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Deliding and lapping my i5 3570K - lowering my temps

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I started with the following situation when it came to overclocking my CPU


And that is using a 240mm AIO cooler running full tilt (with 2 fans - have to mod my case first a little, before I can mount the other 2 fans the way I want) . As you can see I m nearing the 80°C mark, making any further tinkering a wasted effort. The reason for this is Intel's infamous cost saving measure on all mainstream platforms since Z77 (Ivybridge, Haswell, Broadwell and Skylake) replacing the solder between the CPU Die and the heatspreader (IHS) with some kind of thermal paste (TIM). My personal believe is they 're using the cheapest toothpaste they can get their hands on. On the enthusiast platforms X79 and X99 CPUs are still soldered, which means the following procedure is pointless with these CPUs and will even damage it (IHS removal) in most cases.



The solution to this problem is removing the IHS from your CPU and replacing the original Intel gunk (it's probably brick hard by now) with Liquid Metal (LM).
There are several methods to do this including: razer, vice and the lastest and best imo a delid tool like the one below which I choose.


You can also 3d-print your own btw

After CPU and IHS are seperated they both are cleaned and the LM (Thermal Grizzly - Conductonaut in my case, any other LM will do) is applied to the CPU Die and the inside of the IHS. Afterward everything is glued back together. LM application in the video below.



In my case I also lapped the IHS of my CPU during that process resulting in a flat surface area between CPU cooler and CPU cooler.

How to:

I only went for 1000 grid (which is enough) and didn't do a polish (useless in my opinion). On Intel CPUs be carefull with touching the underside of the CPU with your hands. Better grab it at the sides.


After everything is put back together I now get the following results:


Nearly 20°C lower temperatures leave much more room for overclocking.

If you want to read an in depth article about this topic hardwareluxx.de recently published this one. Google translate works pretty well for german -> english.

Was it worth it?

Hell yes! Despite my CPU not being a golden OC sample judging from the voltage needed to run 4.5GHz, I now can at least find out what the limits are for my CPU and at the same time lower the rpms on my fans.

Beside overclocking is there an other use case for this whole operation?

A hot running noisy living room / media PC comes to mind, otherwise it doesn't make much sense and even there other avenues should be explored first.

Linustechtips also made a video on this topic, worked sloppy and choose the wrong use case. You can admire the fail here. A good example why you should consider that channel more as entertainment and less as a serious source for pc tech information.

The only thing left to do, is to thank "Stullen Andi" from Hardwareluxx.de for deliding my CPU as I didn't want to spend 90€ on a delite mate and don't have a 3d-printer to print one myself.
 
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Razor method on mine. About a 20c drop too. Then went without the IHS completely, that changed nadda. They really did use some crap TIM on those CPUs
 
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Then went without the IHS completely, that changed nadda.

That's something I wouldn't recommend/do. The risk of damaging the Die or the elements (caps?) beside the Die on newer Intel CPUs (Haswell) isn't worth the risk compared to the results you can get with LM imo.
 
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That's something I wouldn't recommend/do. The risk of damaging the Die or the elements (caps?) beside the Die on newer Intel CPUs (Haswell) isn't worth the risk compared to the results you can get with LM imo.

Worked fine except getting enough pressure for the pins to seat. Was it worth the risk? Yes. Would I recommend it? Nope... there was no real measurable improvement.
 
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i dont think its as simple as toothpaste tim.. its more to do with how they are put together.. some have poor contact between the chip and spreader resulting in too thick a layer of tim.. some being worse than others..

no tim is that bad.. :)

i did my 4790K and it gave me about a 15 to 20 C drop.. when you remove all the intel glue the spreader presses on the chip properly instead of the glue.. its this that gives the real gain not changing the tim.. as i say no tim is that bad even toothpaste.. :)

intel may claim to be overclocking friendly but the way they put these things together tends to suggest otherwise..

be careful with that liquid metal stuff it literally eats aluminium.. i made the mistake of using it on my mostly copper direct contact cooler base.. the aluminium bracket that clamps it down turned into black crud and the cooler popped off.. it took about 30 minutes for this to happen.. i knew it wasnt aluminium friendly but was kind of amazed at what it does to it.. :)

trog
 
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I don't use aluminium based coolers since socket A days, and even there I had a Zalman made of copper. I didn't apply LM between IHS and cooler because of the mess it makes when changing/reseating the cooler. LM is just the replacement for that Intel gunk - it was a fucking mortar like mess. If Intel would just use LM instead of this cheap junk all would be fine. Their chips are expensive enough without any competition.
 
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Update: switched to an i7 3770K




before:

thermal "paste" under the IHS :

after:

... -30°C


btw - this CPU seems to be a very good sample, 5GHz are running Prime95 stable with 1.35V @70°C
 
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btw - this CPU seems to be a very good sample, 5GHz are running Prime95 stable with 1.35V @70°C

That's a golden chip right there if it's only being cooled by an AIO water system. My 3570k wouldn't do more than 4.8 stable.

And the stock paste really is shit, I'm a first hand believer.
 
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That's a golden chip right there if it's only being cooled by an AIO water system. My 3570k wouldn't do more than 4.8 stable.

And the stock paste really is shit, I'm a first hand believer.

I'm still using the Artic Liquid Freezer 240mm with 2 out of 4 fans. Running Prime95 Custom atm for ~15h now to check the 5 GHz @1.35V. The temps stay between 60-70°C depending FFT size and the fans arn't going fullt tillt but around 1000rpm.

Yes, the original mortar TIM between IHS und DIE as you can see on the 2nd picture above was totally dry, more like old paint.
 
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i dont think its as simple as toothpaste tim.. its more to do with how they are put together.. some have poor contact between the chip and spreader resulting in too thick a layer of tim.. some being worse than others..

no tim is that bad.. :)

i did my 4790K and it gave me about a 15 to 20 C drop.. when you remove all the intel glue the spreader presses on the chip properly instead of the glue.. its this that gives the real gain not changing the tim.. as i say no tim is that bad even toothpaste.. :)

intel may claim to be overclocking friendly but the way they put these things together tends to suggest otherwise..

be careful with that liquid metal stuff it literally eats aluminium.. i made the mistake of using it on my mostly copper direct contact cooler base.. the aluminium bracket that clamps it down turned into black crud and the cooler popped off.. it took about 30 minutes for this to happen.. i knew it wasnt aluminium friendly but was kind of amazed at what it does to it.. :)

trog

Use the tooth paste to remove imperfections in the lid, tooth paste is an abrasive. It will remove fine scratches in the lid, then tim on lid after removing the tooth paste. I use tooth paste to remove scratches off car:clap: WINNING!
 
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