Is IC Diamond 7 worth the $40 upgrade (cpu+gpu)?

1 I am looking to buy the sager/satori 17inch with HD 6990M and 2.2 ghz quad intel core i7. I might also overclock upto 10% of the frequency. My question is it worth the upgrade?

2 also i will buy a laptop cooler for sure, so if I am buying a cooler ,does it make a thermal paste upgrade not required?

3 Laptop cooler i have used b4 are enermax (that big a$$ fan) , cryo lx and notepal u3. I love cryo lx , its the best i know off. please let me know if there is something better. what abt the zalman nc2000 or 3000? i dont buy it that they have the 2 small fans up somewhere ! thanks guys!

 

Upgrading the thermal paste does help if you plan on overclocking. Better paste and a cooler will definitely help manage your temperatures.

However if you think cost to upgrade it is too expensive, some people buy their own paste and apply it themselves.

Did you take a look at this? http://forum.notebookreview.com/accessories/304671-notebook-coolers-buyers-guide.html

 

The thermal paste will (for most) do more good than a laptop cooler. The thermal paste makes heat transfer to the heatsinks and out of the case more efficient- the cooler won't be able to duplicate that kind of cooling. IC Diamond on average reduces temps by 4-8C which can be significant. If you're comfortable using a screwdriver, you can also apply it yourself.

For most people, a laptop cooler isn't very useful. If you have the upgraded paste and use the laptop on a hard surface (even better if the back is raised) then the cooler affect will be minimal.

 

someboy01 i have looked at that b4.

malibal , i am comfortable changing ram, hdd but i dont want to mess with the cpu/gpu to save $20 bucks. 8C is a good temp diff, i had up to 12C diff with no cooler n cryo. it also looks really cool!
I might decide to get the ic7 , I am guessing it will easily last 2-3years!

 

that is for hardware newbie......$40=10ml icd7......10ml icd7=50~100 times repasting

 

yeah I know it's cheaper to do it one's self, but I would have much more peace of mind having the Pro's do it, saving me from messing it up. I'll change the easy bits like memory and hard drives, I'll leave that to them. Worth the money if you aren't that sure if you'd pull it off.

I may be vastly overestimating the task, and it's easy even for a novice. But either way actually having the paste on, no matter who did it, is much better than none. Easier than bothering with a cooler(and cheaper too!)

 

This is what I picture every time someone talks about installing "ICD7" / "IC7" /"IC7 Diamond":


Mainly because the "7" in IC Diamond is denoting the "7 carat" 1.5g size of the tube versus the "24 carat" 4.8g tube of the two sizes it comes in, it's not part of the base product name it's self.

On another note, I do actually recommend IC Diamond, I've been very happy with my manually applied results on two laptops.

 

is that a sager np8170? looks neat! i dint imagine it to be so thin? i m getting that on thanksgivin day! and I think let them do the thermal paste, i m guessing 1.5g each(cpu + gpu)

 

No that's the NP8130/8150, heres the NP8170:

 

On notebooks where the CPU and GPU are easily accessed a TC application by the owner is not a hard thing to do.

Often notebook factories apply too much TC and may actually hurt the cooling process.

TC is only needed to fill in the pores in the metal of the chip and heatsink replacing the air so that there's maximum surface contact between the heatsink and the chip.

The more metal to metal contact there is the better the heat transfer from chip to heatsink.TC is needed where air prevents contact.

Having a thin layer of TC separating the chip and cooler is not optimal.

Optimal is where the old TC is fully removed with 100% isopropyl alcohol or product made for TC removal and just enough TC is applied to fill in the pores and any tool marks in the heatsink cooler.

I use a finger covered in plastic wrap to spread a very small amount of TC on the chips and heatsinks and then the straight edge of a razor blade or credit card to perform a squeegee type action to remove any excess TC.

I use Tuniq TX3 but there's only about 5 degrees C between separating properly applied quality TCs.

This site does montly testing of TCs.
Thermal Compound Roundup - October 2011 | Hardware Secrets

Naturally,your milage may vary.

