NC2000 results with the G51vx-A1. Not as hoped.

So i just got my NC2000 yesterday in the mail.
I was reading that people were getting 5-10c drops in the temps and all that, so that's what i was hoping for.

I had already undervolted my GPU and CPU and nothing is overclocked

I did a Cooler with fans on and legs propped up test, and a on top of wooden table test. Running 3dmark06
I gave both of them ample idle time, and waiting for their temperatures become stabilized after a 5 min shut down.

These were my results.

With riva tuner, i marked the two highest temps and then spaced them out by 1 min marks.


So according to HWMonitor,
idle went down 3degrees Centigrade
While the max temps went down 2 degrees (except gpu went down 3)

The ambient temp here is about 90F.

I was just expecting to see more of a drop, after all it did cost over $60.
Is anyone else getting similar results as mine?

Or maybe I should return mine and exchange for Cryo LX

 

Honestly, It'd be better idea to invest in the copper blocks:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=414147

EDIT:
Well... Cooler plus those copper blocks will be a good combination to cool down the notebook components.

-Leonid

 

Hmm....if you have room on the cooler, try moving the laptop around until the fans hit the sweet spots, which is the CPU and GPU

 

Also, what are your ambient temperatures?

By the way, don't sneeze at a 3C drop. It's the difference between gaming for an hour at 90C or 87C.

 

I believe there's a HUGE difference between hitting 90C and 87C.. 89/90C is when your fans kick full speed...

So, if your cooler can keeps your temps below 90C, it means its being more effective than the notebook cooler itself =D

 

Wait, what?

 

I think he meant the internal notebook fan

3c isnt much i admit. You should see at least 5c drop. Have you seen the NC2000 mod to focus air flow to specific hotspots of your notebook?

 

yeah, but then $60 dollars is a lot too.

Forge, what temp change did you experience with your zalman?

and i did see the mod, but do you guys think my cooler is defective or something?

 

I haven't tested on/off under load yet. ( Left 4 Dead is calling, so I can rectify that).

And I'm not a good person to ask, since my laptop has been heavily modded.

 

What settings are the fans on? Can you feel airflow coming out from the pads surface?

Flip the pad upside down and check both fans are spinning.

 

yeah, i checked it. they seemed to be spinning just fine, a slight breeze. with max


sigh, i have the worst luck with so much crap.

 

Well, compared to what the other Asus users have done.

Well, okay, the fact that munchkin and Kondor cut out a hole probably trumps some 1/16 holes and copper blocks.

WHATEVER MAN.

 

accuracy, you can try this simple mod for the NC2000.

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Beat'n

10chars

 

Uh, um, the one in flipfire's link was in Spanish.

 

?

Egad, you're right!

 

I ordered one a few days ago - can't wait to get my hands on it.

 

That's a great mod idea, thanks for the link Soviet.

Hopefully getting all my new gear next week including a ZalmanNC2000.

Was wondering though, isn't the Zalman made of a special aluminum so that it stays cold thereby cooling the bottom of the notebook slightly even if its off? I was thinking of using black construction paper for the mod but won't that act as an insulator? Maybe some sort of tape or plastic would work better so that cold metal still effects other parts of the unit.

Also wondering if the air flow out of the mod holes is stronger than without the mod.

 

The NC2000 isn't made of any special aluminium. It's just a large slab of milled aluminium that has been anodized black using conventional acid anodization. If they used palsonite anodization, then will it be very special aluminium that I would so badly want to get my hands on. When used as a passive cooler, meaning that the fans are off, the aluminium stays cold because it is just that, a big bad block of metal. Even if you were to rip off the feet of your laptop and have it lay perfectly flat on the face of the cooler like a Macbook, the metal would still not get hot or insulate heat because of the sheer amount of mass and surface area absorbing and dissipating heat on both sides of the horizontal plane.

When I used to have the NC2000, I was thinking of doing the mod as well, but with a large copper sheet. However, my plan was to install the sheet on the inside of the cooler so the thin copper doesn't get damaged or interfere with the clearance between the bottom of the notebook and the top of the cooler.

CFM is increased when you take away area for air to exhaust. That means if you block off all the other holes and only leave holes open under critical points such as fan intakes or vents, then air will be forced more strongly through the holes.

 

I just meant that if I used construction paper, it would act as an insulator and would come between the heat of the notebook and cool metal surface.

Copper sounds like a great idea too! Something very thin so it can be cut it easily.

I'm hoping this mod will do well until I make a custom cooler like munchkin man's. Would realllly like to add copper heatsinks like Forge but I'm worried about the warranty. If something went wrong and I had to take them all off ... yikes, no fun.

 

Construction paper works well too. It's not going to insulate heat since in most cases it will only be touching the feet of your laptop, and the air flowing from inside the cooler when the fans are on will keep it ice cold. As long as you position the holes in optimal locations, the redistributed airflow will outweigh the construction paper by a long shot.

The Home Depot sells a whole bunch of copper sheets in various thicknesses. 0.1mm should be thick enough that it doesn't add too much weight, damage as easily, or interfere with airflow inside of the cooler. And because it is so thin, you can just use a hobby blade or a box cutter to make the necessary holes.

All you would need to do it take apart the cooler and use thermal tape to stick the copper sheet under the holes.

 

Well, there's always a price to pay for improvement.


Anyway, Soviet, do you recommend the XPad over other passive coolers? I noticed with my Zalman on, an hour of Left 4 Dead maxed at 86, while fans off maxed at 87. I'll try more tests, like Furmark, once my room cools down to my "usual" testing temperatures, but I'm wondering if the XPad would be a good choice, since I'm not plannig on lugging the Zalman around.

 

The Xpad raises the laptop by ~6.5mm and gives a lot more space between the bottom of the laptop and the top of the cooler. This is the advantage that the Xpad has over the NC2000 and the Cryo LX when compared with fans off. Fans would work more efficiently because the fan intake isn't so close to the ground, which affects how strongly the fan can intake air. Passive cooling is also increased as there are now air channels underneath the laptop. Less mass and an extremely slim profile equates to a highly mobile and portable supplement for any laptop, big or small. Plus, it receives the Soviet Seal of Approval.

A lot of people have been asking me how it compares to the Thermapak and it's bootleg imitations. This is me going Benedict Arnold on my once loved Thermapak. http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5020003&postcount=6

I haven't tried too many other true passive coolers so I can't say much. If you call out the names of some passive coolers, I can give you my opinion based on it's design.

My philosophy was to make my laptop completely self reliant on it's own cooling. The Xpad serves as a supplement and as a platform to enable me to use my laptop on my lap without hindering the fans or burning my balls. It requires no maintenance and comes in a sleek silver tone, which surprisingly is an exact match of the silver trim on my M570TU.

 

I found the testings on cnet.com to be interesting. Of the eight coolers tested the Xpad showed the largest drop in temperature (from 80.8C to 74.4C). Granted the testing doesn't include some newer favorites like the NC2000 or Cryo LX, but just looking at the Xpad still showed a surprisingly efficient result.

 

Quoting myself from my copper'n'drill thread:

80C degrees equilibrium (at an ambient of 75F) is a freaking snowstorm for a G51's GPU under stress.