Need some advice.

So in advance if I posted this is the wrong place I am sorry. I am hitting my head against a wall for the last 8 hrs or so.

So I finally tore down my laptop because it was starting to go into the high 190f. So being the brave soul I am I started to take it apart. I got it apart but now I don't know how to deal with what I found under the CPU heat sink.

Spoiler

I am not sure the proper way to get all that paste off. I don't really want to try without some advice.

Thank you and sorry again if I put this in the wrong place.

 

Lint free cloth and 90-100% isopropyl alchohol. I always actually use a q-tip and kinda dab alcohol all over and let it sit for a minute it seems to help dissolve it some to make it easier to while up. Then using a microfiber cloth or something of that nature pretty wet with alcohol I just slowly wipe it up. Don't flood it just good and damp. Make sure no AC or battery power is plugged in and let it sit for a little while after your done to make sure any excess alcohol is dry.

 

Forget the isopropyl alcohol.. get a jack hammer & a 4" disk grinder ... :hi2:

But seriously don't be tempted to use a metal scraper or spudger. As pathfindercod has said steady as she goes.

 

I would also take a can of compressed air to it after you get all the paste up. Given the amount of excess paste there is a good chance that some will flake off during cleaning and fall inside of the laptop.

 

What a mess, and a huge waste of thermal paste. As Brother Pathfinder suggested, if you're patient and let the alcohol soak on it a bit it should all thoroughly break down and wipe off effortlessly. As mentioned, avoid the temptation to scrape on it. If you have a stubborn chunk that won't come off for some reason, use a soft plastic material or your fingernail to knock it loose... never metal or anything that has a rough or sharp edge to it.

 

I'd just scoop the most of that with a piece of toilet paper. Finer cleaning with fancier stuff after that.
If that's hardened, then do it sideways over a trash can so everything that flakes off drops into it.

 

Great advice, you can also watch some videos on youtube about this. That way you'll have a clearer idea!

 

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Will this little bit make a difference? Also I was thinking I am not going to be moving this laptop much anymore. I was thinking about getting an xm processor and water cooling it as I use an external keyboard and 2 more monitors... does the laptop check to see if the keyboard is attached, and will it post without it?

edit: not sure if I am using the spoiler correctly...

 

That's enough, bro. Good job. Don't get too stressed about the paste between the surface mounted components. Better to leave it there than to risk screwing them up trying to dig that crud out. You don't need to make it squeaky clean as long as the mating surfaces on the die and heat sinks are squeaky clean.

And, yes... good job on the spoiler. You can make that image larger if you want to.

 

will a 260m sli cable work on 560m? I am asking because the routing is different, it goes around where the cpu heatsink is located...

I couldn't figure out how to make the picture larger...

 

I don't know on the first question, but probably so if the connections on the end are the same.

If you uploaded directly to the forum (which you did based on the image URL) edit the post. Double-click the thumbail to generate an options dialog box and choose another image size. You can also copy and paste a URL in that same window so that clicking the image launches another URL. In some cases you need to click the "Go Advanced" button to see the image preview. If you still see only text, click the first icon on the tool bar and it should change from code to a WYSIWYG mode. Like this...

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If you are using a URL to images hosted by another web site controlling image preview size requires more effort and the use of tags. There are a couple of ways to do it using a URL versus direct upload to NBR. I generally use a thumbnail or downsized image URL for the preview and insert a hyperlink to a full sized image so that clicking the thumbnail opens a new web page showing the full sized image.

Here is an example:

PHP:

This... [URL="http://i.imgur.com/zVaXhva.jpg"][IMG]http://i.imgur.com/zVaXhvaL.jpg[/IMG][/URL] 

notice the different URL for the image preview has an "L" at the end (the second URL) and the first URL does not


produces this... clicking this smaller preview image will open the full-sized image in a new browser window.