 

atmosk!! the laptop looks awesome!!!

whtsthepoint, thanks for the post, but i m not gonna do it,i might mess it up, i m gonna get it with ic7

 

Yes, if you don't feel secure about gutting your notebook and ploughing through its steaming warm entrails, best let someone else do it for you.

Gotta love the performance of mayonnaise in that survey!

 

Alot of good reports about MX-4 as well. Honestly I never used ICD but I can confirm that mx-4 comes close, if not better than it based on various tests made.

 

Ok, since i played a little bit to much dissasembling and assembling my x7200, i think my paste wore off. So i need to buy another paste and make a refill.

So i stumbled upod Innovation Cooling Diamond Cooling paste.

On their site it says it is made of up to 92% industrial diamond partiles wich have a very high thermal conductivity.

Having looked on wikipedia on thermal conductivity article, here are some interesting facts.

Thermal conductivity is the proprety of a material to conduct heat.

Example, a wood heated to 100 degrees celsius, will not burn your hand as much a metal heated to 100 degrees celsius, because the wood has lower thermal conductivity and metal has higher thermal conductivity.

Thermal conductivity is measured in watts per meter kelvin (W/(m·K))

Remembering coolers are made out of alluminum and copper, Here are some values:
Air=0.025
Wood=0.04-0.4
Glass=1.1
Stainless Steel=12-45
Alluminum Alloys=120-180
Pure Alluminum=237
Gold=318
Copper=401
Silver=429
Diamond=900-2320
Purified Shynthethic Diamond = 2000-2500 (as stated by Innovation Cooling)

As you can see diamond has by far the best thermal conductivity.
Innovation cooling states that purified synthethic diamond has as you can see 2000-2500 thermal conductivity.

Now you can probably understand why this thermal paste is probably the best money can get.

And you would imagine that if i were a sheikh, with billions of dollars, i would order custom made Shynthethic diamond RADIATORS to go with my coolers.

Now, at the end i do have a question.

How much should i buy, since this thermal paste comes in 2 varieties:
1.5g and 4.8 grams.
I want to paste my gpus and my cpu.
Do you thing 1.8g isenough for all, or should i go with the 4.8g version ?

 

good question. I wanna know if the resellers apply 1.5g? and if yes is it enough? or is 4.5g better?

 

Those aren't two separate pastes- the 1.5g is just a smaller tube of paste (the same stuff is actually in both). 1.5g is way more than enough for a single CPU/GPU pasting. You'll probably have some leftover. Not to mention, that mobile dies are smaller than their desktop counterparts that the tubes are frequently used on.

If you plan to repaste often, the larger tube will of course last longer.

 

Some cooling enthusiasts have lapped the surfaces of their chips and heatsinks to a highly polish and completely flat condition that just about eliminates the need for a thermal compound.

Tool and Die Makers have use of a highly polished and flat measuring tool known as Johansson Blocks.

The blocks in a set stay stuck to each other when stacked for precision measuring without being magnatized because there is no air trapped between the blocks when put together.

Because there's air in the pores and toolmarks that needs to be replaced with a high heat conducting compound is why we need TCs on our chips and heatsinks.

There's so little TC that actually fills the voids that proper application is much more important than the TC used.

A properly applied silicon based TC is much better than a bad job done with IC Diamond or other high price TC.

 

Thanks for the info.
Now, how do we proprely apply thermal paste ?

I thought so:
1)Take out all the old paste from both surface.
2)Make them extra clean with some alcohol solution.
3)Let them dry
4)Apply in the middle of the die a little bit paste, the size of a pea.
5)Make contact, so that the paste is spread all over

And thats all.
Am i missing something ?

ALso mentioning that the prices in euro are
8.9 euro for the 1.5g serynge
19.9 euro for the 4.8g serynge

If its worth 40 bucks, i dont know, maybe if they send you the rest in the package. Also one must observe that THEY also apply the paste.

I would sey its worth it.

 

I learned that the washing should (i dont know if instead of should is a must) be done with pure isoprophyl alcohol. 95 or 99 % pure.

Is that really neccesary ?

Because what i have at hand is something called wash benzine.
Can i do the cleaning with this, or is it dangerous to use ?

Ill make a picture when i get home, and if that doesnt cut it, i best be looking for ispropil alcohol.

