a few months ago I proved that both
Apple's desktop and laptop computers
suffer from thermal throttling now for
the uninitiated amongst you that means
that the computer's components get so
hot that they are forced to reduce the
voltage and the clock speed and by
extension lower the computer's
performance just to make sure that the
parts don't overheat nice that would go
bueno
but as it turns out to give Apple some
credit I suppose their coolers are
capable of more because on a follow-up
video I demonstrated that when I replace
the stock thermal paste which is the
grease that you find in between the
computer CPU and copper heatsink cooler
which kind of helps the heat transfer
between the two parts
I was able to improve my 2017 13-inch
MacBook Pros performance by about 7% on
average and that's actually quite a lot
unfortunately it was still hitting 100
degrees Celsius and being throttled to
about 2.9 gigahertz on my kb lake i 573
60 u cpu so that's it videos over right
not so fast I'm going to show you
something awesome and I'm sorry to
disappoint it's not an $800 back in but
it's almost as cool I'm going to apply
liquid metal thermal compound which is
so hot right now
well actually it's it's cool but
regardless unlike traditional thermal
compounds which are mostly silicon with
a few additives like zinc oxide liquid
metal is well metal Gallants tone to be
exact which is a mixture of gallium tin
and indium oh by the way all of this
stuff in this video can be purchased
through my Amazon affiliate link and
don't worry I didn't sell my soul for a
vacuum comm it's a real website okay
quick science lesson gallium which is
the main metal in gallon stem has a
melting point of around just above room
temperature 29 degrees Celsius which is
85 degrees Fahrenheit however when you
add indium the melting point of that
drops to a frigid negative 19 degrees
Celsius so unless you leave your
computer turned off outside in a
northern Russian winter liquid metal
will stay liquid huh yeah yeah so
whatever why use this stuff well liquid
metal is far better at least in theory
at transferring heat than conventional
thermal paste and that's why we're going
to use it however it does come with some
serious risks
unlike thermal grease which stays in
place this
is not viscous it's liquid metal it is a
liquid and so it can move around pretty
freely which may not seem like such a
big deal until you remember that liquid
metal is not just thermally conductive
but it's also electrically conductive
and that can be bad so if it leaks or
spills you run the risk of shorting
something and ruining your entire
computer not ideal now technically if
you apply liquid metal correctly that
shouldn't be an issue but because this
is a laptop and it's going to be
subjected to a lot of motion I figured I
would rather be safe than sorry so I'm
going to apply some conformal coating
which is basically just a silicone and
lacquer insulating layer and I'm going
to add it to the traces around the CPU
die as well as some of the capacitor
surrounding the cooler so if some does
shift around a bit nothing's going to
happen now this stuff isn't expensive
but if you want to go at cheaper route
you could use clear nail polish lacquer
instead be warned however that that may
act as a thermal insulator which kind of
defeats the purpose of this whole thing
so just get the conformal coating again
at your favorite website down below
alright
liquid metal time push the plunger very
very slowly because this stuff comes out
crazy fast as Linus tech tips discovered
yeah you don't want to do that now there
is a neat looking needle style
applicator included but I didn't find
that it helped restrict flow that much
and it was very difficult to suck any
excess back up so I don't recommend
using it if you're feeling particularly
clumsy you can do what Linus did and put
the stuff into a parts tray first but I
decided to just put it directly onto the
die and it was fine
slowly apply a blob and then kind of
basically suck all of it back up into
the syringe until you're left with a
tiny dot see how little my tiny little
dot is well it's still way too much and
I had to remove quite a bit of it
off-camera you don't want it to look
pooled up a tiny little microscopic bit
goes a very long way but man moving that
q-tip and seeing it spread out so pretty
made me feel like Michelangelo liquid
metal really brings out your inner
Italian I'm so sorry
Oh stupid now it's also recommended to
add some to the underside of your heat
sink where the cooler contacts the die I
masked it off with some scotch tape to
make the process a little easier but
that's not necessary please note that
liquid metal is not
paddle with aluminium heat sinks and it
croats the metal super quickly because
aluminum is pretty porous in fact liquid
metal corrodes all common metal types
including the copper found in my MacBook
however very very slowly not enough to
impact performance over the next several
years
aluminum know everything else okay okay
so I finally risen pulled my macbook pro
and this is the moment of truth
will she power back on haha yes but how
does she perform first I did the same
Final Cut Pro video export that I
performed a few months back now the
improvements are noticeable but they're
not huge over the upgraded thermal paste
it's only about four percent now that
does sum up to 13.5 percent in total
from the pace that Apple applied from
the factory and that is pretty
monumental but for my previous
modification not much and the same held
true in the handbreak 4k Pro res to
h.265 test about a four percent
improvement from my already upgraded
thermal paste now I be inclined to say
that the four percent improvement isn't
worth the risk but wait there's more I
noticed that during these tests the
laptop seemed a lot quieter that the fan
wasn't screaming at full speed so I went
into Windows because Mac OS is horrible
at Hardware monitoring and after several
minutes in an i 264 stress test I
observed that not only was the CPU
running at about 3.1 gigahertz which is
a 200 megahertz improvement excellent
but that the temperatures had dropped a
full 10 degrees Celsius
10 degrees now it was still warm at
about 89 to 90 degrees but it wasn't
throttling for the first time ever even
after my first thermal paste replacement
in fact the fans had even spun down to a
much lower and quieter rpm all while
gaining an extra six percent in clock
speed and performance so was it worth it
well I guess that's for you to decide
but I get about a 15 percent improvement
over the stock configuration my fans are
quieter the CPU is significantly cooler
and while I didn't test it my battery
life and longevity is theoretically
improved now many may believe that these
improvements over the regular thermal
paste swap isn't worth the risk but I'm
willing to take that gamble please visit
don't worry I didn't sell myself for
vacuum about comments real website to
buy
your thermal pace or really anything
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