Bottom of heatsink scratched

[lynch052]

Hey everyone,
I've been reading posts on this board for about a month or so and learning quite a bit from your expertise. Hopefully you guys can enlighten me a little more.
My XPS Gen 3 has the same fan noise problem that a lot of you already know about. At any rate I decided to remove the stock thermal paste and replace it with Arctic silver 5. After cleaning the bottom of the heatsink I noticed several scratches in the copper portion. These scratches are not minor imperfections. These are deep enough to catch the end of my fingernail in when drawing it across the surface. Two of these scratches run parallel to each other like rails of a track (1.5 mm apart) and are perfectly parallel to one edge. Appeared to have been made in production from what I can tell. My question is, I seem to remember reading somewhere that there should NEVER be scratches on the area of the heatsink which mates to the top of the CPU since it will negatively affect heat transfer. My post on the DELL site got a reply that stated: "Thats what the thermal paste is for". I'm not comfortable with that answer. But I'll feel better about it if you guys agree. If not, any suggestions would be most welcome.
Thanks
Mark

[TRow]

Hello and Welcome to the forums!

As long as the scratches do not impede "good" contact between the CPU and H.S, using AS5 will nullify your problem. Given the scratches, you will need to apply more AS5 to the CPU than usual.

I find that using a credit card to distribute the paste is easiest, like taping drywall. The application thickness: 5 sheets of Standard Notebook Paper.


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I would not consider Lapping the Heatsink, heres why:

bubbadubba said:

Here's an update: I lapped in my Dell HS and it sucked!!! The bottom of that HS was horrible. The surface was uneven and not flat. It looked like it had been surfaced with 80 grit sand paper. So I after I lapped it in and re-installed it I could tell that I had taken off too much material and it was no longer seating with a tight secure fit. The Dell retention mechanism doesn't have any adjustment to it so I was stuck.

I've ordered a new Intel retention mechanism and also the Thermaltake Copper Pipe101 HS. I going to run the Thermaltake 90mm Blue UV UFO Fan that I've used previously.

I've noticed the trend that the more Dell crap I replace with after market parts the better everything runs. I see no reason not to expect the same here. Expect an update soon...

T.RoW

[lynch052]

Thanks for the reply. I can see how lapping the bottom of the heatsink would cause a clearance problem as bubbadubba had written. I guess I'm flashing back to when I used to rebuild MX motorcycle engines.......seeing scrapes or scratches in the cyclinder...yikes! Yeah, it's two in particular that had gotten my attention as I had described before. I'll add a little more Arctic Silver 5 as you suggested.....feel a lot better about it now. You guys on this forum really know your "stuff". Can't wait to "dig" a little deeper into computer mods...anyway first things first. Thanks again.
Mark