 

Wash benzine and nail polish are highly unadviced, go for the isopropyl alcohol or the most common rubbing alcohol as well.

Those two products can easily deteriorate or eat the heat spreader cap on CPU and core in the time, better to avoid it IMHO.

 

Thanks for the advice, i'll go right ahead and smoke the wash benzine.

 

Also make sure you use a lint free material to clean the surface with the alcohol. You'd want a microfiber cloth or lens cleaning cloth for that. Coffee filters have been reported to work in a pinch. Paper towels and other cotton fibers are notoriously bad though.

 

Rubbing Alcohols that I have seen are mostly only 80% isopropyl alcohol and 20% additives.

I'd stay away from them because they'll leave a residue after the alcohol evaporates but it may smell nicer.

 

I think its worth it. Got it on my 8170 from xoticpc, and they apparently did a good job because my machine stays cool as hell (heh).

 

Hardwaresecrets does monthly thermal compound testing and usually tests 5 new TCs every month.

In there November testing they tested IC Diamond 7 Carat.

See how IC Diamond faired againt the competition.

Thermal Compound Roundup - November 2011 | Hardware Secrets

 

I liked that they included butter, toothpaste, etc on the list. I was surprised that in every case, something was better than nothing. Then, after 12 hours, the results were worse than the initial application, but still better than nothing.

This got me thinking, how long does thermal paste last? I assume that it breaks down over time, but I have no idea how often it should really be applied.

 

Anything to bring down the heat...

 

It depends on the paste and whether you're talking application or storage. The pastes that are comprised almost entirely of diamond generally speaking take longer to go bad in terms of shelf life (they have very little other materials in them to separate). Applied, they can typically go 2-3 years easily without another application. That said, if you were to remove the heatsink and expose the applied stuff to air again, you'd have to reapply with new paste to get the same performance.

The lifespan of the applied stuff is really hard to judge because it's based on usage and such. Realistically it's years before you have to worry about it.

 

That article was an eye opener... What is the stock that comes with Sager?

 

The stock is a gray thermal pad.

Remove the old with 100% isopropyl alcohol or

Newegg.com - Arctic Silver ACN-60ML (2-PC-SET) Thermal material Remover & Surface Purifier - Thermal Compound / Grease

Proper application is key to good results more than the choice of which TC used.

 

And why doesn't Clevo/Sager include a better stock considering these machines are supposed to be beasts.

 

we are all geeks boukyaku, we ll never be happy with what we have. there will be ic diamond 7++ which will give us an extra 3C cooling and we will about it

 

it does help ~ 5-7c imo
but
$15 u can get enough diamond 7 for 5 cpu+gpu's
if u can do it yourself and u love to try, save the 25$ and have fun diy
else just pay extra $40 or choose standard

 

I just ordered my Satori P170HM today from Malibal w/ the IC Diamond applied.

I definitely think it's worth it over stock paste after looking at the temp differences. I'm probably a little biased though since my current laptop barely runs due to heat issues, so I'm extra paranoid about it. Besides, this way, I can be up and running w/out any hassles from day 1!

I do still want to open the case to take a look when it comes in, but it's just not worth it to me to have to muck w/ the heatsink if I don't need to. This thread is great though. Now I'll know where to look if I need to do it. I may experiment on the old laptop once this one comes in. Maybe w/ butter...

 

You could've bought IC Diamond or whatever paste you want and tried it on your old laptop first. $40 can get you a lot of tubes.

 

Yup, that's a very good point. I certainly could have saved a few bucks. At this point, I think my current laptop is a lost cause and heat is definitely the culprit. For me $40 isn't such a bad price to get some peace of mind on the new one. Down the road when I replace this laptop, I will very likely feel differently about it.

 

my dear friend stevenqhj , buy ic diamond or use stock paste, really??? that is the title of the post man!!! lol

reedshark thanks for your comment on this being a good thread, i think so too

patrck : i agree with reedshark , i would not mess with the heatsink setup to save $20. there are a lot of other places where we can save money like buy one less game

 

Once you realize how simple it is on a Clevo/Sager notebook and give it a try you might think differently about doing simple upgrades like this yourself.

IMO the $40 could be better used toward parts that can give a better computing experience.

