Dell M1210 GPU cooling problems

[R00man]

Ok so my dad recently gave me his laptop which had janked out so i fixed it and he gave it to me. I do on the other hand have one problem with it still the GPU with this model has been known for its bad cooling. After some fooling around with the laptop this problem became evident. I tried seeing what this laptop could handle so I tried running portal and my display quickly became deprived of all it colors

I quit the game and the colors shortly returned

I immediately knew something had to be done about the cooling problem so being smart I took pictures of the motherboard and heatsink the first time I opened it so by looking at these pictures I hope you all can help me fix this cooling problem I was thinking of adding another intake fan. so here are the pictures
GPU:

Overview:

any advice is greatly appreciated.

 

[Aguiluz]

Try some arctic silver?

 

[Nintendofreak]

Yea, I know the feeling. Laptops can have hardware internally placed in the most terrible spot when it comes to heat dispersement.

A few temporary solutions include:
1. Laptop cooling stand/desk
2. Any external fan (makes portability useless)
3. Sometimes a good prop under the Laptop cools it down considerably, Like a book or case.

There are harder, but Longterm solutions:
1. Add another internal fan as you suggested
2. Get a fan controller, (digital or physical: digital would require a fan that supports the software)
3. Replace the main fan with a faster one, and or pointed in a different direction besides out.

The main problem is that the GPU is located fairly far away from the Only fan, and is instead next to the long, skinny heat-sink.
One big idea would be to add a cross-breeze fan. A fan that blows air in from the other direction and get sucked out of your already installed fan.
Having a fan that blows out without a main intake isn't the best idea. Plus, your GPU is far away enough for it to have passive cooling temps.
I despise passive cooling for gaming.

PS. I was playing Portal today : D

 

[snowpenguin]

This is the solution to all your problems.

Nintendofreak, the whole point of a heatpipe like the one on his laptop is to channel the heat to a different place, in this case the large heatsink around the fan.

R00, your best bet is probably to take the heatsink off, replace the thermal paste with some good stuff like AS5, then if you need to add bits of copper and aluminum where you can to try to make the heatsink bigger, but around the fan mostly.

 

[Nintendofreak]

I know what a heat sink is. The problem as I see it, from the GPU to the Fan the heat sink is too long for the best heat dispersement, the heat is not blown out very well.

 

[snowpenguin]

I didn't say the whole point of a heatsink. I said a heatpipe. The heatpipe MOVES the heat through itself to the other end where a large heatsink is sitting around.

 

[Bibin]

Oh god stop right now just STOP

Make sure it's not the LCD itself. Plug it into another monitor to be sure. That picture looks a lot like an LCD data cable issue.

 

[XCVG]

Could be both. I'm assuming the orange cable goes to the LCD. Look how close it is to that heatpipe. It probably doesn't like that heat very much.

 

[R00man]

I think it was both because it would work fine with an external display but I tested my luck and tried reflowing it in the oven and it woks!

 

[Bibin]

It was probably just unplugging and replugging the LCD that fixed it... Your GPU did NOT have cooling issues. It did NOT need a reflow. Coincidence deserves some thanks.

 

[R00man]

No it was definitely the reflow that fixed it because i had tried reinserting the cable many times and it didn't work because that was my first intention when I opened it up.

 

[PalmerTech]

Hmm...

R00man, it still does this, at least for me. Within 10 seconds of booting TF2, warped image.

 

[R00man]

crap really It worked fine for me. I played tf2 for 2 hours on it even with out any problems.

 

[PalmerTech]

It actually decided to work all of a sudden for no reason! Then it decided to not work... And now it is working again. :-/

I am sure you shipped it in full good conscience, this is just why I am always wary of nVidia reflow jobs. I had a problem like this on an HP DV6000, and a reflow "fixed" it every time, three times... But only for a little bit.

 

[R00man]

well dang I thought it was fixed for good I do know for a fact that it is the cable's connector with the heat problem not the actual gpu so if you were to replace that vga port there shouldn't be random fuzzies attacking. Sorry it ended up messing up again.