

Just an update, guys--the temps are back again. Maybe just because of blocked airway on the vents but I got a feeling that the heatsink isn't the right design for the laptop. Been hearing about an HP ENVY dv6 user who had his heatsink changed into a different Part number and enjoyed much cooler temps. Can't see squat about the part number though.

 

Hi, Do u have any news on the HP ENVY user? I would like cooler temps too
Thnx