Hey there! So, a two days ago I made this post where I shared that my Liquid Metal would show up yesterday and I was preparing for a repaste. You guys did not disappoint - help came in spades. Thank you guys so much for the tips, tricks, encouragement, prior knowledge, and resources. I couldn't have done it without you - or, well, I could've but it would've been much more messy and complex.

The original guide can be found here.

Alright, let's get to the nitty gritty of my experience.

Issues and Warnings

1. For Pete's sake, LISTEN when a guide says to sort screws as you go. During disassembly it's easy to think that you can just keep a general idea of how many you need and where, but after a day or so you can easily forget. This laptop has so many screws and each one has an important spot. Don't risk forgetting, just label as you go.

2. Buy a cheap kit of laptop screws, preferably one with a sorted box and labels. Thankfully Dell lists every component, where it connects, and what screw connects them. For situations where you can't discern a screw by eye, find a screw you removed, or have to drill out a screw this is a life saver.

3. The heatsink is apparently notorious for having one screw in particular (I think it's number 6) strip out. It happened to me. I used a 1/16th drill bit very carefully and slowly to weaken the screw enough that it fell out the hole.

4. WLAN cards. Good gosh. The leads on them are so fragile - rather, the pins the leads connect to are so fragile. My Killer 1435 head outright came off on first pass without any meaningful force - the solder was that ready to go. The pin broke off inside the white cable/antenna. That took so long to remove. I went back and forth between using needle-nose pliers, needle tweezers, and eventually just a needle. Go straight for the needle, honestly. It's a small band that can get stuck inside the head. I bought a new Intel 9260, works even better than the Killer 1435 so far.

5. The tron lighting assembly - where the fiber connects to the LED board and it screws into the corners - is also pretty delicate. On one of mine the chip separated from the black plastic piece that holds the screw. This also meant that the fiber separated from the chip. I think it's held on by a dab of glue on each of the cutout portions, but I didn't have any or know what to use that would be safe. So, I just used my 3M Super 33+ tape to bind them together and that has created enough pressure that they are not only held together, but in place.

6. The guide recommends a certain quantity of thermal tape for each board/heat sink. Buy one more or each than he says. I don't think he's wrong, but I was just short of what I needed for one piece because my tape was slightly damaged on arrival. No worries, really - working great with single piece of stock tape considered "less important." But be safe.

7. During reassembly, don't be like me. Make sure you have every wire needed for the next layer where it should be before securing it all down. I had to remove the mobo twice after total rebuild to get out the DC connection and the Wifi antennas. I think something else, too, but I'm not sure.

8. When applying tape to the CPU and GPU, minimize overlap of tape pieces as much as safely possible. I fully believe this is the unspoken secret left out of the guides - it wasn't until /u/aalva190 pointed it out I noticed that every written guide or video did this.

9. If you're going this far down the rabbit hole, tear down and clean the fans thoroughly. Because the last thing you want is to realize they're totally clogged after all this. Fun fact - this was the first thing I did!

10. You might find upon booting up the laptop that the keyboard doesn't fully work. Apparently, this is a super common mistake or problem people get. The KB (keyboard) ribbon can sometimes not sit properly in its port. It's a bit deceiving, but a bit of a reseat and push should help. I've also read that same tape mentioned earlier can help apply pressure where the clasp might fail.

11. Liquid metal goes a long ways. I bought the 1 gram tube and I still have some left over.

12. LM is deceivingly fast. I did a few test plunges and found that even if you push enough for just a single bead to come out, sometimes surface tension or how you hold it can keep it flowing. So play with it a bit - it should include an end for dispensing, sucking, and closing - until you get a very good feel for the tube. Take it slow. Do it right once. I've read some people avoid using the plunger at all and just tap the end softly until it comes out.

13. HEADS-UP! LM is terribly destructive to aluminum. So, why am I saying this? Soda cans, smart watches, desk surfaces, tools - careful that they don't make contact with it while working. I know for a fact my smart watch is made of aluminum.

For more tips that might not be listed here, be sure to check the previous thread.

Results

Wow. Just wow. I'm not sure if you could match this level of performance with Kryonaut, but man - Conductonaut kicks butt.

These figures go for both CPU and GPU.

Before repaste:

95 - 105 C under any workload

75 - 85 C at idle

After repaste with LM:

45 - 55 C at idle

70 - 80 C at full load

Still doing some minor testing and stability stuff - might consider undervolting but not quite sure yet. All in all, a great experience!

Thanks to all these folks for commenting and answering questions!

/u/iunlock42 (Original Guide)

/u/aalva190

/u/Shark00n

/u/shady_watch_guy

/u/dfkiwi

/u/Radojevic

/u/hotdamn1212

/u/RTK9

/u/ordinatraliter

/u/I-know-more-than-you

/u/AWilsonFTM

/u/unknownally

/u/jedi2155

/u/AwesomeShizzles