Improving T60p heatsink performance

[Johan]

do any of you guys know how to lubricate the fan itself???

Lubricating ThinkPad T4x fans have been reported to work (in the sense reducing fan noise), so the same may (?) perhaps also work for T6x fans? See the thread Total solution for absolutely ZERO oscillatory noise in T4x.

Johan

[jprovostla]

I just finished the penny modification suggested in this thread...
I took out the heat pads from the GPU & Northbridge...
I glued [silicone] 2 copper pennies

 to the bracket [against the springs], used thermal grease and re-installed everything...
BTW the copper pennies fit perfectly in the bracket...
I did not glue the heat pipe to the heat sink yet [no thermal glue, next project]...
My GPU now idles in the low 60'C...
I added back the FGLRX driver... now idles in the low 70'C
now watching a DVD movie and its in the high 70'C...
This is a great idea, thank you

[bmwman91]

Hey folks, I ran across this thread while looking for pics of the t61p heatsink...which it would seem won't offer any performance improvement from what I have read.

I just did my own mod this past week, and it has lowered my GPU temperature 20C under full load. I just bent the heat pipe so that the GPU portion of the assembly would sit ~2mm lower, eliminating the need for the thermal pad and allowing me to use thermal grease instead. I was taking measurements with calipers, and it would seem that there is about 0.5mm of thermal pad between the GPU die and copper plate in the original design...which is HUGE. I just had to install/remove it a few times with fresh grease (cleaning it all between installs) until I got it bent so that it would sit flat on the GPU die. I was seeing GPU temps in excess of 97C previously, and after this I could not get it above 77C in a warmer room than the first test. It will idle at 58-62C with the fan at either 3000RPM, or off.

I also bent the 2 prongs on the retaining clip so that it would apply more force. I think that this is probably the best & easiest way to improve GPU cooling, and you don't need to worry about taping pennies in or gluing heat pipes. Heck, this wouldn't work if you DID glue the heat pipe as it needs to remain flexible to allow for proper seating.

Later on I plan to solder some copper fins on anywhere they will fit to aide cooling further.

[roadrunner_gs]

Today i also stripped down my T60p.
I do BOINC a lot on with the primegrid-project.
These tasks are very very CPU-intensive and previously i undervolted my CPU to 1.175 V with occasional lockups due to ~100°C CPU-Core-temperature and 92°C GPU-core-temperature (aticonfig --set-powerstate 1) with the fan at 3800 rpm.
Today now i stripped the for my opinion too fat thermal-pads and reaplied thermal-compound to CPU, GPU and Chipset.
I applied 1 Euro-Cent over the Chipset and 2 Euro-Cents stacked over the GPU and now i have 85-90°C CPU and 78°C GPU also at the lower powerstate-mode) with the fan at 3400 rpm.
I think i don't have to bother about lockups anymore.
I to think the heatsink-design is crap.
I would inspect my R61 in the near future, i suspect a similar situation there...

[Marin85]

Welcome to the forum!

Sorry for going off-topic, but don´t you think that primegrid is a pure waste of resources? Since all the natural, and in particular the prime numbers are infinitely many, looking for bigger and bigger prime numbers even of a specific form could hardly yield any reasonable structural statement. Numbers are simply numbers, I don´t think this project could really contribute much to the distribution of the prime numbers...

Just my 0.02$

Marin

[misfit]

I also bent the 2 prongs on the retaining clip so that it would apply more force. I think that this is probably the best & easiest way to improve GPU cooling, and you don't need to worry about taping pennies in or gluing heat pipes. Heck, this wouldn't work if you DID glue the heat pipe as it needs to remain flexible to allow for proper seating.

Actually, I would go as far as to say that, if anything, insulating the GPU heatpipe from the CPU heatsink would improve efficiency. If you understand how heatpipes work they need a hot end (evaporation) and a cold end (condensation). If you glue / thermally bond part of the length of a heatpipe to another heat source then you're interfering with migration of coolant from one end to the other, thus making the heatpipe itself less efficient by short-circuiting the flow.

