Resurrecting my S6Fm.

Hi all-
A few weeks ago I decided to get my S6Fm out from the drawer it'd been lying in and see how well it still worked. Sure enough all of it's old issues essentially remained the same - scorching temperatures, memory bottlenecks, discoloration - but it still ran...for about an hour, when the Seagate (of course) 7200.4 HDD I had installed in it decided to crap out.

Fast forward to today, when having some free time I decided to pull the thing apart, which is necessary in order to get to the HDD. I managed to do so without issue and figured, after surveying the mess of hair, dust and grime everywhere on the inside - instead of just replacing the HDD with a spare 100GB one I've got lying around, why don't I try to re-purpose this into a nicely functional machine and ensure it runs as long as it can? Mostly this means cleaning, but sometimes it means upgrades (up to $100 total).

The inside, as I said, is filthy. While compressed air helped some, most of the dirt and grime stubbornly stuck on. I'd want to use something like rubbing alcohol to take care of it all, but of course I don't want to damage anything. I've used alcohol before to help clean CPU surfaces of thermal paste before applying Arctic Silver 5 or Ceramique, but never cleaned an actual motherboard before. There is, of course, this:
Cleaning a Motherboard Using Scrubbing Bubbles - YouTube
but the concept scares the crap out of me and seems way too drastic; it's not like the motherboard no longer works. So any guidance here would be helpful.
The thermal pads on the GPU and what I can only guess is the chipset look like they're gone - full of hair and nonsense, so I'll be removing them and using AS5 or Ceramique instead. Likely Ceramique because the conductivity of AS5 in this kind of space is scary. I'll be posting pictures at the end of this post so that you guys can judge for yourselves.

As for the CPU: the fan has a bunch of gunk on it and the black plastic fins that surround it have frayed a bit (see pics and link). PCHub (never heard of them) apparently has exact replacements for around $32 shipped:
SEPA HY50E-05A-P801 Cooling Fan
I don't actually know if the fan is in such bad shape that it needs replacement though; all I do know is that even with the poor thermals of this particular laptop, running at 90+ degress Celcius is absurd. But, it could be that a thorough cleaning (how though?) is all I need. Thoughts? Any fans that'll fit the tiny space I'm working with, are electrically compatible, and work better than this one?

Beyond that, in terms of upgrades, there are few options but I guess they're worth talking about. An SSD would make this computer relevant, even if the 2006 chipset is a bottleneck, and prices have essentially crashed, to the point where a 64GB Crucial m4 can be nabbed for $60, maybe even less with a Staples pricematch deal. A used one may cost even less but there few of these at the moment. My concern is that I honestly don't know if the BIOS will cause me problems or what. What has been the experience of people here who have upgraded 2006-2007 vintage ASUSes recently?

I have a similar concern for the memory. Right now it's maxed out at 2.5GB but a used 4GB DDR2 SODIMM might be within budget. Unfortunately I have no idea if the BIOS will yell at me/if 2.5GB is all it can address. Even if it can't, I don't think I'll be running anything other than WinXP Pro, so gaining maybe an extra GB of RAM, all told, is probably not worth it, especially if the 2GB DDR2 SODIMM I currently have won't fetch much. I definitely think this is a secondary concern to the SSD, but it's still something to consider. What do y'all think?

The last concern is replacing the optical drive, which doesn't play well with newer DVD+R or DVD+R DL media. Otherwise it works more or less OK, and I'm not sure if getting a newer drive will help much on that front. Now, I don't want to go the external route, but am considering it after find out putting a hard drive in the optical drive's stead is possible thanks to this little wonder:
Amazon.com: 9.5mm IDE Optical Bay Hard Drive Adapter Caddy: Electronics
but I don't really see need for a secondary machine like this - which will likely end up in a guest room or see light use as a spare, unless I can think of anything more interesting - warrants that kind of upgrade.

Much obliged for any thoughts. Watch this space for photos!

