E7450 Thermal paste question

I took my e7450 apart to reapply the thermal paste. The stock application looked pretty bad as you can see.

But I am wondering something, The processor seems to have 2 mirrored surfaces. One of them was covered by the paste and one was completely uncovered. What is the second surface for and should I apply anything to it if it was not covered from the factory?

This is the 5th gen i7 (e7450)

 

This article explains that the smaller chip in the CPU package is the platform controller hub (PCH). If it has been given a shiny surface then I would interpret that as an indication that it should have some thermal paste. The dollop of paste on your CPU is the right size but in the wrong place. Clean it all up and reapply. There's no need to be as generous as the person in Dell. The equivalent of one grain of rice should be enough for the PCH and a bit more on the CPU chip. There has to be enough paste to fill any gaps between the chip surfaces and heat sink but more is wasteful. If you arent sure how much then try putting some paste, fix down the heat sink then remove it again to see how well it spread (too much or any gaps?). Then clean up and do it again.

John

 

Thanks! I cant understand why dell can mess such a simple thing up.

 

I agree. This shouldn't happen. Perhaps someone in a factory who is allowed 10 minutes to assemble the computer wasn't giving proper attention.

Fortunately, Dell makes the Latitudes reasonably easy to service (unless you have the dGPU version of the E7450 which is somewhat different inside to the iGPU version).

John