Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

After almost two years of use, I've recently disassembled my laptop. I've cleaned the case, mobo, heatsink and fins, fan, and reapplied new thermal paste. I've also added an additional cooling hole under the fan on the outside of the case. Things are great now. As far as Dolphin and PC gaming, I've easily gained 15C+ compared to how things were running before. It's great. I used to have to worry about the laptop getting extremely hot (especially while overclocked) and now I don't have to worry about it anymore.

You've gotta love how the factory applies thermal paste.









You'll have to forgive the camera, it's not the greatest.

There's probaby not a whole lot to talk about here, but I figured I'd share anyway. Anyone having cooling issues I'd highly recommend that you open it up and make it right.

I may as well eventually try reapplying the paste on my wimpy MacBook Air's wimpy CPU. It's a bit of an oven right now, even more so than I think I remember it being when I first got it.

Shame that trick can't solve my laptop's heating problems. The fan is so small it gets clogged by dust very easily, and I have to blow it out every month or so. Bleck. I hate this house.

It wasn't just the thermal paste (although that was a big part of the issue).

I kept the fan clean regularly, since it was easy to get to the fan without having to disassemble the entire laptop every time I wanted to do that. Even so, the fins on the heatsink (picture 3 all the way to the right) was pretty clogged and was not accessible otherwise. It didn't matter how clean I kept the fan, the hot air wasn't finding its way passed the fins and out of the case.

So in order of what made the most difference in my case:

New thermal paste
Unclog the heatsink fins
Extra cooling vent added
Clean the fan

Now the laptop is just able to breathe properly, it makes all the difference.

My laptop was cheap to begin with and not even suitable for playing Dolphin even on really old SVN builds. That said, I still use it for less demanding emulation now and then. I doubt I can take mine apart as extensively as yours (I'm not willing to mostly, need to buy a new laptop anyway) but I should check for dust. It's never been cleaned (never thought it was dirty) but I notice the fan tends to turn on a lot sooner than when I first got it or even when I took it to college.

Btw SS, how hard was it for you to navigate through the whole process of disassembly and reassembly? Ever feel there were points where you might have messed up something beyond repair? Just curious; dunno if I could have done it myself.

(05-09-2013, 03:26 PM)Shonumi Wrote: [ -> ]Btw SS, how hard was it for you to navigate through the whole process of disassembly and reassembly? Ever feel there were points where you might have messed up something beyond repair? Just curious; dunno if I could have done it myself.

I wouldn't consider it to be a difficult job. If you remove a screw, you put it back. If you remove a ribbon cable, you put it back when you're done. You do end up with a nice pile of screws and parts when you're done, but just go slowly and be organized and you shouldn't have any issues. There is no rush, and it's not like you can put something in the wrong spot. Everything only has one place that it can go, and so you put it there. Once you get around the laptop case, it's not much different from any other PC.

Just one thing that I've learned that I'd like to pass on, do not do this in front of other laptop owners. It seems that when they see you do something like this, they seem to automatically want you to do the same thing to their laptop and assume that you will.

Quote:I doubt I can take mine apart as extensively as

You need to do it ...for scientific purpose

Starscream Wrote:but just go slowly and be organized and you shouldn't have any issues.

That's a very high prerequisite. Again, dunno if I could have done it myself :p

admin89 Wrote:You need to dot it ...for scientific purpose

Nah, I'll most likely screw something up. Besides, I'd rather just keep using my laptop until it dies, then buy a new one. I'll dissect it once it's been worked to death

@Shonumi

"Put thing where thing fits."

Seriously it's not hard. I don't know how you could manage to fuck it up. Like SS said even if you somehow forget where something goes it's not going to fit anywhere except where it's supposed to go.

(05-09-2013, 08:31 PM)NaturalViolence Wrote: [ -> ]@Shonumi

"Put thing where thing fits."

Seriously it's not hard. I don't know how you could manage to fuck it up. Like SS said even if you somehow forget where something goes it's not going to fit anywhere except where it's supposed to go.

You guys act like it's the putting things back together that's my problem. It's the taking things apart where I manage to get things messed up. "How can you be bad with screws?" you ask, "Easily," I say. Can't tell you how many I've jacked up trying to get them in and out when I was investigating my older computers. I may just be unlucky, but half of the screws in every computer I've tried to take apart just didn't want to turn to loosen up, and I've left my fair share of stripped screws inside 3 machines already. Those are all systems I could not care less about, so imagine my hesitation with a system I semi-frequently use.