 

.. um.. Core 2 duo? Means it's kind of warm on the surface to begin with.

The dirt on the mainboard doesn't matter. Forget about it. If you want to wash it, use a lint-free cloth and wipe it. Perhaps a damp cloth. Use lighter fluid and a q-tip, something like that if you can't get to the edges and so on. If you can, pick the motherboard out of the case and clean the case, though.

But generally it's not a good idea to wash the mainboard, simply because it starts to overgrow much more easily afterwards. It's like your girlfriend when she starts to sha... never mind.

What you should focus on is the surfaces of the chips on the northbridge, the cpu and the ram. Take off the cooler (screws on top, no need to take off the contacts underneath). Use lighter fluid or something that vaporizes quickly to loosen up the cooling goop that no doubt is burnt to crisp. Same for the underside of the heatsink. These need to be clean. Use some ultra-fine sandpaper to make the surface on the cooler smooth, if you can. Don't try to sand down the cpu-core on a core2duo (it should be smooth/1000+ paper, if anything), and be careful with the things on the surface. Don't accidentally put a screwdriver in it.

The core on the cpu is very small, and if the heatsink isn't perfectly level, then it works as isolation instead of cooling. Same happens if the heatsink is full of dust, but that's easy to blow out once you have it opened up. Again, unless you're actually going to overclock it for a record attempt, you don't need to worry about the copper being completely clean. It just needs to be free of caked dust.

So you need two things here.

1. Some relatively sticky cooling goop. Not as liquid as arctic silver, but something a bit more coarse. Since the laptop is going to be tossed around. Happens a lot of the time that people use expensive cooling goop in laptops (specially the extremely expensive brands), and that this is the reason why they overheat.

2. Cooling pads. Something like this: Thermal Pads / Tape | Page 1 | Sort By: Product Title A-Z - FrozenCPU.com  
And if you don't have a heatsink on the northbridge already, you could buy a small ultra-cheap heatsink with 5mm high fins, that kind of thing, and then stick it on the chip with the cooling pad. If you have screws you can use to connect it as well, then there's no problem and you can use anything you want - but consider using an adhesive pad, since it will deal with bumps and so on better than ceramic compounds.

Nothing else in the computer really needs cooling, and I'm not going to recommend that you should glue some cooling fins on the dram. It might work, but might also not be necessary - and even be worse than nothing. Usually it's no problem on the timing/voltage on a laptop.

Put a gob of goop on top of the cpu-point, put the cooler down, screw it on one rotation at a time in turns back and forth. All you want is really to just make sure there's any heat conductivity through to the heatsink.

Things beyond that don't really matter all that much. But I know I've had luck with connecting the metal in the bottom panel to a heatsink near the exhaust. If that kind of thing is worth the effort to you. Most likely it has no bearing on how this laptop functions, though.

 

Thanks a lot for the detailed response.
So here's where I've gotten so far. I managed to get the goop residue off of the heatsink, but have scratched it up pretty good (I'm a genius). I don't really know much about sandpapering, but is it salvageable? How high should the grit be for that job?
I eased off a bit CPU using 91% isopropyl alcohol. Some black goop around the core remains, but I'm not sure how to proceed or whether this is even an issue. I've also gotten rid of the adhesive on the northbridge and gpu. I'm not sure if you meant that I should get goop for the processor but thermal pads for the CPU and Northbridge or if I should use both on all of them. As I understood it you're saying that both ceramic and silver compounds are inadequate to the task because they are prone to getting lose from jostling? Even the ceramic compound? If so, do you have any specific recommendation for the compound like you had for the thermal pads?
The 'heatsink' for the CPU and GPU is basically the metal sheet that's part of the top case (see pics). I don't see where it ever transfers to the fan though.
Like you, I'm not worried about the DRAM. There's plenty of space between it and the cover.
Incidentally if you know any way of removing that ugly sharpie spot on the touchpad, I'm all ears.
Here's a few pics, maybe they'll help:
DSC_0289 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

What about external cooling? Are any of those pads with fans in them actually effective?

