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m15 R7, thermal pad specs?
Hiya. Have an Alienware m15 R7 (6800H with RTX 3060), need to change the paste & thermal pads on the heat sink again (pretty sure I used the wrong pad size the first time)|, but I cant find what the exact specs / dimensions used for the default pads anywhere (dimensions or thickness) before I open it up. The service manual doesn't seem to specify exactly.
Here's a pic from a video for what they look like =
Am I right in saying the pink & green are different? I know the green should be 1mm (I somehow remembered to measure that one but not the pink when I last opened it up...)
For the paste, I know the default is Element 31. Or would it be recommend replacing it with something else this time?
Thanks!
Mike1788
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April 5th, 2024 12:34
Pads are mostly .5mm, 1mm and 1.5mm. They're soft enough to compress if the OEM used something slightly thinner than the commonly sold sizes I just wrote. Pads in laptops aren't gonna be loaded that hard, so as long as they touch both surfaces and don't cause mounting issues you're good. Don't worry about brand and any listed thermal specs for pads, just use something with decent reviews, I bought some cheap Silicone blue pads from Amzn in a variety pack of the 3 thicknesses listed and they're fine.
For paste, direct-die in Laptops isn't at all comparable to desktop benchmarks with integrated heat spreaders and huge thermal mass from coolers, and by far the best in my experience is Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut. It's overpriced and needs repasting more frequently than most at maybe 12-18 months to not lose effectiveness, but it's been hugely better than other laptop pastes I've tried for reasons I can't explain or make sense of. It's hard to research for Laptops since the vast majority of posts are for desktop, but Kryonaut is the only paste that's made a significant difference for me on the laptops i've used it in.
Just make sure to really clean the fans/heatsink fins spotless while in there.