Why are there so many different results for graphite thermal pads

[warmslicedbread]

I've been messing with my Dell G7 (7790) laptop for a while now and now I'm just trying to optimize it without turning it into an oven. The i7-9750H runs really hot and peaks repeatedly at 100c after scrolling through a couple chrome tabs when plugged in. Throttlestop is a rabbit hole that I don't want to mess with because I don't have much time to spare atm, so I started looking into a relatively simple solution: just changing out the thermal conductor on the CPU. I've replaced the thermal paste THREE times with varying amounts and my CPU still reaches 100c after a very small load. Task manager says it peaks at about 30% cpu usage for a small peak but temps are insane. ANYWAYS, I began researching graphite thermal pads and it seems like every other test result says something different. I understand that for larger PC's and overclocking it's not a viable solution, but the results seem to be varying. It either creates a decent decrease in temps or does worse than regular paste.

 

Basically, I would love to know about your experiences with using graphite thermal pads in your laptop, and if it created a temp decrease or just made your CPU run even worse. 

 

if the results are horrible, i'll just go down the undervolting rabbit hole again and tweak settings for a week straight

 

and i cant use liquid metal because people say the gallium can ruin even a copper heatsink if it gets too hot so that's out the window. 

 

[Qyygle]

You should redo your thermal paste job and carefully inspect your heatsink. Peaking at 100*C for simple tasks like opening chrome isn't normal operation. It seems more like you've got a loose fit in your mount somewhere. You may also want to check your background processes, possibly try a clean install of windows. Are you running at 30% usage even on idle at desktop? That should not be happening.

 

Graphite thermal pads work ok on desktops because they can have more uniform and higher pressure heatsink mountings. On a laptop, that may vary depending on manufacturer. At best, a thermal pad will do about as well as a mid-tier paste, and with bad mounting pressure, it'll do much worse.

The one advantage of a pad is that it won't dry out over time. With normal paste, every few years it's best practice to redo and remount as the exposed material dries out. A graphite thermal pad won't have that issue. It won't magically cure your temperature issues however, and honestly, it sounds more like an operating system level issue rather than a strictly cooling issue you have here.

[warmslicedbread]

24 minutes ago, Qyygle said:

Are you running at 30% usage even on idle at desktop?

 

It only gets to 30% at random moments when the "antimalware service executable" starts running but generally it idles at 2-7% cpu

[Neggy-Z]

A graphite pad would be worse then using a high end thermal paste, they are more for situations where you apply and never have to change it again.

I own a Dell G7 7700 with an i7 8750H, similar cpu with slightly lower clocks.

From what i can the cooling solution is really under powered for what hardware is packed into these laptops.

Using high end thermal pastes i didn't noticed a difference over the stock paste, the heatsink is just heat soaked far to quickly, i doubt even LM would help.

My only solution was to limit how high the cpu can boost it's clocks.

[warmslicedbread]

On 5/13/2022 at 3:02 AM, Neggy-Z said:

A graphite pad would be worse then using a high end thermal paste, they are more for situations where you apply and never have to change it again.

I own a Dell G7 7700 with an i7 8750H, similar cpu with slightly lower clocks.

From what i can the cooling solution is really under powered for what hardware is packed into these laptops.

Using high end thermal pastes i didn't noticed a difference over the stock paste, the heatsink is just heat soaked far to quickly, i doubt even LM would help.

My only solution was to limit how high the cpu can boost it's clocks.

undervolting it is...... have you done it to your system? Did you run into any trouble along the way or was it relatively painless? 

[Neggy-Z]

11 hours ago, warmslicedbread said:

undervolting it is...... have you done it to your system? Did you run into any trouble along the way or was it relatively painless? 

So my main issue was during light load usage the fans would ramp up way too much, mainly due to the cpu wanting to boost up to 4.7+ghz at silly voltages like 1.3+v.

One of the fixes people suggest on the dell forums is to just completely disable turbo boost all together, while this does help, your cpu is now stuck at base clocks.

There is a setting in the registry that you can enable that lets you set a max cpu frequency in the power plan options, seems to work much better for me as you can set it to what ever you want.

I never bothered with undervolting as this mostly solved my issues with this laptop.

Allow Max CPU Frequency.reg

[warmslicedbread]

16 hours ago, Neggy-Z said:

 

It doesnt even pop for for me- I remember looking at other people troubleshooting this same issue and found that dell completely locked them out of changing voltage. But the percentages should still affect the min/max processor clock so I'll try this out and see if it works. Thanks again!