IC Diamond Compound worth it?

Anybody have real info on if the IC Diamond compound is worth the $40 charge?

I saw "temps" on the website touting it but I take that with a grain of salt.

FYI I am thinking of the NP8130 from XoticPC. The cooler I can get it, the better. I spend hours sitting in my chair programming and playing games. Bought a Logitech N700 laptop pad to use with it.

 

well, "the cooler i can get it, the better" sounds like it's a worthy upgrade. if you're not into the $40 part, you can pick up a tube of ICD7 at your local comp store or online and apply it yourself for a fraction of the cost. i'm sure there's youtube videos of general application of the stuff shouldn't be too difficult

 

Technically, I'd say a notebook should be designed from the factory to be able to operate with no problems at all with the stock cooling compound. You should really only need to replace the compound when it dries up after a few years.

IC Diamond might really only be helpful if you want to overclock on a laptop. Which, if you were to do so, I would regard you as purely asking for heating troubles on the dang thing, no matter what compound you use.

So my opinion really is that IC Diamond on a laptop?! Not worth it.

 

Not worth it.
It's $40.

And for around $20 you can get a thermal compound cleaner kit and a premium thermal compound (like AS5, 7758, G751, IC Diamond, etc...)

 

If gaming is one of the reasons behind getting a Sager, I'd repaste it. You can easily reduce 5-7c of the max load temps. Stock thermal compound is decent but not the best and neither are the application methods used by most vendors. I managed to reduce 10-15c on a few ThinkPads just by re-applying the paste (same product). Pretty much on any laptop coming factory fresh you can lower the temps by 5-7c by re-pasting.
Two questions remain, -
1) Do it yourself 2)What paste to use.
Personally, I prefer doing it myself but not everyone will eagerly tear the system apart, not to mention that such an act may void the warranty (check with your reseller).

As for the paste, I'd probably go for something easier to apply and clean (Tuniq TX-4, OCZ Freeze, etc).

 

Not worth it. If you want it buy it yourself and do it. It's easy.

Added benefit of buying it on your own is that you can use the rest later!

 

Mythlogic does it for free

 

I'm sure that's probably built into their costs somewhere

 

They must because they are quite a bit more expensive ($250) then the same PC at Xoticpc.

 

Hehe, yes we are a bit more expensive, than the other guys. But thats more due to the additional testing and validation, along with the better quality internal parts. IC Diamond only accounts for about $1.20 of that price. Big tube of IC Diamond costs $11'ish and you can do about 7 laptops with a big tube. Takes 20 minutes to scrub the stock stuff off everything, but its pretty smooth sailing after that.

 

Don't understand the higher quality internal parts. They are all based off the Clevo models. So do you rip out a bunch of the internal parts such as the heat sinks and such and put in better versions? What internal parts are "upgraded" from the basic Clevo model or better than a Sager version?

Unfortunately for me that $250 pushes it beyond my budget capabilities which I am pushing at $1350 (originally budgeted $1200).

Thanks.

 

Makes me wonder as well, could you please be more specific about what sort of internal parts are better quality in Mythlogic-built laptops, as opposed to Malibal, Sager and whoever else? This information might be very important, and a major competitive advantage too.

 

Their battery houses many tiny little gerbils...

 

They mean name brand rather than generic, IE crucial ram not whatever manufacture non branded ram sager gets cheapest. These days even those have pretty good quality control though.

 

Woa Woa Woa, we agreed there is NO DISCUSSING THE GERBILS!

That is company trade-secret!

But really, we use only Kingston and Crucial Memory, and for rotational hard-drives its either Seagate, WD, or Samsung (Only for the 640's). We also only use Intel or Bigfoot nic's.


But seriously, stop with the gerbil discussion, its supposed to be hush hush :tongue:

 

Non branded? I'll just throw in that Malibal used Samsung M471B5673FH0-CH9 RAM and a Samsung Seagate ST9500420AS 500GB HDD for my stock stuff. I got it for the same price as Xotic and most resellers have it for.

