No thermal Paste??

The processor may not have any heat transfer paste but that doesn't mean that it doesn't have some type of heat transfer medium. If you go to the Intel site, you'll see that they are using a type of tape now. It almost looks like a strip of thick black duct tape. It is supposed to be very fragile according to intel and the whole assembly is to be replaced if removed.

Is something like that on your fan assembly? That may be one cause of our overheating problems. Maybe the constant remote relocation of the laptop affects the fan assembly seating? I myself bought 2 more years of warranty on the last day when my N250 came back from the depot a second time for the same problem and couldn't pass its own memory tests (couldn't boot up either), so I haven't opened it for fear of voiding my warranty.

If it helps, I did talk to some overclockers and they told me the intel tape type heat transfer medium is bad. Do it at your own risk though.

Check this site for Arctic Silver 3  http://store.yahoo.com/directron/as3.html

I have used artic silver on all my other pc's before. However all my other machines are amd not Intel. The heatsink covers not only the processor but also covers the chipset and video card processor. the chipset has a conductive pad that rests on the top of it and the cpu has nothing but metal to metal. I found that kind of strange. im not having any overhaeting problems with my laptop. The only reason why i took the whole thing apart is to fix the headphone jack. For in the future i was checking out the cpu heatsink. If I have any problems with it in the summer time in 100deg. weather then I will probably put some arctic silver paste on both my processor and the chipset.

Message Edited by levi_v on 01-24-2004 10:15 AM

Is metal to metal contact specific for Levi_v machine or for every SmartStep machine. And if so, can we apply some Arctic Silver 3 for those people having overheating problems (probably with the N250). My house is at a cool 18C in the winter and my whole machine acts like a radiator. In the summer time when my house is 28C and above I am expecting thermal shutdown protects. Can the moderator comment on this topic. PS. I have the latest Bios and my laptop elevated 1.2 inches off my desk.

Mine had the thermal pad, although it appeared that Dell disturbed it when I sent it back the 1st time and never replaced it.  I cleaned it off, lapped the heat sink from 320 down to 600 grit sandpaper, and used Arctic Silver 5.  The thing has not shut down since.  After I let the AS5 break in for a week or so, I ran Folding @ Home on it(100% CPU load, lots of heat) for 36 hours straight without a single shut down.  This is now almost a month later and it works like a champ.  I dont even have to prop it up on my desk anymore.  I use it everyday in class on my lap and the fan comes on every 10 minutes or so for 30-45 seconds.  Just keep it diust free and throw some good thermal compount in it and there you go, a working Smarstep, amazing isnt ?!?