Custom cooling trick for laptops

[Anonymous_26]

I have an Asus X54L laptop with an I3 2330M processor, 4 Gigs of RAM and a 500 Gig HDD. I use my laptop mostly for fooling around on the internet and sometimes light gaming. Even though I'm not playing demanding games this thing still gets really HOT! I had heard of a trick were people sandwich a small shim of copper sheet metal between the processor and video chip and the heatsink. Has anyone tried this trick before and does it actually work?

 

[Guest]

I have an Asus X54L laptop with an I3 2330M processor, 4 Gigs of RAM and a 500 Gig HDD. I use my laptop mostly for fooling around on the internet and sometimes light gaming. Even though I'm not playing demanding games this thing still gets really HOT! I had heard of a trick were people sandwich a small shim of copper sheet metal between the processor and video chip and the heatsink. Has anyone tried this trick before and does it actually work?

I don't think that will work I'm guessing what that is supposed to do is to help increase the pressure between the heatpipe and the chip to transfer heat better. But this will be counter-productive since with the copper sheet metal you're going to have now 2 layers of thermal paste and a sheet of copper for heat to go through rather than just thermal paste. A better solution is to just apply a thin layer of thermal paste and just tighten the heatpipe down as much as possible.

 

[Anonymous_26]

From the few video's I've seen (not that-that is the be all to end all but..) the people placed the copper shim directly on the chip with no thermal paste. Then they placed thermal paste on the top of the shim then the heatsink. So it would look like this

heatsink -> thermal paste ->shim ->chip

in these video's people have claimed anywhere from a few degree's to 10 degree drop in temps by doing this. I wasn't about these claims thats why I wanted to see if anyone has actually tried it here. If it does actually work then I had a few questions so I could try it myself.

 

[szaboaz]

Do you use power profiles? Maybe you can find one which results in lower temps and still fast enough.

Have you checked the dust situation at the radiator yet?

 

[Guest]

From the few video's I've seen (not that-that is the be all to end all but..) the people placed the copper shim directly on the chip with no thermal paste. Then they placed thermal paste on the top of the shim then the heatsink. So it would look like this

heatsink -> thermal paste ->shim ->chip

in these video's people have claimed anywhere from a few degree's to 10 degree drop in temps by doing this. I wasn't about these claims thats why I wanted to see if anyone has actually tried it here. If it does actually work then I had a few questions so I could try it myself.

You will not NOT see these drops in temperature. If you did it could be because while doing this you removed dust clogged on the heatsink that reduced temp but not the shim. Or it could be because a terrible thermal pad was on that was reducing heat transfer. Use thermal paste, you'll see better outcomes. The stuff between the heat pipe and cpu is to maximize as much contact as possible. thermal paste helps fill in the gaps to transfer heat. The shim will just create two surfaces with gaps in them.

 

[cbrunnem]

You will not NOT see these drops in temperature. If you did it could be because while doing this you removed dust clogged on the heatsink that reduced temp but not the shim. Or it could be because a terrible thermal pad was on that was reducing heat transfer. Use thermal paste, you'll see better outcomes. The stuff between the heat pipe and cpu is to maximize as much contact as possible. thermal paste helps fill in the gaps to transfer heat. The shim will just create two surfaces with gaps in them.

you must not have ever seen a laptop heatsink. a lot of things could make them better.

 

[Guest]

you must not have ever seen a laptop heatsink. a lot of things could make them better.

What are you talking about? Why the first sentence and what other things(that actually work) do you believe we can do to make it better?

 

[cbrunnem]

What are you talking about? Why the first sentence and what other things(that actually work) do you believe we can do to make it better?

They are horrible. There is always too much thermal paste and the lower end ones are normally all aluminum. Most people would gain some just from reseating the heatsink. I would not be surprised if using a thin and i do mean thin piece of copper to put between the hsf and the chip and cause lower temps cause copper is kinda soft and would probably absorb heat better then the excessive amounts of thermal paste already there.

 

[Guest]

They are horrible. There is always too much thermal paste and the lower end ones are normally all aluminum. Most people would gain some just from reseating the heatsink. I would not be surprised if using a thin and i do mean thin piece of copper to put between the hsf and the chip and cause lower temps cause copper is kinda soft and would probably absorb heat better then the excessive amounts of thermal paste already there.

You haven't read my post have you

 

[cbrunnem]

You haven't read my post have you

yeah ive read your posts

 

[stingstang]

yeah ive read your posts

Doesn't look to me like you did. He mentioned that you can get the biggest effect by reseating the heatsink and applying only a thin layer of thermal paste.

 

[cbrunnem]

Doesn't look to me like you did. He mentioned that you can get the biggest effect by reseating the heatsink and applying only a thin layer of thermal paste.

i didnt deny that, i even echoed that but i was talking( wasnt said well cause i was on my phone) about the possibility of his mod working. if the shim increases the area outside of the heatsink for air to hit that could also help. we are talking hypothetically here.

 

[Guest]

i didnt deny that, i even echoed that but i was talking( wasnt said well cause i was on my phone) about the possibility of his mod working. if the shim increases the area outside of the heatsink for air to hit that could also help. we are talking hypothetically here.

I doubt that the mod will work. The only reason why I think it may work is because the gap is too big/the heatsink can't be pushed on hard enough and so because copper conducts heat better than thermal paste it helps conduct heat over the distance. But you'll have to do heatpipe|paste|shim|paste|cpu, not putting paste between any later will dramatically decrease thermal conductivity. But you want to avoid doing this, plain thermal paste will always be better.

And yeah. Adding shim to the heatsink could definitely help but you'll have to make sure the area of the shim exposed to air is bigger than the area its covering.

 

[ram1009]

From the few video's I've seen (not that-that is the be all to end all but..) the people placed the copper shim directly on the chip with no thermal paste. Then they placed thermal paste on the top of the shim then the heatsink. So it would look like this

heatsink -> thermal paste ->shim ->chip

in these video's people have claimed anywhere from a few degree's to 10 degree drop in temps by doing this. I wasn't about these claims thats why I wanted to see if anyone has actually tried it here. If it does actually work then I had a few questions so I could try it myself.

Sounds like an I.Q. test to me.

 

[jaguarskx]

I would just replace the thermal paste and not bother with the copper shim.

 

[Anonymous_26]

Best answer selected by Anonymous_26.

 

[ArakelTheDragon]

You can put the shim piece on the heatsink, not on the chip, that will help.