{"id":701,"date":"2026-05-30T16:40:33","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T14:40:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.familie-kleinman.nl\/brain\/?p=701"},"modified":"2026-05-25T17:19:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T15:19:15","slug":"congratulations-your-motherboard-is-now-modern-art","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.familie-kleinman.nl\/brain\/index.php\/2026\/05\/30\/congratulations-your-motherboard-is-now-modern-art\/","title":{"rendered":"Congratulations, your motherboard is now modern art"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">Liquid metal as cooling solution, an accident waiting to happen.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">I do understand why manufacturers use liquid metal instead of MX-6 or another traditional thermal paste as a cooling solution.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">The thermal performance is amazing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">Usually a machine runs a few degrees cooler compared to its non-liquid-metal counterpart. That means longer boost clocks, less fan noise and better benchmark scores.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">But if you would ask me honestly?<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">In my humble opinion, using liquid metal inside a laptop, or honestly even inside a normal desktop computer, is borderline insane.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">In a normal desktop computer you at least have options.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">You can install a larger cooler, add more heatpipes, improve airflow, install bigger case fans or simply accept temperatures that are a few degrees higher.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">There is usually no real need to introduce electrically conductive liquid metal into the equation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">And a laptop?<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">Well.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">Liquid metal is electrically conductive.<\/p>\n<p>Yes, no shit Sherlock.<\/p>\n<p>The problem is that manufacturers are putting electrically conductive liquid metal into devices that usually experience at least some form of abuse during their lifetime:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Moved around constantly<\/li>\n<li>Multiple heat cycles every single day<\/li>\n<li>Shoved, gently and not so gently, into backpacks<\/li>\n<li>Flexed<\/li>\n<li>Bumped<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">Not to mention that users periodically want to open up the backside of their laptop for maintenance.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">If the containment barrier, or &#8220;dam&#8221;, around the CPU or GPU ever fails, there is a very real chance that liquid metal escapes onto the motherboard.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">And in that case it is almost instantly: short circuit, dead motherboard, game over.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">So hey, great that your laptop runs 2 degrees cooler.<\/p>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">But when, and not if, the liquid metal eventually escapes:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"isSelectedEnd\">Congratulations, your motherboard is now modern art.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<h2>Serviceability<\/h2>\n<p>Luckily my laptop did not come with liquid metal.<\/p>\n<p>And serviceability in some cases makes the whole situation even worse.<\/p>\n<p>For example: inside my Lenovo Legion 5 I cannot remove both cooling fans without removing the entire heatsink and heatpipe assembly.<\/p>\n<p>Which means:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>hello CPU,<\/li>\n<li>hello GPU,<\/li>\n<li>hello thermal compound.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>With liquid metal in place, servicing a laptop suddenly becomes a much bigger and riskier operation unless the manufacturer specifically designs the machine around it properly.<\/p>\n<p>In my opinion, if a laptop uses liquid metal, the fans should absolutely be serviceable from the top side without disturbing the cooling assembly at all.<\/p>\n<p>And the irony is that modern thermal compounds keep getting better and better, making the choice for liquid metal feel even more questionable.<\/p>\n<p>At some point reliability and durability matter more than squeezing out the last 2 or 3 degrees Celsius.<\/p>\n<p>Especially in a device specifically designed to be moved around in the first place.<\/p>\n<p>My Legion laptop is still going strong and I do not feel the need to replace it anytime soon.<\/p>\n<p>But rest assured:<\/p>\n<p>the choice of cooling compound is now officially on my shortlist when buying my next laptop.<\/p>\n<p>Brain, thermally concerned, out.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Liquid metal as cooling solution, an accident waiting to happen. I do understand why manufacturers use liquid metal instead of MX-6 or another traditional thermal paste as a cooling solution. The thermal performance is amazing. Usually a machine runs a few degrees cooler compared to its non-liquid-metal counterpart. That means longer boost clocks, less fan&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[96],"tags":[241,238,455,456,457],"class_list":["post-701","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computers","tag-cooling","tag-laptop","tag-liquid-metal","tag-mx6","tag-thermal"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Congratulations, your motherboard is now modern art - Brain&#039;s Ramblings<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Liquid metal cooling in laptops may improve temperatures slightly, but at what cost? 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