The RAM is the same stuff that's in my W510 Thinkpad at work too, and it was like a $2500 config (bought in bulk by Cisco)

 

Nothing stops Samsung from being the lowest bidder

 

huh?? wha???????????

 

The bolded? Blew my mind.

You have to remember that most businesses are simply resellers of Sagers builds. Samsung ram and Seagate drives aren't the best, but they aren't the worth either. (Most ram companies use Hynix or Samsung chips on their ram anyway.) You also have to remember that every business is trying to save a buck. I bought a $2000 HP laptop and it came with a Hitachi drive!

Another note to make is that Kingston/Crucial/OCZ/other boutique ram companies don't have the desire or market share to market themselves to OEMs, even if their binning process is more controlled. This becomes a major advantage of aftermarket parts via Sager.

 

that is a really expensive upgrade for the price to be honest. $35 for a drop or two?

you can buy a whole tube for $15.

NCIX.com - Buy Innovation Cooling IC7 Diamond 7 Carat Thermal Compound Paste Tube NON-CONDUCTIVE NON-CAPACITIVE - Innovation Cooling - IC7 - in Canada

(which im putting on my card when it arrives )

 

The point is the labour and risk involved. You can fry a GPU/CPU in minutes if you apply it wrong. If THEY apply it wrong, they have to replace the GPU/CPU for you. It also takes a good hour or two for someone inexperienced.

 

I have built hundreds of desktops over the years and only a few with special paste. But I have zero experience with laptops other than my current Dell and upgrading its ram.

I don't want to risk a $1400 investment over a small mistake.

 

Pays for the time of the tech probably at ~$30 an hour to do the dismantling and cleaning and putting it back together. The cost of the goo is inconsequential. They have to make a profit on the tech's time.

 

This is one thing I loved about dealing with you guys. The light hearted nature of some of the replies and the attitude towards things was very refreshing.

OT: If it's going to provide you with better cooling I don't see why not. It's not like you're not spending a lot of money already. What's another $40? Unless of course you're willing to buy some and apply it yourself.

 

Best paste I have ever used, but yeah buy a tube for a few bucks and install it yourself.

 

Can you also significantly reduce the idle/light use temps? Or will repasting/IC diamond only help with lower max temps?

 

Idle goes up pretty quickly if your fans are off so I'm not sure about idle... Definitely good for Max temps though.

 

not worth it

just G751 by yourself

 

All else being constant (ie, the fan speed is equal) the better thermal paste will give you a CPU temp drop. It conducts heat better, allowing it flow from the CPU to the heatsink and be blown out of the laptop faster.

 

I could of done it myself, I already have the cleaning kit in my toolbox but for 30$ it was worth it to me to have the factory do it and not have to tear apart my brand new machine.

 

Are you guys spending like a thousand bucks on a leisure (gaming) machine and trying to save 30 bucks?

The price looks fine for me. It should cost more to apply thermal paste properly (which needs expertise) than for plugging some RAM. So don't compare their costs with only its market value...

 

More like anywhere between 2500 and 4000 bucks, and yes, point well made.

 

I was curious about this as well... not so much about the 30$ being worth it, but the actual paste being worth it. If it does lower temps then I think I will pay for Malibal or whoever to do it for me.

Honestly, 30$ to save me an hour or two and peace of mind is a great deal IMO, especially on a 1500-2500 laptop lol.

 

Ignoring the other stuff, I'm pretty sure xotic and others only use Intel and Bigfoot NICs as well.

Also, re-pasting is a good idea, regardless of whether you or the reseller does it.

 

Not true. Ordering the noname internal Wifi/BT card basic on most Sagers will get you (not shockingly) a noname wifi/BT card. Same with the RAM, it's most likely to be Samsung, since it's Sager building the machine, and just Xotic/etc reselling it.

