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How much does adding pennies help?


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I've seen a few people add pennies/other coins to their heatsink/heatpipe like so:

http://forum.techinferno.com/hp-business-class-notebooks/2537-12-5-hp-elitebook-2570p-owners-lounge-2.html#post64008

I was wondering if it is worth doing. If it shaves off a degree I wouldn't feel like it's worth it.

Would it be better to add a copper sheet cut to shape instead of a series of pennies?

Thanks for the input,

atn

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Would it be better to add a copper sheet cut to shape instead of a series of pennies?

I think so too, because adding pennies leads to gaps which you have to fill with thermal paste, this is always worse than one solid piece of metal.

For me such a thing will never be a real solution, but an ugly hack.

Also modern pennies are mostly zinc with a copper plating, while earlier models were really mostly copper. The specific thermal conductivity of zinc is far worse than that of copper, it is even far behind that of aluminum which is roughly half as good as copper.

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I think so too, because adding pennies leads to gaps which you have to fill with thermal paste, this is always worse than one solid piece of metal.

For me such a thing will never be a real solution, but an ugly hack.

Also modern pennies are mostly zinc with a copper plating, while earlier models were really mostly copper. The specific thermal conductivity of zinc is far worse than that of copper, it is even far behind that of aluminum which is roughly half as good as copper.

Yeah, that's why I mentioned it, for both of those reasons.

I also have a gap between my two pipes on my heatsink:

post-6146-14494996078766_thumb.jpg

Should I fill that in too? Although from the looks of it, it won't really matter since the are so close to each other on the radiator portion.

I should be able to get some copper sheet from Lowe's, Ace Hardware or the like.

---

Anything else I should consider (apart from clearance issues)?

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Better use some silver Dollars... :P

Nah, seriously... if you want to do a mod like this then better try to increase the surface of the heatsink, not only the mass... if you check ebay or similar you can easily find cheap little copper heatsinks that come with a thermal adhesive and have an effect on the temperature, at least up to a certain degree. It's definitely not a panacea for overheating systems. What will make a bigger difference is increasing the pressure that is applied on the die, e.g. with a retention clip mod or by modifying the mounting posts / backplate. Just be careful not to crack the die.

The gaps between the heatpipes of your heatsink doesn't matter, rather the opposite, this increases the surface where heat can dissipate.

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So the main thing is to increase surface area of the heatpipe assembly, even though the heat would be dissipating inside the laptop? After a few hours the whole left side of my laptop is quite hot.

I guess I could cut another hole for letting some heat escape - that I don't mind. I should be able to apply a little more pressure on the die without worry.

---

Do you know of any super slim fans I could add? Just enough to circulate some air. That would be nifty, I have a few spots that might fit one.

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The gap between the heatpipes doesn't dissipate much heat, it has little surface (compared to the finns) and there is probably not much air flow anyways.

Filling the gap would cover the surface, but also create new. It would certainly transport some heat, but an experiment would be needed to see if the effect is positive. Thermal capacity would certainly increse by a few percent, but this has no positive effect except for a very small timeframe.

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Better use some silver Dollars... :P

Nah, seriously... if you want to do a mod like this then better try to increase the surface of the heatsink, not only the mass... if you check ebay or similar you can easily find cheap little copper heatsinks that come with a thermal adhesive and have an effect on the temperature, at least up to a certain degree. It's definitely not a panacea for overheating systems. What will make a bigger difference is increasing the pressure that is applied on the die, e.g. with a retention clip mod or by modifying the mounting posts / backplate. Just be careful not to crack the die.

The gaps between the heatpipes of your heatsink doesn't matter, rather the opposite, this increases the surface where heat can dissipate.

Should I use copper or aluminum heatsinks for this? IIRC Aluminum is better at changing its temperature faster but copper is better at absorbing heat - or something along those lines.

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