Thermal paste swap brought my 2007 laptop back from the dead

My old Toshiba from 2007 was shutting down randomly every 20 minutes, even just browsing. I figured it was the end, but then I noticed the fan was spinning fine and the bottom was scorching hot. Turns out the original thermal paste had turned to chalk after 16 years. I spent $8 on a tube of Arctic MX-4 and spent a Sunday afternoon taking the whole thing apart. After cleaning off the crusty old paste and putting on a fresh pea-sized drop, the temps dropped from 95C to 68C under load. It has been running stable for 3 weeks now with no crashes. Did anyone else find that old paste gets worse than no paste at all? I always assumed it just stopped working, not actively hurt things.

0 comments

0 Comments

No comments yet

Be the first to share your thoughts on this discussion.