I try to buy my new notebooks without an OS,minimum memory and a single large hard drive I can use for storage after I put in an SSD.

A better graphics card,screen and 3 antenna wireless card are options I would consider having done by the reseller plus a better parts warranty is where I think my money would be better spent.

Now if I had an Asus that needs to be almost fully disassembled to get at the chips to apply TC on,I'd opt to have it done by the supplier.

Spend less and replace more often!

 

Where do you get the parts/upgrades?

 

IC7 is worth it. I'm still very curious to know how resellers do the paste job. I hope they don't just drop a blob and use heatsink to spread. Because IC7 is very hard to spread, if the resellers can deliver a good paste job, then I would be willingly to pay 40$ (even thought a tube costs only 20$ = 3-4 repaste I think).
Anyone opted this take a photo of the paste job please ? Thanks
@Reedshark: can you when it's delivered ?

 

i ordered ic7 for $40, i would trust them to do their jobs well wild05

 

December Thermal Compound Roundup

New in the roudup this month IC Diamond 24 Carat

Thermal Compound Roundup - December 2011 | Hardware Secrets

 

Just to chime for no good reason; I ordered a small tube of Arctic Silver 5 for $3.99 on Amazon. Whenever I get the new system in the mail, I'm going to use thermal paste for the first time. From the videos and guides I've seen online, it doesn't look like there's much to it and the little tube has enough of the compound to use trial & error to find just the right application.

 

@Cslacks: true that you can try many times, but it's important how you spread it or simply put a blob on it. Because in most cases, the way you spread and leave some air pocket (heat travels out). I watched videos and read tuts, but still haven't been able to spread properly (I used MX-5). IC7 is harder to spread as far as I know, the next TC I will get is probably IC and just simply put a blob on the CPU+GPU

 

I aint messing with my cpu/gpu !!! trial and error, yeah right!!!

 

Well a good starting point would be some advices on how to do it.
So a little poll: which kind of method you use for gpu?
Spreading, straight line, single blob?

CPUs like i7 should be repasted with a straight thin line afaik.

 

See there are a lot of opinions on this, I bet its real simple when you know how to do it. Its the same with changing an alternator in a car, but if you don't know what the hell you are doing, just let the pros do it and stick with changing tires and oil changes ! i paid the $40 and I am really happy

 

Wild05kid05, I'd like to help, but my whole point in paying the $40 is that I don't want to remove the heat sink and disturb the job that the experts at MALIBAL did for me. My understanding is that once you remove the heat sink, you really should repaste. I'd be interested to know how it compares too, but I doubt anyone who spends the $40 will be willing to eat that cost as they would still have to do the work themselves anyway.

I plan to buy a tube of Arctic Silver 5 when the new laptop comes in so that I can try to reduce the temp on my current laptop. I'll probably experiment some since I really don't have anything to lose. If I come up with anything interesting, I'll post it here.

 

Ah, I see your point Reed, totally forgot about the heatsink thing . If you want "experiment" apply some to the ridges of the CPU+GPU heatsink. I did it with my Envy and it runs relatively cooler than without it

 

Well, the way I'm thinking about it, I won't be messing with the CPU or the GPU (although, obviously I will). I'll be messing with the area in between the processors and the heatsink; replacing that old, good-for-nothing air with a heat conductive substance. The first technique I'll try is the BB-size blob in the middle of the die, using the heatsink pressure for uniform spreading. I'll remove the heatsink and check to see if I've used too little or too much, clean it off and start over again. (Alternately, I'll go with the method that Arctic Silver recommends and wild05kid05 mentioned, manual spreading.) I imagine that I could take photos.

Once I read up on it and found that a good application would last a good 2-3 years, or until the seal is broken, I was really tempted to pay the $40 for Malibal to put it on. But once I started cutting costs out of my build, I got excited when I got under $2K.

True story: When I bought the laptop that I'm currently using (the one in my signature), I had a Dell discount for $750 Off if I configured an E1505 worth $2,000 or more. I got to $2,060 and paid $1310 plus tax. So, basically, the new laptop in my sig at $1,988 ($2,088 without the Clevo $100 Off) is only worth $28 more than my Dell from almost 6 years ago.