SM301

Is it hard to open the notebook, and reapply thermal paste? I have Arctic Silver 5 and Arctic MX-4, how is the fixation on the heatsink for the CPU and where is it located?

If you have the np9380s then it comes stock with Diamond IC which in my opinion is a better alternative than the Arctic products. Right now your temps don't seem terrible. Have you tried undervolting to bring down the heat a little? It did lower the temps on my w230st.

If the cpu is 99C and the air coming out is room temp, then it sounds like the heat is not being transfered to the heatsink. Are you sure the thermal paste has a nice even, and thin coating? It should be very thin but completly cover the die, without anything between. If that is right, then maybe a heatpipe is dead or broken. I would heat it up upgain, let it hold temp for a while, then quickly open the unit and see if the heat sink is hot, and which parts of it are hot. Be carefull you don't burn yourself.

After I had reapplied the paste last night it was running at 99c in SC2 but once I gave up on playing I changed my undervolting from -80mW to -100mW. I left it running the XTU stress test overnight and while I was at work today. The temps have been averaging between 65-70c at 100% CPU load. The entire time I can feel warm air blowing out the side and even as I type this now I can feel it blowing as a constant warm/hot temp like it should. However, if I load up SC2 at random times the fans go into overdrive, the air comes out cool and the cpu throttles until I get about 1-5fps. It starts randomly but once it does it continues until I close the game out. I'm thinking its an issue with SC2 and Windows 8.1.

While running Battlefield 3 the CPU never goes above 72c and its running like it should.

I have a 4800MQ in a w230st. I'm averaging 50c idle and 99c while running anything intensive. I have been trying to play StarCraft 2 and on some maps the game is completely unplayable. I have undervolted and its not making much of any difference. When the PC is saying the temps are 99c the fans are going at full blast but the air coming out feels cool. I'm thinking I may have a defective CPU. I reapplied thermal paste and it is done correctly.

I use a Das Keyboard Ultimate. It's a mechanical keyboard with all blank keys. It takes a little getting used to but once you get the feel for it its great. You can replace the keys with custom keys as well. Ive changed out all of my function keys with custom caps. I have the keyboard with the Cherry MX blue switches. Blue switches are clicky. The brown switches are quieter. I have owned both styles and just find that I like the click better.

Das Keyboard Model S Ultimate | Das Keyboard

WD portable drives also have their USB port built into the drives controller. On Seagate/Toshiba etc it is a regular 2.5in drive plugged into a SATA to USB adapter. If you break the port you can always pull the drive and put it in another enclosure. If you break the port on a WD drive it has to be repaired by WD.

Can the Prema BIOS be safely flashed back to stock or is there a higher chance of bricking like with a downgrade? Thanks