The rest of this is all good, increasing thermal contact between the copper and the GPU / northbridge. However, when I get around to opening my T60 (non-p) and tinkering as ultimately I do with all my machines (I just can't help myself) I'll be looking at making a better thermal bond between the GPU and it's copper 'sink, probably by adding a copper shim between the two, fixed to the 'sink. If anything I'll also be looking to try to insulate the GPU heatpipe from any effects of heat from the CPU interfering with it's internal coolant flow.

Thanks for starting the thread jeepcoma, some interesting ideas...

Cheers,

[misfit]

As you can see from the pic at http://www.notebookreview.com/picture.asp?f=25783 of a T61p heatsink assembly Lenovo make no effort to route the GPU heatpipe too near the CPU, and that's as it should be. You need a hot end and a cold end remember. Having heat applied to the middle of a heatpipe will only decrease it's effectiveness. Wiki will explain how they work for those who don't understand the principles.

(I hope that works as a link and not as an embedded pic...)

[underclocker]

I just did my own mod this past week, and it has lowered my GPU temperature 20C under full load. I just bent the heat pipe so that the GPU portion of the assembly would sit ~2mm lower, eliminating the need for the thermal pad and allowing me to use thermal grease instead. I was taking measurements with calipers, and it would seem that there is about 0.5mm of thermal pad between the GPU die and copper plate in the original design...which is HUGE. I just had to install/remove it a few times with fresh grease (cleaning it all between installs) until I got it bent so that it would sit flat on the GPU die. I was seeing GPU temps in excess of 97C previously, and after this I could not get it above 77C in a warmer room than the first test. It will idle at 58-62C with the fan at either 3000RPM, or off.

I also bent the 2 prongs on the retaining clip so that it would apply more force. I think that this is probably the best & easiest way to improve GPU cooling, and you don't need to worry about taping pennies in or gluing heat pipes. Heck, this wouldn't work if you DID glue the heat pipe as it needs to remain flexible to allow for proper seating.

I did the exact same modification (without using calipers) and it reduced my temps to the same range, the GPU being the hottest with high 50's to low 60's at idle or with light use. The fan/heat sink assembly should have been properly fitted at the factory.

(My T60p has a T7600 CPU and V5250 GPU.)

[wild_bill]

I used a US dime coin (91.7% copper) between GPU & heatsink rather than on top of the clamp

although the arctic silver 5 and heatsink bending made a big difference, the biggest temp difference of all was realized by vacuuming while brushing with a clean paintbrush, the fan housing & blades, ducted areas and copper cooling fins in the corner of the system, so don't forget to vacuum the dust periodically, it is the most important factor for a cool running system!

[ArtShapiro]

I used a US dime coin (91.7% copper) between GPU & heatsink rather than on top of the clamp

It's so easy to suggest work to other people but: any chance of a photo, for those of us software geeks who get a little bit apprehensive dealing with fancy hardware issues?

Art

[wild_bill]

It really not difficult if you have attention to detail, like in building a model, just follow the procedures elsewhere in this thread, but before you reassemble everything back together, just clean off a US dime with alcohol and coat both sides with Arctic Silver 5, and lay the dime directly on the GPU chip before the heatsink or clamp. If you want to get fancy and have the time, then file the dime both sides perfectly flat, that will help the heat transfer even more.

you can get Arctic Silver 5 here:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6835100007

[Crunch]

Welcome to the forum!

Sorry for going off-topic, but don´t you think that primegrid is a pure waste of resources? Since all the natural, and in particular the prime numbers are infinitely many, looking for bigger and bigger prime numbers even of a specific form could hardly yield any reasonable structural statement. Numbers are simply numbers, I don´t think this project could really contribute much to the distribution of the prime numbers...

What's up, Marin!!!!!!!! I'm back (so to speak) lol...Did you get a W series Thinkpad when we last talked about a year ago?? I just did, early this morning.

Anyway, should I just buy a new heatsink, or can I "fix" (by rebending ugh) the ATI chip's heat pipes...anyone?? Anyone know where, besides IBM or Lenovo I can pick one up.

One more thing: Are the heatsinks of the T60's and T60p's the same? I bought my girl a T60 after she just had to have it. And I'd like to "take a looksie".

