Anyways, the move was really painless to me. It just proved my backup and restore system works even between different servers. Plus, I got to correct some weird configuration choices I did on my old server that I’ve forgotten already! There’s finally a correct binding between Docker, FirewallD, and Fail2ban among others!

Anyways, so far, I’m quite pleased with the outcome. Compared to my Linode instance, my LightNode instance also has more RAM and storage. Maybe when I have time, I’ll add other services which I’ve passed up before due to my previous server’s RAM and storage limitations.

Ordering a PTM7950 is easy thanks to Lazada. Ordered two (I always order in pairs just-in-case) and then I thought, what about the memory and VRMs? Thankfully, Datablitz came to the rescue with Thermaltake’s Duronaut. Now why a paste instead of a putty you might ask? Well, IMO, I don’t like handling thermal putty. Simple right? LOL! Anyways, I’ve long since read that Duronaut was quite viscous which is why it’s touted for its longevity which, I thought, was quite what I wanted for an apply-now-and-forget substitute for thermal putty for the VRMs, memory chips, among other things. Not to mention that, in laptops, the distance between the heat sink and the non-die components are reaaaaaally minuscule (< 1mm) so it’s feasible to use paste rather than putty.

After ordering, the next thought that came to mind was, how would I remove the liquid metal. I’ve been fighting the need to do this for quite some time since I know of the hassle of removing liquid metal from the laptop’s dies. But then while getting my food delivery downstairs, I saw the small, newly-opened pharmacy on the first floor and thought, A SYRINGE! And so I procured the smallest syringe I could get since I’d only be using it for liquid metal removal/harvesting.

After a few days, we have:

*didn’t include the PTM7950 since it came in a generic anti-ESD bag

And so comes the time for disassembly and after a bit of finagling with screws, battery removal, cable disconnections, and carefully getting the heat sink off without getting liquid metal everywhere, we have:

As you can see, much of the liquid metal has indeed settled outside the dies. And so, the task of arduous cleanup began.

I first tackled the putty on the VRMs, and memory chips and afterwards, the liquid metal removal. Now I didn’t get to take pictures here since it was a stressful/difficult procedure. First I used q-tips to herd the liquid metal onto one big blob on the die itself. After, I used the syringe to suck it up. I found that if they’re not in a big blob it won’t work. Maybe the surface tension of the big blob allowed the syringe to suck it up but in smaller quantities, the weight of the liquid metal was too much for the suction? Anyways, when there was no more liquid metal to be herded, I used a tissue with some alcohol to pinch up anything remaining. I think there were still some left at the sides of the dies but they’re not moving even when being prodded by the syringe’s needle so I think I could just size the PTM7950 a bit larger to cover those areas. I also didn’t remove the foam “dam” on the heat sink so even if there are minute amounts that manage to pool again, it shouldn’t leak out.

As to applying the PTM7950s, these came with applicators which I didn’t use at first. But after a couple of times tearing the PTM, I tried using the applicators and found that they made removing the plastic easier!

*PTM7950 with applicator stickers

I’d recommend that if you’re going to apply the PTM, use the applicators. The PTM tears too easily even when cooled beforehand.

Afterwards, I took the Duronaut and applied little beads on top of the VRMs and memory modules… anywhere that previously had putty. Afterwards, I replaced everything and booted up my laptop and…waited. Boot-up took a few minutes since it was memory training.

As a side-note, it takes my laptop a few minutes from a cold-boot to start since it has an asymmetrical memory size. The onboard non-removable memory module is 16GB but the memory I installed as the second one is 48GB! YES! 48GB! Why? Because I wanted 64GB of total RAM on this thing. Anyways, rant complete.

