Getting the best performance out of the Lapbook SE

[Matej Dian]

Few notes about the process.

20mm*20mm*1mm copper shim is actually good idea, of course you can get away with smaller but still need to cover whole SoC die. Since you have used higher thermal conductivity material between die and shim and less thermally conductive between shim and factory copper plate. With bigger contact area the amout of heat transfered should be ok. Same principle applies for thermal pad on top, you may be able to order cheaper, slightly lower conductivity one, but with bigger size you may actually have better results. Best thermal pad on market i found is Thermal Grizzly Minus Pad 8, has 8W/mK (thats comparable with high end pastes) and 30mm*30mm*2mm costs around 10 euro. There are also cheaper pads on ebay, eg. 5W/mK 50mm*50mm*2mm and should have similar results.

For the thermal adhesive, i think it wasn’t necessary. Since the plate is fixed with screws and with decent pressure, the die shim should not move even with regular thermal paste (should yeild better thermal results)

What about those screws under rubber feet? Did it stick back just fine or had to glue it back?

[seer]

re: removable rubber feet: yes, b careful when u pop em off, and put them back on soon as you finish the heat mod. mine seem to be holding fast so far with no additional adhesive.  seer

[Matej Dian]

Alright i finally did the heatsink mod (since both items arrived). I used liquid metal on die, thermal paste between the shim and factory copper plate and finally thermal pad contacting the aluminium housing. I know LM is a overkill for this, but there were enough leftovers on the q-tip (from previous application) that i managed to cover both die and contact area of the shim. (SoC package SMD’s covered with electric tape for safety)

Paste instead of thermal glue because:
a) better thermal conductivity
b) no need to glue since the mounting pressure is good enough to keep it in place
c) i don’t have one readily available.

This is kinda optimally tiered TIM usage as with less conductive materials, there is more contact area for heat transfer.
Eg: 49mm^2 @ 73W/mK (advertised Thermal Grizzly Conductonaut)
-> 400mm^2 (2*2cm) @ 12.5W/mK (advertised Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut)
-> 1400mm^2 (3.5*4cm) @ 5W/mK (advertised EC-360 Blue thermal pad)

I have also repurposed the original thermal pad, half fold on short side and then tri-fold resulting in 6 layers of the pad and used it on the M.2 SSD controller (only component of SSD that actually needs cooling) although i’m again sure it’s not going to make any difference in terms of performance (since the original SSD is unlikely to throttle).

After doing bunch of testing (FurMark, LoL, …) for more than an hour, device itself is already pre-heated so for the final test i did 7-Zip benchmark. It’s been running continuously for more than 40 minutes (all cores at 2.3 GHz) and temperature is steady at 63°C (+/- 1°C), ambient 25°C. Of course, all testing done connected on AC with maximum performance power plan, disabled C-states and power limit removed (with RWeverything).

PS: Rubber feet seems to hold fine, but i will still keep my eyes peeled so i won’t loose them while traveling.

[seer]

Matej,

thats some serious dedication re heat moding. Great thermals tho,  got my box beat:) but not by a whole lot heheh.  If i run everything short of a flamethrower on it,  well I DID once manage to see 74C for a one or two seconds. Normal “hard working” does not pass 64C and the highest I’ve seen when doing general computer work, in a 80 F plus room is around 54. This is with the power limit completely disabled.

[Pietro]

Hi there, if I use SE just for normal office work is it good to run the remove limit power without change anything physically inside the PC? I’ve just to use the program in your zip file or I have also to change things in the BIOS? Thank so much.

[Matej Dian]

Very unlikely, the power limit mod is only going to help you with continuous multi-core and gpu load. Even if power was the limiting factor in your usecase, SoC would hit 90°C within seconds and instantly throttle clocks down, so there is not much that you can do. Ofc you can disable C-states so it will be boosting more agressively (actually improving responsivness) but it will also run hotter. Disabling Windows Defender is going to give you the biggest improvement you can notice (without hardware intervention / additional cost).

[Pietro]

Is there anyone who can send me a PM with the link to download the Win 10 Pro Lite optimize for this notebook? The link in the original article has been taken down. THX

[Gulali Vakar]

Me too. I’ve just bought this notebook yesterday and I’m desperately looking for the Windows 10 lite image. If anyone have it please send me a PM

[Soyef ahmed]

Hi Chris I have the lapbook se bought recently. I have a problem with windows so haven’t been using it for a while. Could you please help me with these questions.

