Thermal Paste Scares Me.

I am going to change out my thermal paste for Arctic Silver 5 paste, i'll be honest the thought of doing this wrong and breaking my beloved P150HM fills me with dread. As I have never done this before I have seen plenty of how to guides and it looks easy enough, however I was wondering if anyone knows of any horror stories regarding this practice, and what sort of temperature improvement to expect, currently runs at 45C idle, 75-85C for DX9 games, 85-90C for DX11.

Cheers.

 

Applying a better thermal compound will help. Since you're temps aren't bad you can probably skip it if it makes you too nervous. Underload AS5 gets about 2-3C lower in temps and IC Diamond will get you 2-5C lower. Every bit helps but if you're not running into issues you can probably pass on it.

 

If you follow the guides and take your time, you aren't going to mess anything up. Take it apart carefully, clean them, apply the small (correct) amount and then reassemble by reversing your steps. Make sure everything fits snugly and the screw holes match up so nothing needs to be moved just a hair further.

As was said - if you aren't experiencing any problems with overheating, or being annoyed by the fans running loudly - then doing something that scares you a bit but actually gives minimal benefit can probably be skipped. If you do go ahead with it, it will help you get over the worry about messing things up. Generally it's just a matter of following the correct procedures and not missing any steps.

 

I have seen that there are two schools of thought to applying the paste, one is to put a small 5mm blob of paste in the centre of the gpu/cpu, the other is to smear a thin layer over it. Which would you recommend?

 

Depends on the paste. Follow the instructions provided by whichever paste you buy. One thing you don't want to do is overly paste!

 

It depends on the particular paste you are using. Arctic Silver traditionally you smear a thin layer, barely enough that the core will make a visible mark - you are only trying to cover up imperfections in the metal - the metal itself works better than the paste. IC Diamond's instructions state you should use the pea-sized blob and it will expand so as to not introduce air pockets...while spreading it could do so.

Traditionally I have spread Arctic Silver using my finger in a fresh sandwich baggie so I don't contaminate it. It's not hard, but frankly any method where you do the spreading requires a bit more 'finesse' than just putting the right-size blob and letting the pressure of the heatsink do all the work for you. If you're nervous about getting it wrong - that's the easiest way.

 

Fluffy kittens scare me! Oooohhhhh just the thought of those sharp teeth gnawing on my bones.

 

Here are two resources for you if you don't already have them:

AS5 application instructions: http://www.arcticsilver.com/pdf/appmeth/int/ss/intel_app_method_surface_spread_v1.1.pdf

P150HM Service Manual: (see signature): http://forum.notebookreview.com/sag...evo-p150hm-owners-lounge-174.html#post7251448

Hope this helps

 

I was also pretty nervous the first time I did this too. Just follow the directions and monitor the temps. You'll know if something is wrong right away, but it's not that difficult.

 

What scares me is the thread title.

There's several different ways to apply new thermal compound and the best way is the one that completely removes the old and applies only the amount needed of the new.

Common mistakes are appling too much new TC and not removing all of the old.

The TC is needed only to replace the air that is in the pores of the metal on the CPU,GPU and heatsinks.

The idea of filling the pores with TC is so the result is maximum contact between the chip and the heatsink to optimize the heat transfer.Air does not transfer the heat well or allow maximum contact.

A stock TC properly applied is better than the best TC improperly applied.

You can use 100% isopropyl alcohol as the solvent to remove the ols TC or one specifically marketed to remove TC like Artic Clean.

I use my index finger covered in plastic wrap to spread just enough Tuniq TX3 that I'm very fond of to fill the pores and force out the air.

 

On the contrary, you don't wanna underpaste, leaving air between sink and PU. Overpasting never hurt anybody.

 

You are probably better off simply raising the back of the laptop.

 

unless the paste has high electric conductivity or its liquid metal.

 

Agreed, in the early days of Arctic Silver when it had a very high silver content, if you put too much on, you could short out the processor, or anything else you happened to get it on. Thankfully it's quite a bit easier today.

 

Arctic Silver can still possibly do that if you short some traces on the motherboard with it. It's exceedingly rare, but they do warn about it on the product page nonetheless.

 

You couldn't be more wrong.

Many enthusiasts lap their chips and heatsinks to get them as flat and polished as possible so that maximum contact is made between the metal.

The pores in the metal are where contact isn't made and this is the only place the TC needs to be.

Maximum transfer of heat from the chip to the heatsink that is cooled by the fan is when there is maximum contact between the chip and heatsink.

Clean unoxidized Metal to Metal makes the best heat exchange.