[Crunch]

It really not difficult if you have attention to detail, like in building a model, just follow the procedures elsewhere in this thread, but before you reassemble everything back together, just clean off a US dime with alcohol and coat both sides with Arctic Silver 5, and lay the dime directly on the GPU chip before the heatsink or clamp. If you want to get fancy and have the time, then file the dime both sides perfectly flat, that will help the heat transfer even more.

you can get Arctic Silver 5 here:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6835100007

I agree. It was a breeze popping my T7600 in replacing the T2600 a couple of years back. I recently re-applied more AS5, and it's now cooler than ever. My GPU, when watching a Bluray movie , for example, and having it on Maximum performance, will *always* take no more than 2 seconds before shutting the whole system down.

@Wild Bill: I just read your message carefully, and then the whole thread. That is one awesome idea! Is this only for the GPU, and never to be done with the CPU, right?? I can see that this would finally resolve the thousands of people with T60p's (and other series' I'm sure) who have GPU overheating problems. How much AS5 do you recommend? The same amount as with a processor?? And where exactly is the GPU on the T60/p's (<---- file this under: there is no stupid question lol)??? Pretty much very close to the CPU since they share the same heatsink I assume? Without introducing the dime, the GPU's overwhelming heat would only dissipate by way of the clamp???

Thanks everyone!

[bhtooefr]

The GPU is the ATI chip that's uncovered in this shot: http://bhtooefr.ath.cx/images/IMG_1233.jpg

And, it will get SOME cooling from the main heatsink, but not great, as it is.

This thread definitely interests me, as I'm not happy with my GPU temps... (No, that heatsink is no longer on this machine. Lenovo took care of that.)

[LegendaryKA8]

Alrighty... after reading this thread(I just got my T60 today, and am experiencing idle temps of between 65-70C), I think I'm going to try something similar. I just want to get some feedback before I commit to doing this.

I found and pulled a small flat piece of copper off a damaged T4x long fan. After opening up my T60(but not pulling the heat sink out), it looks like this piece will fit flush with the GPU and its memory chips. My current plan is to remove the woefully inefficient thermal pad(feel free to use stronger language here as I really hate these kinds of pads) and substitute the copper piece in its place, using AS5 between the GPU and copper plate, then more AS5 between the plate and the heat sink itself.

It sounds like it'd work based off what I've read here, but I thought it best if I asked for any second opinions first. So.... go or no-go?

[ThinkPadophile]

I've considered making this mod to my T60p as well. I do agree that the GPU temperatures would come down significantly if the thermal conductive pad were replaced with a metal shim. However, I do not think it wise to eliminate the thermal conductive pad altogether. I doubt that the only reason that IBM chose to use it was to keep manufacturing costs down; there was probably a design reason as well. The problem is manufacturing tolerances. We all know that the Northbridge chip stands higher than the GPU chip. What we don't know is whether their top surfaces (the surfaces that must make contact with the heat pipe) are perfectly parallel to each other. The design engineer had to assume that they would not be parallel, but would be slightly misaligned. This causes a significant problem: to have good heat transfer, the heat pipe must lie perfectly flat on top of each chip. However, if the tops of the chips are slightly off-angle with each other, then the heat pipe would have to twist in order to maintain the desired contact with both chips. Because the distance between the chips is rather small and the heat pipe is rather rigid, a great deal of twisting force would be needed, and this twisting force must be supplied entirely by the chips. The most likely result would be that the heat pipe could not twist enough to make perfect contact with either chip, yet would place great stress on both.

In light of this, it seems to me that the better solution is this. Rather than trying to eliminate the thermal conducting pad altogether, minimize it. Use a metal shim to span the greater part of the gap between heat pipe and chip surface, but place a very thin section of thermal conducting pad between them. This would eliminate the need for the heat pipe to twist in order to conform to the chips and thus eliminate the stress problem. Thermal conductivity, on the other hand, would be better since the majority of the thermal conducting pad would have been replaced by metal.