1) which windows software gives most reliable readings of my CPU power limit, so I can check if bios meddling worked.

2) if I keep windows, does windows eventually auto update itself to super slow and glitchy? I had a big update that resulted in USB HDD not showing in “my computer” but showing in storage section of control panel, and also showing in devices section along with printers etc.

3) I didn’t understand what you meant by DPTF in the OP.

4) I’m not looking to game, but want a lagfree browsing experience. I have found that Linux is pretty slow in default bios settings but somehow windows is okayish, but you can tell from the scrolling that it is struggling. Is disabling the c state very important to get any benefit. I thought c states were good for extending standby time.

 

Thanks for reading.

[Brad]

Soyef ahmed wrote:

Hi Chris I have the lapbook se bought recently. I have a problem with windows so haven’t been using it for a while. Could you please help me with these questions. 1) which windows software gives most reliable readings of my CPU power limit, so I can check if bios meddling worked. 2) if I keep windows, does windows eventually auto update itself to super slow and glitchy? I had a big update that resulted in USB HDD not showing in “my computer” but showing in storage section of control panel, and also showing in devices section along with printers etc. 3) I didn’t understand what you meant by DPTF in the OP. 4) I’m not looking to game, but want a lagfree browsing experience. I have found that Linux is pretty slow in default bios settings but somehow windows is okayish, but you can tell from the scrolling that it is struggling. Is disabling the c state very important to get any benefit. I thought c states were good for extending standby time. Thanks for reading.

What Linux distro (distribution) is this, eg. LinuxMint, Ubuntu, Xubuntu, Manjaro… and which desktop, eg. Cinnamon, Mate, Xfce, etc.
You shouldn’t have to change the default BIOS settings and almost all Linux versions should run faster than Windows 10.  If you want to maximize Linux performance install either Lubuntu, Xubuntu, or Manjaro Xfce.  I would recommend Manjaro.

more about me here

[Soyef ahmed]

I have tried lubuntu and elementary. Elementary feels extra sluggish and does feel like the processor is not keeping up.

But now I have installed Cloudready and having a great, actually fantastic, browsing experience. Cloudready’s display server and mouse responsiveness is wayyyyyy better than any open source stuff out there. Possibly, I’m not sure!

Now just waiting for the copper shims etc to be delivered before I try messing with processor and thermal settings in bios.

From what I read here, I gather that the ‘in windows’ software is only necessary to overclock the graphics. But making bios adjustments are enough to bump up the processor.

You mention that any linux distribution should be better than windows. That is what I expected too. But I am so disappointed. I don’t know why I don’t get a smooth experience on linux. Things like jerky scrolling, etc. I also have the teclast f7, even worse experience with that on linux. Dragging windows around is disturbing to the eyes with constant redrawing. Just not a polished experience. Tried several things from Ubuntu forums. Also asked about it on the forum but no reply!

BTW if anyone installs cloudready, the right click and drag function may not work out of the box for touchpads. Ask here if you need. Plenty of help on the cloudready forums too.

[A]

I recently bought a Lapbook SE and I am trying to improve the gaming performance. I did the heatsink mod and it brought down the max. temperature from 87C to 70C (at the stock 6w TDP). I’ve tried to increase the TDP for more performance, but it seems whatever I do the GPU won’t reach high clocks, it only goes up to 400-450mhz, so I think I must be doing it wrong. Please could someone advise me exactly what to do in the BIOS and in Windows? Many thanks!

[Miguel Silveira]

Hi there, if use a Thermal Pad like this one – IC Graphite thermal pad that i found on Amazon.

I was thinking of using it instead of the copper shim and paste. what do you guys think ?

If i buy the copper shim and paste it will get close to a good thermal pad…

[Bartek]

Hello, my LapBook SE died recently, propably due to bios corruption. Can you dump bios file for me from your working machine?

Use tool like this.

https://github.com/google/pawn or something else made for windows. I really need that bios file.

[Soyef ahmed]

Sorry can’t help you as I am running Chrome OS and not good with command line. Hope somebody else helps you.

[Author]

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