Delidded my i7-3770K, loaded temperatures drop by 20°C at 4.7GHz

[Idontcare]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'd kind of assumed that the chips are packaged before they're sorted into K and non-K versions and labelled as such.

Do they get binned as bare silicon?

They definitely get binned before even getting packaged, otherwise they'd be wasting lots of packaging capacity and expenses.

Also, remember they have a special new TIM for Devil's Canyon that they aren't using (supposedly) on the rest of their "Haswell refresh" SKUs.

If they can solder the Haswell-EP chips, and have a special production process for Devil's Canyon to use a new and improved TIM, then they can surely solder Devil's Canyon (or any of the 'K' SKUs) as well for the OC'ers and enthusiasts while retaining their cheaper TIM paste production process for the non-overclockable SKUs.

 

[dqniel]

It's been about three weeks since I put IC Diamond between the core and the IHS, and load temperatures are still vastly improved over the stock solution. I will update my old post in a moment to show details-

Thermal Cycling/TIM Failure Test

System Info:

3570K Delidded with IC Diamond between the die and IHS
ZT-10D HSF with Arctic Silver Ceramique between the IHS and the HSF
4.5Ghz @ 1.232v (after vdroop)

Delidded and IC Diamond applied 8/29/2012

After one week:
(9/4/2012)

Ambient temp - 25C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 67C, 76C, 74C, 73C

After three and a half weeks:
(9/22/2012)

Ambient temp - 22C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 62C, 72C, 71C, 69C

After about five weeks:
(10/1/2012)

Ambient temp - 22C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 62C, 72C, 70C, 69C


After lapping IHS and HSF base down to the copper and using Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra in all areas of contact:
(10/2/2012)

Ambient temp - 21C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 52C, 61C, 56C, 59C

After about four months since switching to Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra:
(1/29/2013)

Ambient temp - 21C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 53C, 63C, 59C, 60C

I'm going to be updating this again, after a long, long delay. Hopefully I'll get to it tonight or tomorrow night. If my gut instincts are right, it'll show that the CL Liquid Pro has remained stable for over two years. I have the same case, motherboard, HS, fans, and so forth- so the only variable that should have significantly changed is time. At a glance, my temperatures remain good.

If I do the tests and they come back with a result that I'm happy with, it'll be on to the next project- doing the exact same procedure, but with a 4690k in a Rosewill Legacy U3 SFF case.

 

[dqniel]

And the update, if anybody still cares about this

I know the 3570k is old news, but I assume the same lesson could be applied to, say, the 4690k.

Results:

After lapping IHS and HSF base down to the copper and using Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra in all areas of contact:
(10/2/2012)

Ambient temp - 21C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 52C, 61C, 56C, 59C

*2 Years Later...*

(10/15/2014)

Ambient temp - 19C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 51C, 59C, 55C, 58C


Conclusion- CL Liquid Ultra seems damn stable for this application. 2 years later, the rise above ambient is right around 0-1C within the original readings from 2012.

I can't recommend this hard to use, but incredibly effective, goop enough.

 

[Homeles]

Wow, thanks for the update! I'll probably use it for my next build.

 

[Mussels]

Normally lurk at other forums around the interwebs, but this seemed like the best delidding thread around for IB chips.

9-15C drop using an old tube of MX-2 under the IHS, as i ran out of MX-4 at a bad time.

Thanks for the guide and the insanely detailed posts Idontcare - this thread is an information goldmine.

edit: one thing i noticed is that one of my temp sensors (via realtemp) is wonky, and about 7C cooler in idle and 7C hotter at load than the others. Maybe this is why 'YMMV' applied so greatly - maybe it was the sensors varying between chips, causing such varying readings?

 

[ehume]

Normally lurk at other forums around the interwebs, but this seemed like the best delidding thread around for IB chips.

9-15C drop using an old tube of MX-2 under the IHS, as i ran out of MX-4 at a bad time.

Thanks for the guide and the insanely detailed posts Idontcare - this thread is an information goldmine.

edit: one thing i noticed is that one of my temp sensors (via realtemp) is wonky, and about 7C cooler in idle and 7C hotter at load than the others. Maybe this is why 'YMMV' applied so greatly - maybe it was the sensors varying between chips, causing such varying readings?

Not only sensors, but the cores themselves can vary in their temps. Compare the inner ones with the outer ones, for example.

 

[Mussels]

Not only sensors, but the cores themselves can vary in their temps. Compare the inner ones with the outer ones, for example.

in my case 1 is in the middle, 2 is always too hot/cold while 3&4 give the exact same readings.

my brother had this chip for years and couldnt get past 3.2GHz due to heat, now i'm sitting pretty at 3.4 with plenty of room to spare - especially if i get the CL ultra under the IHS - did anyone ever have long term negative effects from that? still reading the entirety of the thread, takes time.