Here's my proposed procedure:
1) Remove the thermal fan.
2) Calculate the gap between the heat pipe and each of the chips. Simply examine the way the thermal pad conformed to the chip. The amount of thermal pad between the heat pipe and chip surface tells you the depth of the gap.
3) Make a metal shim that is slightly undersized. If the gap is 1mm, for instance, make a metal shim that is slightly thinner, say .8mm. This eliminates most, although not all, of the gap, but allows enough of a gap so that the heat pipe doesn't have to twist.
4) Apply the metal shims to the heat pipe with thermal bonding paste.
5) Apply a thin section of the thermal conducting pad onto the bottom surface of the shim.
5) Reinstall the heat fan.

I must repeat that I haven't yet tried this myself due to time constraints, but intend to as soon as I have a chance.

[bmwman91]

Improving the GPU portion of the heat sink is really simple. All you do it remove the gap pad & carefully bend the heat pipe a little so that the GPU portion sits a little lower (don't crimp it though). Then you just apply thermal grease & plant the heat sink directly on the GPU. Just leave the gap pad for the NorthBridge. Bend the 2 prongs on the steel retaining clip to press harder, and boom, done. I also stuffed some 6mm thick thermal gap pad in between the spring slip & the heat sink for added conduction / compression.

[Silencer]

After I upgraded to Core 2 Duo 2.33GHz from original Core Duo 2.0GHz, I've spent a lot of time chasing proper fan for that new CPU on eBay. There are two modifications of fans (check T60p maintenance manual for part numbers) and the one for Core 2 Duo is slightly better built. Below some comparison photos. The one on the left is the new one, it has better and longer heatpipes and different configuration of fan blades.



There's also a problem with thermal pads between copper radiator and actual CPU/GPU cores (you can see them on the pictures, I later removed them), the pad is 1 mm high for CPU and 2 mm high for GPU, which too much. I've used 1mm copper sheet to replace thermal pads and Arctic Silver paste to improve the things in that department. Additionally I've increased the pressure from above by sticking a couple of coins under the metal thingy that creates the pressure there.

I had to buy three fans on eBay, one of them was badly bent and radiator never fully covered CPU, and another was very loud (fan was defective).

[yak]

Right now I'm in the process of upgrading my GMA950 T60 from T2400 to T7200. Will I need a different fan too? I mean, it's not a T7600 with V5250 so I may get away with the old cooler, right?

Thanks!

[Silencer]

Right now I'm in the process of upgrading my GMA950 T60 from T2400 to T7200. Will I need a different fan too? I mean, it's not a T7600 with V5250 so I may get away with the old cooler, right?

Well, you can get away with old fan, and since you don't have hot GPU chip, you should be alright. But I've checked maintenance manual again, and there are two different part number for T60 with CoreDuo vs. Core2Duo. You have 41V9931 and the upgraded fan part number is 41W6406.

[yak]

Well, you can get away with old fan, and since you don't have hot GPU chip, you should be alright. But I've checked maintenance manual again, and there are two different part number for T60 with CoreDuo vs. Core2Duo. You have 41V9931 and the upgraded fan part number is 41W6406.

Right, my T60 runs on a T7200 now (instead of T2400) with the standard fan it came with and some Arctic Silver 5. No issues so far, with BIOS controlled fan, idle temps are slightly over 40. I feel a nice performance bump during CPU intensive tasks.

Gosh, there's not much more in my T60 I haven't upgraded (see sig.).

[Silencer]

Gosh, there's not much more in my T60 I haven't upgraded (see sig.).

I hear ya You should've upgraded to T7600, another 5-10% performance boost there. You also can upgrade wireless to Atheros ABGN and replace your HDD with SSD.

[yak]

I hear ya You should've upgraded to T7600, another 5-10% performance boost there. You also can upgrade wireless to Atheros ABGN and replace your HDD with SSD.

T7600 is too expensive for me in terms of bang for the bucks and hard to come by. Even T7400 isn't seen very often on eBay here in Germany, apart from these Chinese modified ones. T7200 was readily available from a private seller so I went with that. Besides, I want the battery life to be as long as possible.

I'm using a direct 40MBit up/down LAN connection to my University at home with external monitor and keyboard so I don't really have use for 802.11n, I prefer the big screen. The Intel card works for me when I need WiFi.

