Alder Lake CPUs almost 5 degrees cooler, if you bend the cooling problem straight again – ILM-Mod for the Intel socket LGA-1700 | practice

Intel’s Alder Lake CPUs run hot, very hot. A few weeks ago, Igor identified the bending of the CPU and mainboard due to the LGA1700 socket as a potential cause of this. Today I’m going to show you a simple modification with which you can gain up to 5 ° C in CPU core temperatures and which could hardly be easier. We have to thank (again) buildzoid from Actually Hardcore Overclocking, who had the original idea for the mod and had his results validated by me. You will see the fruits of it today.

First of all, we have to understand the initial situation by taking a closer look at the new LGA-1700 socket from Intel and its Independent Loading Mechanism (ILM). It is important to note that the base has become larger and more rectangular, but the ILM is still building its pressure at the same points along the long edges.

This is different to the predecessor LGA1200, where the socket was smaller and almost square, or to the LGA2066, where the socket is larger, but the pressure by the ILM is built up at the corners of the CPU and thus better distributed. In the case of the LGA1700, the obvious conclusion is that the CPU is bent down in the middle and thus sits lower there than on the short edges. This ultimately results in a U-shaped curvature of the entire CPU including the Integrated Heat Spreader (IHS), with the axis drawn in pink at the top being the lowest.

A matching picture also emerges if we look at a CPU with several hundreds of hours of operating time alone next to a straight edge (or something that comes close to one). Here, too, it can be seen that the CPU is convex from above and concave from below, slightly bent in English along the axis where the ILM applies its pressure. If the center of the CPU is now lower than the rest, the cooler base cannot make optimal contact and the heat has to overcome more distance through the gap-filling thermal paste. So if you could fix the bend, theoretically better cooler contact and lower temperatures should result.

The mod is just as simple as it is ingenious: washers are simply installed between the mainboard and the ILM, which effectively sits higher and thus exerts less pressure on the CPU in the socket. Before we start screwing on the mainboard, you should of course first de-energize the system so that a screw that may fall cannot cause a short circuit.

For the mod, all you have to do is loosen the four M4 Torx T20 screws of the ILM. So that the backplate of the base does not simply fall off the back afterwards, it is advisable to lay the mainboard on a flat surface beforehand or, as here, to leave the backplate of the cooler installed, which holds the base in position.

The CPU can also remain in the socket and thus protect the sensitive pins of the LGA socket. However, caution is of course advisable, as only gravity holds the CPU in the socket. The M4 washers are now simply placed on the 4 screw holes, regardless of whether they are made of metal or plastic. We’ll get to the recommended height on the next page in the tests.

Now simply reinstall the ILM with the four screws, although I cannot give a fixed torque value. Based on the perceived effort to loosen the screws, I recommend “only lukewarm”. Now close the base again as usual, which should now be a little easier, and install the cooler as usual.