 

[crashtech]

Relidding and reinstalling the CPU with the stock LGA retention mechanism results in extremely high pressure being exerted on the die. This is why pump out occurs. An ideal relidding would involve a precise shim around the perimeter of the IHS that would help bear the load of the retention mechanism which must insure contact to the 1155 lands in the array. Otherwise you have PCB flex and pump out, the former only became noticed with Skylake's thinner PCB.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

There is an acceptable error range in the Tj sensors. I'm not even sure if the range has changed much between chip generations. Add to that the variation on core loading under stress, and temperatures on my old Sandy Bridge processor will show a range of 10C degrees under load.

Not sure how surprised I was that this thread has been rejuvenated with posts today. But I've been considering the possibility of buying my i7-6700K processor from Silicon Lottery and paying them to do the de-lid, CLU application and re-lid.

However, between Ivy Bridge and Haswell or Skylake, the stock Intel TIM formulation has been improved with a "new polymer compound." So de-lidding and re-lidding an IB-K with CLU may show an improvement of 20C degrees, but doing the same on the newer generations of processors may show a more modest improvement.

Of course, I'm not yet in a position to know, and I'm mostly guessing about this. Anyone have data from a Skylake delid-relid with CLU?

 

[Mussels]

cant speak for delidding a skylake, but my brother just bought a 6700K and clocked it to 4.5GHz, and he's rather disapointed that its <25% faster than this 3770k he gave me (and i delidded), let alone my old 2500k at 4.9ghz.

It's awesome and sad at the same time, how these K chips have held their own for so many years.

And the update, if anybody still cares about this

I know the 3570k is old news, but I assume the same lesson could be applied to, say, the 4690k.

Results:

After lapping IHS and HSF base down to the copper and using Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra in all areas of contact:
(10/2/2012)

Ambient temp - 21C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 52C, 61C, 56C, 59C

*2 Years Later...*

(10/15/2014)

Ambient temp - 19C
3570K max temps after Prime "blend" for 30 minutes - 51C, 59C, 55C, 58C


Conclusion- CL Liquid Ultra seems damn stable for this application. 2 years later, the rise above ambient is right around 0-1C within the original readings from 2012.

I can't recommend this hard to use, but incredibly effective, goop enough.

40 pages in and a year later, this advice is still valuable to some. Thank for testing over such a long period of time.

 

[xdownsetx]

OK I just couldn't let this go, it bothered me that we had not definitively determined whether or not the benefits observed in delidding these Ivy Bridge CPU's came from replacing the Intel stock CPU TIM with something superior or if it came from reducing the gap between the IHS and the CPU (reducing the thickness of the CPU TIM).

After failing to nail the gap height correctly using metal shims and thick paper shims (I used 0.203 mm metal shim stock and then 32lb paper), I decided to try again with the paper shim method only I used a thinner paper (20lb).

In an uncompressed state the paper measures 0.09mm thick with my digital calipers.

I cut out a shim using the IHS as a template. Here it is before I put the IHS onto it:

I used NT-H1 for the CPU thermal paste, I also used NT-H1 for the HSF mounting TIM.

When I was done with my tests I removed the H100, cleaned up the TIM on the IHS surface and measured the thickness of the entire CPU package with IHS to see how close the paper shim came to the original stock thickness.

Original Stock Thickness (before delidding, contains the IHS adhesive and Intel stock CPU TIM):



And the measured thickness after replacing the stock CPU TIM with NT-H1 and using the 20lb paper shim under the IHS:



They are identical! :thumbsup: So we know the gap between the CPU and the IHS must be the same in both test conditions, meaning the differences (if any) in operating temperatures will be entirely due to thermal conductivity differences in the CPU TIM (Intel stock vs. NT-H1).

And the results?



^ Compare all the "a" cases to the "b" cases, the only functional differences in these two test conditions is the CPU TIM. Notice that the Intel stock CPU TIM outperforms the NT-H1 replacement TIM once the CPU-to-IHS gap is identical

(all the "b" cases are ~2-3°C warmer than the "a" cases)

And if we remove the paper shim and drop that IHS down onto the CPU (not perfectly zero of course, there is still some NT-H1 CPU TIM there after all) reducing the gap to as close to zero as possible then we get the "c" cases...and the temperatures show the expected fantastic drops we have all come to expect from delidding our Ivy Bridge chips.

Conclusion: The Intel stock CPU TIM is not the reason Ivy Bridge's run hot, and replacing the Intel stock CPU TIM is not the reason a delidded Ivy Bridge runs so much cooler - the benefits of delidding are entirely due to the resultant reduction in gap height between the CPU silicon die and the underside of the IHS.

It looks like Photobucket is holding all of your hard work hostage. This is great reference material for dispelling the myths regarding bad TIM but unfortunately all of the information is locked up now.

(Sorry to dredge up an old post)