SSD is my next stop I guess. I would have to get a SATA bay adapter for my current Scorpio Black drive. SSD prices is what keeps me away for now.

[Silencer]

SSD is my next stop I guess. I would have to get a SATA bay adapter for my current Scorpio Black drive. SSD prices is what keeps me away for now.

SATA bays are $10-15 on eBay from China. I have a couple, all work with no problems. Regarding SSD prices, check Kingston SSDnow series. 64GB is around 100 EUR.

[Ursus]

The fan on my T60p started to chatter so I did this mod when I replaced the assy. I have the T7600 CPU with the ATI FireGL V5250 GPU, and temperature has always been a problem for me.

The method I ended up using with positive results was Arctic Silver adhesive between the GPU/NB heat pipe and the CPU plate, deleting the foam pad, using a quarter and a penny between the clamp and the GPU/NB plates (the coins inside the clamp force the stock heatsinks to make direct contact), and using Arctic Silver 5 thermal compound between the heatsink and chips.

The long-term effect is that the GPU has dropped from an idle temp in the mid-70s to the low 60s. The CPU has a much lower cold start temperature too, but the BIOS thermal management seems to be happy keeping a mid-50s idle temp, so the long-term temperature has not changed much.

Good mod, glad I did it, thanks again for posting the details

[velani]

All right folks, I am ready to do this mod due to high GPU temperatures. I have read all instructions in OP post.

Some background. My T60p was repaired by Lenovo service center, heatsink/fan unit replaced. Everytime we do anything graphics related, the GPU temp shoots up, unit locks up and shuts down.

I have taken the heatsink assembly out of the laptop. There was negligible dirt arund fan blades. I cleaned the old paste from CPU. I have noticed a strange thing on GPU paste pads. There seems to be a plastic cover over the 2 gray thermal pads (if that is what they are) which are still there. Did the technician not remove them thus taking the effectiveness of GPU thermal pads? Wow, if that is the case!!

Also, I am tad bit confused about adding the penny to secure GPU pipe to heatsink. Do I still have to go the thermal bonding route or will the pennies do the job?

Help, please.....

[Ursus]

The plastic film is protection for the thermal foam pad and should definitely be removed. Be careful because the pad will want to separate from the copper when you pull on the plastic.

The way I setup the coins was to put them between the clamp and the copper (like a spacer, a quarter in the upper wide section and a penny in the lower narrow section), and then used regular arctic silver 5 thermal compound between the copper and chip. This way is different from the above but it seemed to work the best mechanically.

[velani]

3 questions:

Would you add AS-5 thermal compound to the 2 grey pads which cover the GPU chips for better heat transfer?

Would adding copper pennies to the GPU heat pipe connect and conduct heat to the heatsink be equivalent to adding a Thermal Bonding Paste to bridge that gap of GPU pipe?

By essentially transfering some of the GPU pipe heat to CPU copper area, would that harm the CPU by running a little hotter?

Thanks a lot.

[Silencer]

3 questions:

Would you add AS-5 thermal compound to the 2 grey pads which cover the GPU chips for better heat transfer?

Would adding copper pennies to the GPU heat pipe connect and conduct heat to the heatsink be equivalent to adding a Thermal Bonding Paste to bridge that gap of GPU pipe?

By essentially transfering some of the GPU pipe heat to CPU copper area, would that harm the CPU by running a little hotter?

1) No. I've tried it first, didn't help, made it slightly worse.

2) You need to remove grey pads and put pennies on top of the heatsink to add pressure to it so it touches both GPU and CPU. Only when copper heatsink touches chips directly it makes any kind of positive difference. Just don't forget about some AS paste.

3) When you make the mod you will see that CPU temperature goes slightly up, but average temperature of both GPU and CPU will go down. T7600 can be up to 100 degrees warm. So it's not a problem if you go up from 50 to 55.

[velani]

Thank you silencer and ursus.
I need to look at photos again as I am getting confused about where the pennies should go. My fault I am not able to follow instructions.

So the heat pipe from GPU which currently does not touch the area of copper HS above where CPU chip would be, near the start of the CPU fat heat pipe, I need to use a Bonding Compound?

Thanks for all your patience.

Velani