Durability: Once applied correctly, liquid metal TIMs can last longer than traditional thermal pastes because they don’t dry out or degrade over time in the same way. However, they do require careful handling due to their reactivity with some metals like aluminum.
It also has a better heat conductivity, but that doesn’t matter if it’s not making sufficient contact with the IHS and head-sink. So imho that doesn’t apply in the current implementation by framework.
I’m considering one of those Honeywell PTM7950 pads or one thermal grizzly products. To see if it improves the contact which would indirectly increase the heat dissipation and lower temps or decrease fan rpm.
For a laptop that is so easily serviceable, the downside of paste isn’t really that bad.
I’ve used liquid metal before and also had to repair board due to use. It definitely can mess up things due to its conductivity and messy thin nature. I haven’t taken off the heatsink or checked to see what my thermals are yet. My fan does pulse sometimes though. My thinking is carbonaut reusable pad would fit the spirit of the device. You can check out the cooling and just put back the pad. Wont pump out. Doesn’t require any intense care when installing. Maybe this is something framework could deploy via support that is cheap and mailable too.
Ill check out my thermals later. Maybe Ill be a guinea pig.
I’m still waiting for a reply back on my support ticket. Depending on what they say, maybe I’ll try some alternatives to the factory liquid metal. PTM-7950, IC Graphite pad, etc. We’ll see. I don’t know that mine is bad enough that I’d want them to send me a whole new board or anything. Unless they are wanting to analyze the board or something. I’d just as soon have them send me a new thermal pad to try. Then I can try some other things first, just to see how they compare.
Mine was bad enough that they cross-shipped me a new Mainboard which did meet their expectations - for a few weeks, that is. Now they want me to send the entire laptop in for analysis and repair. Quite the troublesome issue they’ve got on their hands here…
That’s another reason why I think I might lean toward trying some thermal pads before having them spend the money to send me a new mainboard that may not be any better.
Yeah, I’m currently on the fence as to whether or not I actually want to commit to sending it to them or just winging it with modifications of my own.
The peculiar thing about the entire situation is that the current cooling solution has demonstrated itself capable of meeting and exceeding Framework’s own stated performance target of 45W of sustained load. The big question is what the point of failure is causing the drops in sustained power output (and performance, by extension).
As @PSierra117 documented over in FW16 Batch 20 Guild, switching to what he believed at the time was PTM7950 and lapping the contact plate on the heatsink brought his board beyond Framework’s own targets. Recently, he did report that performance had dropped again to just within spec, leading him to believe that the “PTM7950” he received may actually be a different TIM altogether, so the jury’s still out on whether that’s the cause of his observed performance loss after modification.
Like I said, it’s really strange stuff going on here. Here’s hoping the FW team can figure things out.
Couldn’t have said it any better (Non Nativ Speaker)
When i am back Home in October i will try to get a Genuine PTM Batch and check up my cooling Solution But i will also Buy a Replacement Heatsink and the LM-Pads which should be available in October.
When they are here i will try to further modify the OG Heatsink, maybe even try to remove the Heatsinkextension sitting on the Vapor Chamber all together so i can shim it with a Copper Brick. I am willing to sacrifice my already done Work, just for Science
BTW i have an Answer from Framework regarding the RMA’s and if they have done some Investigation:
My Question:
“I would like to ask, did you Guys start an Investigation on why the
Heattransfer from the CPU to the Heatsink is degrading and all across all
Batches there are more and more RMA’s regarding that Problem?
Even freshly RMA’d Boards like mine do not hit the expected Performance or
start to degrade after a Month or so? We are really active in the Forum and
trying to find the Reason. It would be great to hear from you Guys.”
Answer:
"As for any issues brought up to us (especially hardware related) are tracked and investigated. When things go through our RMA process they are logged and if we find a widespread or niche weird issue, we send the hardware in a bad state to our engineers or manufacturing partners for deeper investigation. If things are found to be out of spec during warranty period, we are happy to go through the RMA process for those specific cases.
Few have gone through RMA process for being out of spec due to believed Thermal Pump out issue, but our RMA team is tracking things further. If we find things are incorrect or there is a manufacturing issue, it is something we would share and a process for things to be resolved."
I didn’t have any major issues with performance (15,015 in cinebench R23) on my batch 5 7840HS. However, I could not match the sustained 10min performance of @PSierra117’s modified cooling solution.
I lapped my heatsink and bought some unverified PTM7950 on Amazon like @PSierra117. With the new cooling solution I have gotten above 16k in single cinebench runs and the fans take noticeably longer to ramp up. I am attaching some images of the original liquid metal and lapped heatsink.
Thank you for trusting my Worklog and verifying my findings. Its a big leap of faith, doing something like this to an expensive Machine just on the Words of a Stranger in the Internet. As you said its alot more pleasant device after the Thermals are in Order
What did you use for lapping the surface?
Today, I ran another test, getting about 14,400 which is probably within margin of error of my previous score, considering that I had been using my laptop all day for work and only had powered it down to drive home, then run the test, so it likely wasn’t a ‘cold start’ as previous runs had been.
I had an idea today to go about replacing the liquid metal TIM with regular thermal paste and I’m happy to say that this has improved the situation somewhat.
Before, I would be hitting roughly 14.5K in Cinebench R23 at about 40w over a 10 minute run, and now I’m getting 15,359 which initially started at about 51w, dropping to 45w by the end of the 10 minute run.
Thermal-wise, I was previously seeing an almost 20c delta between the hottest and lowest core. Following the re-paste, the now have a delta of about half that, at 9c. When the CPU was hitting 52-ish watts package power, my hottest core was now core 5 instead of core 4 previously.
I’ll be update this thread to see if the performance degrades at all
Removing the liquid metal with qtips and rubbing alcohol was pretty easy for me. Removing the heatsink was the most difficult part for me - I had to use a plastic spudger to separate the heatsink from the CPU.
(Non Nativ Speaker)
But i will also Buy a Replacement Heatsink and the LM-Pads which should be available in October.