 

Transcend, to be more precise.

 

My mistake, I though I only remembered seeing Intel options there previously. Still, not that it matters. The warranty coverage you get from the resellers plus a price that is equal with those upgrades doesn't necessarily make them worse in any way.

 

IC 7 is probably the best thermal compound out there, i'd say it's worth the 20 bucks at xotic. performance wise it probably will give you about 5 degrees celsius worth of peace of mind.

i'm using arctic silver 5 on the desktop, but that was a few years ago and this stuff wasn't out yet.

 

Well some test was done comparing this and AS5 and the difference is negligible.

The 80-way TIM comparison actually claims AS5 performs better than IC7, with a whopping 0.55C difference.

And it does not cost $20 at xoticpc. I remember for both NP5135 and NP8130, IC7 costs $40 each.


So a $20 is reasonable? Probably, consider if you are going to DIY and buy TIM cleaners and a new tube.
a $40? Definitely not.

 

i just checked and it's 20 at xoticpc

from what i've read on enthusiast forums, IC 7 is pretty long-lasting due to its viscosity (or lack thereof). performance wise, it is a bit better than AS 5, although it seems more like a statistically significant effect than anything of real world significance. although, just a few years back the thermal compound option for all the clevo/compal resellers were listing AS 5, and they are now all replaced by IC 7. I'd take this as an indication of industry consensus on performance. the actual cost difference between these two is seriously negligible.

the comparison we have to make is not between IC 7 and AS 5 though, it is between IC 7 and whatever stock compound is on there. the cost is purely labor and risk. for a laptop, i'd rather not break it apart and try to apply the compound myself if the cost of labor is just 20ish dollars for a factory install. i still have some AS 5 left too, but it is a serious hassle to take apart a laptop and hope that you won't mess up.

 

The $20 is for low-end models like NP5160.

For high-end models, which need good TIM costs $40.

Still I doubt if there's any significance by putting it on a Geforce 540M.

Also, Sager/Clevo is designed to have easy accessible heatsinks/memory/replacable GPU&CPUs. It is quite easy to open the back and unscrew a few to remove the GPU&CPU heatsink.

Another question maybe, how Sager resellers apply IC7? How they clean the CPU&GPU and heatsink before they put new TIM on?

I'm not implying anything, just some normal questions one may have.

I've been cleaning heatsinks and re-paste my desktop PC a lot, and I know it's quite easy and safe.

edit: since you edited your post. I will not go as far to say that the "industry consensus on performance". This is just Sager/Clevo. And AS5 is still very popular. Also most enthusiast forums did not give AS5 a 200 hrs break in time. Shin-Etsu G751 is cheaper than IC7 and performs lets say on par with IC7 (in that 80-way comparsion G751 performs better than IC7), then why no "industry consensus on performance?"
I do not put too much trust on resellers. I prefer to have more choice myself, and saves money.

 

well thanks for the information on accessibility. i don't have the proper tools at my apartment to do the paste change myself, so i guess that's one bit of personal info that was missing. if it's a desktop then i won't even consider the option, but im a bit queasy with a laptop.

while it is true that the 540M can probably chug along with just passive cooling, having things too hot just doesn't seem to be a safe thing to do if one wants to have the laptop working in proper order a few years down the road.

 

Think, if you keep the laptop for only 2 years, that's like $0.027 a day (@$20) or $0.068 a day (@$40). For ~5c lower temps every day? I'd say it's worth it if you don't want to get in there and muck around yourself to do it

 

That's a pretty gross exaggeration.

But the key point is, if you don't want to DIY, and want a better TIM, then get it.

 

Agreed

10char

 

does the 540m have thermal paste or a pad? the 8600m gt in my np2092 has a pad so i left it alone.

 

I am thinking about repasting my system if it would help the idle temps and stop the fan from spinning up so much. IC Diamond has been known to leave scratches on some items though.