Being a giant computer geek...

So - my laptop fan finally ran out of steam. It still spun, but at 1/2 to 1/4 the speed it should have. It also started to stop altogether - a terrible sign for a fan! So, I decided to replace the fan, as well as the thermal paste in the heatsink. I almost regretted replacing the thermal paste: the first time I did it didn't make contact and I almost melted the thing. I tried again and got it right - the computer runs a full 10-20 degrees cooler (Celsius).

Just a few screws...seems easy.

After removing the cover and setting that aside, the real fun began.

The guts of a laptop - the heatsink and fan are the majority of what you see here.

First I needed to unscrew the heatsink for the CPU, and disconnect the fan. Prying up the CPU was rather difficult, the heat melted a lot of the old adhesive and thermal paste.



The fan, fan housing, and heatsink for the CPU pulled aside.



The next step was to pry up the GPU (the copper area in the picture above). This was incredibly, incredibly difficult. It's tough to "gently remove" something that has been melted together. Eventually, and with much patience, it popped off and I removed the full unit. 

Look at that melty paste!

I had purchased a new fan on ebay ($12), so it was time to install it. The fan is mounted with three tiny screws. After they were removed, I dropped in the new fan.

Guess which one is the new one.

Before applying the new thermal paste - I needed to clean off the old ones. I used a credit card (since plastic doesn't scratch metal), alcohol, and some q-tips. The cleaning must be very, very thorough - even the oil from the human hand will ruin the thermal paste. 

First the heatsink...

Then the GPU and CPU

After everything was clean, I applied the thermal paste (I used Arctic Silver 5) to the GPU and CPU. I spread it evenly with my finger (using a plastic bag over my hand to keep the oils from destroying the paste).

This was the first attempt: I had to add more paste the second time.

Finally, put it all back together!

It's blurry from the awesomeness.

It's running fantastic now. I won't feel guilty selling it - knowing it had a bum fan would have made it much more difficult to do.