Old News


Updated
Thank you guys for your feedback. I have decided to lap my heatsink after all. The votes came pretty even and actually it was cablesguy who eventually talked me into lapping the heatsink


So this is how it looks like when I unplugged the heatsink. Sorry the image is blur cos I was using my phone's camera cos I forgot the charge the battery of my digicam
Yes I know, some of you might say that I have applied the thermal paste wrongly (I applied the whole square instead of putting one dot in the middle then let it spread).




A very dusty Thermalright XP-90. But I use the fan in a 'suck out' position which actually accumulates less dust than the normal 'blow in' position.... (don't think serong okay! )




One thing I made a difference this time is that, instead of just using tissue paper to wipe the thermal paste off, I used alcohol (I can't afford Arctic Clean ). Yes it is very crucial the wipe using alcohol cos after I wipe it clean with tissue, I used alcohol and the tissue still became 'black'.

AND...........






*drum rolls*





YEHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA..... its done!! Lapped using:
600 > 800 > 1000 > 1500 > 2000 > 1500 grit.... Oops yes I went back to 1500 after 2000. I think its the quality of the sandpaper I bought. The 2000 grit one gave me worse results than 1500. It seems that I can only achieve the 'mirror shine' with 1500 grit.




Nice.... nice..... very nice




Also very nice... hehe...




and last but not least.... the Heatsink Lapper... or Lappist... argh... anything...

As for the temperatures.... hohoho... I'm sure everyone is very curious how it is doing. All I can say is, I'm getting the same temperatures as before I lapped. Which is GREAT news Cos when the Arctic Silver 5 needs time to 'sink-in' so yea... 200 hours from now I will post my results...

*Extras*
Here are some tips from me when lapping your heatsink:


This post has been edited by J-Slade: Jan 9 2007, 03:15 AM

Anyone else can gimme other suggestions on how to further improve the cooling capabilities of my Thermalright XP-90?

There is one way though, altough it has a negative effect to you're body...

Change the fan to a super fast fan, but offcourse, the effect would be a noisier fan, and you can be deaf in no time...

Haha... right now running on Nidec 92mm fan at 3000rpm. I find this the most comfortable 'noise level'. How much more can it go down if I run faster? (I can run it max at 5700rpm but I will be deaf before I even come out to work )

Just leave it be... 1~2°C is not worth the trouble.

1~2c is not a big deal, As long as ur cpu temp is in the range of reasonable temp. Spend more time on other things would be better choice

lapped it till it bleed, hahaha

if ur temp is in a reasonable range than better leave it

but if u the kind who wants to get the best out of ur heatsink, than lapped it till it bleed

lap it till it bleed or lap till I bleed?

i dont think it is worth your time and the risk for something that most probably wont do you any good. hehe

erk.. off topic. ts, i wanna tumpang in ur thread. hehe..

does a scrath on bottom of heatsink will cause a big diff? i just noticed that my tt blue orb got a sratch at the bottom of it.

Hmmm... I think thats the purpose of thermal paste. To fill the gaps if there are any... like scratches and microscopic holes... depending on how bad the scratch is, i guess it shouldn't affect the performance.

the problems is i`ve already applied the as5. ok review back the problem.

before scratch, i`ve applied cm thermal compound with tt blue orb 2.
idle temp = 36, load 45++

then after i`ve done some modd on casing, i remove the blue orb, then suddenly the bottom of it scratch with some screws. i reapplied the thermal compound using as5. suddenly it changed
idle = 39, load 46++

so.. i really2 need to lap the hs.

lap it till both bleed, hahaha


ur right, not worth for 1-2 celcius...


eerrrr, ur AS5 already sink in or not? but still if the AS5 didn't sink in, i think it won't drop the temp a lot when it sinked but it u may get ur previous temp back...

if not then again just lap it la till both bleed

anyway, what mod u done on ur casing? care to share it with us maybe the mod that causing the temp to be higher than before but we all need to know what u modded it

haha nothing much la. minor mod oni
just lapik the mobo with thin sponge, added 2 blow holes (120mm on top, 2x80mm on side panel), change psu and that`s all.. erk.. wait a minute.. does the serabut wires will block air flow? bcoz the previous psu all sleeved. and this new one don`t sleeve yet.

This post has been edited by serez: Jan 7 2007, 02:35 PM

Yes it will...
So, tidy up all the cables...

see maybe ur new psu causing the temp be higher, but never thought i would affect that much though, cause never experience once...

so try to sleeve up the wire, manage it (sorok la mana2 tempt) then tell us ur temp, i bet it will drop, at most u will get ur previous temp back

if u hardcore y not..jus lapped it..end is even 1 or 2c drop only but u still satisfy..is about meeting ur expectation as well having some fun doing DIY

if u can tahan den jus leave it..1 or 2c makes no different at all as long dun overheat..

TS, think about this, if you're going to lap again, what would happen if the temperatures goes wrong?

What i'm trying to say is, what if after u've done the 2nd lapping job, and the results is worse than what you're having right now...

