Hi, I've tried repasting my Alienware 51m R2 five times now with it overheating within minutes every time, and am looking for more ideas.

Last week, I noticed my laptop was thermal throttling the CPU hard - reaching 80C while idle and throttling at 100C when playing games or loading a single core. My apt's ambient temperature is ~20C. I ordered some "Phobya NanoGrease Extreme" from Amazon and tried repasting yesterday. However, after reassembling and rebooting, the temperatures immediately hit 100C after a few minutes (see screenshot below). A few minutes later, the system freezes.

CPU and GPU temperatures and load after repasting and rebooting

Since then, I repasted 3 more times:

1. The initial repaste, I followed the guides online, and applied a rather modest X on the CPU and GPU
2. I thought it might've be an uneven distribution while screwing down the tensioned heatsink screws, so I repasted and rescrewed a little by a little in order
3. After reading an Amazon Review that the thermal paste I got was rather thick, I tried the full spread method instead of the X
4. After reading another post about having too much thermal paste, I tried the full spread again with less paste

No luck every time, the CPU would go straight to 100C a few minutes after startup.

I've made sure:

• The fans are actually running
• The laptop has space underneath for air intake
• The battery was removed while testing (in case charging was creating heat)

Spread application after #3 (right before #4)(Spread application after #3, right before #4)

I'm out of ideas, and the heatsink screw heads are starting to strip . Did I just receive some bad thermal paste? Why is too much paste bad? If I'm out of warrany, is there any third-party service that can help me here?