Also, if anyone has any advice about the proposed RAM/HDD/ODD upgrades, don't hesitate to comment!

One more thing - the black...styrofoamy thing near the fan exhaust is fraying. I'm not sure if that matters or what.

 

^ no worries. It's just supposed to rest against the lid/case. ..Wish someone sold that. A shop just with different thickness and density for support pads lol

1. Don't scrape on the cpu the black stuff on the side is supposed to be there. You only need to polish the flat surface. Wipe off any of the caked goop, but don't use force.

2. Buy some p2000/p1000 paper, just make the copper relatively smooth. As in just brush over the worst. There's no need to create a completely smooth surface (and don't scrape an angle in it). Just brush away the caked goop, and leave the scrapes. That's why you have the ceramic goop. Heat conductivity when the heatsink isn't perfectly aligned.

3. Ceramic goop on the processor (and the gpu). You have to do that with the processor, because it gets so hot on the core. No choice. Gpu may not be necessary, if the temps aren't too high. Anything you buy now is probably better than the most expensive stuff I bought a few years ago No recommendations for goop.

I'm just saying that it's probably because the heatsink started sliding and because the goop got exposed, that it caked. After that, it takes a very short time before the temps go up. And like you see on the heatsink and the processor core, you get just this crisp dusty substance left that isolates the heat, or keep the heasink from being in contact with the metal..

4. Adhesive cooling pads on the Northbridge. If there is nothing there already, it's probably not a serious problem, though. This could be one of those things that I keep doing out of habit, but that hasn't really been necessary since.. 600Mhz processors or so But any goop will do for a heatsink that's already there, of course. It's just that these tend to not get very hot, and the supports tend to be very weak. So a cooling pad lasts longer.

5. External cooling - best for cooling down your fingers. But yes, they do kind of work. By venting more air through the chassis. If the rest of the cooling works, it shouldn't affect the temp on the core very much (on standard clocks, at least).

 

Could you take a look at the photo of the CPU and comment on whether what I've done so far is adequate? I would be hesitant to use more force than I have (a moderate amount but probably still more than I should have). Thanks again for replying!

I'm not sure what you're referring to; can you please direct me to the photos?

Is it that much of a difference that I shouldn't rely on the Ceramique I've got left? It's not something I use very often and I've still got lots of it.

 

The blue caked stuff. That's the caked goop. You need to get rid of that. But be careful about scraping on the processor core with anything sharp. As in.. don't do it at all.

The cooling - what you have probably works just fine. If the northbridge and the gpu is just connected to the metal panel in the frame, though.. you would probably get better conductivity with some cooling pads. Since most cooling goop compounds tend to get hot and cake easily if it's not completely tight on the contact spot.

But then again, it probably has worked just fine with no cooling for a very long time

 

You mean dried up goop next to the core. That's safe to scrape off with an XACTO? And as for what's left of the white gunk on the CPU - should I just go over it again with more alcohol or leave it be?
I wasn't clear before - there used to be thermal pad on the GPU and Northbridge, so I guess I'll be buying new ones. The old ones were filthy - hair and dust all over the place. Thank again.

 

Well... Alcohol, scrape with a nail on the top of the cpu core. Maybe use some of that fine sandpaper very carefully. If there's anything burned or leftover goop on the side, leave it if it doesn't come off easily. On the green surface, or the black thing that looks like resin - just leave it. It's supposed to be like that. The surface of the die should be smooth, though.

Or - it's better to sand it a bit (the top of the core) and make some scrapes, than to have burned goop on the core. But don't scrape with a knife. It'll survive it, but uneven heat-conductivity off the core can be very bad.

You can use more force on the heatsink, though. The thing is that the caked goop has no heatconductivity.

 

Alright, thanks for clearing that up! Will report back when I've got a working machine.