After booting up, everything seemed OK. And my temps are not INSANELY lowered from before. Now, I didn’t perform an average calculation between before and after temps so this isn’t perfect but based on my observations, before re-paste, my idling temps (while running YouTube or something in the background) were somewhere in the 70-90 C range. Now though, It’s not gone above 70 C!!! While compiling my own kernel, I’ve also noticed that it’s able to maintain 4.0Ghz minimum throughout the compilation while before it’ll fall below due to temps. Amazing! When resuming from sleep, it also took awhile before the temps exceeded the 5X C range. Hell, even while writing this, my temps fall back to 59 C every now and then and I have a YouTube video playing in the background with GPU1 (680M) sporadically going to 99% utilization at 57 C.

In conclusion, this has been a worthwhile maintenance operation. Temps are back down and due to PTM7950 and Duronaut having great longevity, I doubt I’d need to redo this anytime soon. If you have an old laptop, I’d recommend doing this if you’re confident or have it done by someone competent. Removal of liquid metal is not for the faint of heart. The whole time I was very careful since if any of it falls onto the board and manages to bridge two metal points, I might be saying bye-bye to my laptop. I’ve been playing Space Marines 2 on it and it’s smoother than it was before. I expect temps to improve as the PTM burns itself in after a few days. All-in-all, 10/10 for both PTM7950 and Thermaltake Duronaut! Also thanks to Datablitz for same-day delivery and Lazada for the quick 2nd day delivery.

Any questions? Suggestions? Comments? Feel free to comment and I’ll try and answer it if I can.

Update (2025/12/17):
Temps at idle still go below 60C.
Light browsing is at 61-62C.
Video makes it go up 67-68C.

1. podman compose up -d can’t do an intelligent recreate when a newer image is available and there’s pod dependencies. Passing the “–recreate” argument to podman isn’t a solution since it’ll just recreate everything everytime I issue the command.
2. Generating systemd service files are nice and all, but it doesn’t seem to work on pods created by a compose! Now, I made it work and all but that still took some time for me to do when it should’ve been seamless. The fact that it can’t intelligently exclude things is just a pain. My services are quite simple but it just throws everything in the service unit that it makes it not work when you try to start the service.

Hopefully, in the future, the above won’t be a problem. If it still is, I’d rather stick to Docker and wait for when Kubernetes becomes more friendly as well.

Out of the box, it’s quite hefty. According to specs, it’s 1.23 kg / 2.71 lbs which lends a nice feel to it when carried. Take note though, that it’s not really meant to be used while carried although it is portable in terms that it has it’s own 6-hour (more or less from my use) battery. For connectivity, you can connect to it in 3 ways; 3.5mm jack, USB audio, or bluetooth. Charging is done through its USB-C port although it seems janky when charging using my laptop. It was better when charging using my PD-capable charger although, as my USB analyzer is unavailable, I’m unable to verify why it’s unable to charge to full when on my laptop versus when using my charger.

For the sound, one thing to note is if you want the maximum volume level it’s capable of, you’ll have to either choose the USB or bluetooth connection. 3.5mm seems to be dependent on the device it’s getting the audio on, which in my case, is my monitor and the volume I get from it is severely stunted. Maybe about 40-50% of true maximum volume. Sound and bass is good enough for me but I’m not an audiophile so I can’t really go into detail about it. Seems in-line with how I hear from my Sony WF-1000XM5’s so duh?

Cost-wise, it’s bang for the buck I guess. Got it from Datablitz for ₱2,395.00 ($40-45) with same-day shipping so I’m quite satisfied with it.

In closing, here’s a photo of how it’s currently setup.

Para saan ang kasiyahan

Kung gunita mo na lamang

Ang kapiling araw araw

Mas gugustuhin ko na lamang

Malugmok sa kahirapan

Maranasan lamang muli

Ang iyong pagtahan

Another thing I did is impose rate limits to my WordPress site to further improve security and overall responsiveness. This should cut down on the amount of blocked requests being filtered by my WordPress site’s plugin since Nginx will block it first so it wouldn’t reach any further. I’ll know in maybe a month or two if it really does the trick.