Seriously, stay with what you're getting right now...

Just my 2cents...

let me get this straight, if u lapped goes wrong will the next lap fix it? or cannot fix already & need to get the new cooler

Maybe yes, maybe not...
Who knows...

aiyo.. i`ll try it later. still busy with final exam papers.
anyway.. cannot tahan anymore ler with sleeving jobs. i spent 6 hours to sleeve all cables at previous i-cute psu. and now this enermax oso need to sleeve. maybe next time.

so nothing to do with the heatsink lah?

Yea it makes sense... I was thinking the same thing... about whether its worth or not. It could go worse than the current one. Most likely it will... cos lapping will still change the surface (permukaan) right?

Yup!
Consider what you're getting now is good la bro...

I'm afraid if it would go worse...

a lot of people seem to vote to lap the heatsink again... I wonder why... can you guys gimme ur reasons?

@J-Slade

They just voted it maybe coz they are not the one who lapped it

I thought so too.... prolly most of them (maybe all) have not even tried lapping a heatsink

Oh... the horror

Well, some people are paying money to get a drop. So y wont u lap again, since it's free but just needs some time?

its not free since my tube of Arctic Silver 5 is finishing.

Hmmm lets see, firstly I'd have to take it out which is very troublesome. I tried once... seems like the XP-90 (which is very tightly stuck to the CPU due to its 'retention' design) got stuck to the IHS which made the CPU once got totally plugged outta my socket despite its locking

Hmm.. lets see, 2ndly... I have lapped it to 2000 grit paper which gave an almost mirror shine (still very rough.. not totally mirror yet) and I supposed that could already be the max I can do. Unless I find a very flat piece of glass which will of course allow me to lap properly further.... but so far, what I have is only a loose tile from my kitchen. I dunno how flat it is but it looks pretty ok to me....

Thirdly... hmmm lets see.... its just abt this whole lapping process. I kinda feel that it might not be as 'very' much effective as it is supposed to be... sigh i dunno man... kinda lost now. I feel like giving it another try

probbably coz everyone is curious to know how much more u can squeeze out of the hs haha...also guilty here as charged ...anyway u might as well coz if not you'll always be wondering shud i or shud'nt i for as long as ur using the hs...right?

you're right..... i hate joo

haha....know why...coz we're all humans...seriously tho, pls dont forget to post the results...wanna see how much u can squeeze out of that "fella"

forgot to add... maybe u like to take pix of ur progress...sort of before n after...n post it here, also great for ur pix collection...anyway always great to see pix like that

This post has been edited by cablesguy: Jan 7 2007, 08:35 PM

so have u made ur decision yet???

ur rite, agree with u

Yes I have.... check out the first post guys

Btw, thank you all for voting. It seems that the result is almost becoming a tie

just to repeat what u quoted:

"Nice.... nice..... very nice" ,

glad it turned out ok...anyway got 2 questions:

1) cant afford arctic clean, but can afford Sony cam....

2) got time to lap another hs?

1) My dad punya la... for some reason, he's into brand names. When in actual fact, Sony is just all name no performance...

2) Haha... want me to lap for you? Can... but no kick la... you gotta lap then you feel the satisfaction of the hard work.

haha, ya think i'll lap it when the time comes to take the hs out....anyway abt the sony cam...not too bad actually...the ccd n lens are abv average frm personal observation/comparison.

so far any difference before and after lapping ??

kind of curious coz usually lapping results few degree drop at least ...

does AS5 need 200 hours to get sink ?? i noticed around 3 days will do ....

of course i might be wrong as well...

Urm... okay, first time I lap I managed to cool down by 2°C. After allowing AS5 to sink in, got another 2°C.

Now second time with proper lapping and much 'cleaner' shine, the temperature remains the same as before (dropped 4°C) but not yet sink in so I am expecting another 2°C drop...

means... my total effort in lapping heatsink (with quality AS5 thermal paste) should be around 6°C... but who knows, I might get better results. Will update it in a week's time.


*update*

I just tested my Prime95... got a noticeable 2°C drop from before.....

This post has been edited by J-Slade: Jan 8 2007, 09:50 PM

great result from your great effort..

great, so the lapping really drop 2 degrees

Thank you so much

Yes, it really did drop by 2°C........ better than 1°C

Anyway peeps, this is out of topic but before I threw away the trashed up sandpaper, I managed to lap one more heatsink for today...



Tadaaa~
My old skool socket 754 AMD stock heatsink. Yea I'm not gonna use it but oh well, since I had extra sandpaper might as well not let it go to waste.

damn, so nice lapped heatsink, guess u don't need any mirror in ur house

nice job on the lapping

may i suggest TS to edit the post..n mod make this sticky as guide for lapping heatsink

Thank you

But my post is far from worthy to be stickied. In fact I think this other post,
http://forum.lowyat.net/topic/363027
should be the one being stickied because it was from that tutorial that I got my inspiration... thanks for viewing my humble post anyway!