System76 Pangolin Performance Panp8: HDD Upgrade and Testing

Surgery table all laid out for the patient and ready to start operating 

This is the last post on the hardware upgrade project I'd been planning for and done over the last couple of weeks. With the upgrade process having been completed and verified to work for my backup Gazelle Pro, it was time to move on to my main working laptop for now, my Pangolin Performance 8 (or panp8 in the shortened vernacular for System76 model reference).

As with the gazp6, the hard disk drive decided for use in this case was an HGST Travelstar TS-7k1000-1000, 2.5" HDD for notebooks [1]. Although the general upgrade process was the same as before, this took a little longer due to some extra work that had to be done.

Noticing some unusual heating of the panp8 under both normal and extended operation, particularly in the area of the left palmrest that would correspond to the location of the heat sink exhaust underneath, I decided to open up the cover to the motherboard compartment as well and do some investigating.

Things took a little longer than planned. A stubborn screw necessitated calling in extra muscle.

Removing the cover to the HDD compartment revealed a Western Digital Scorpio Blue that had been running quietly and reliably for the last 7 years that I've had this machine. What was surprising was the plastic backing with extra cushioning pads that had been screwed on to the surface of the HDD. I assume that it had been put there during System76's assembly process and not by Western Digital, as a form of extra protection against movement and shock. Either way, it was interesting to note. I took a photo of it, which is shown below.

Old WD Scorpio Blue 250GB extracted

Old WD Scorpio Blue HDD pictured with custom plastic backing and cushioning pads.

It was while getting the HGST ready that I had a sudden dose of inspiration - could I transfer that custom protective backing and cushioning from the WD Scorpio to the HGST? Would it fit? A casual examination indicated that the holes and screw patterns lined up, and that it would most likely fit. With that figured out, I used the tools I had to remove it and transfer it to the HGST which was then swapped into the HDD compartment.      

New HGST Travelstar 1TB HDD swapped in.

With that done, it was time to do some investigating around the motherboard regarding the heating issue. Some inspection revealed a large amount of dust collected around and adhering to the radiating fins at the exhaust vent from the heat sink, severely restricting the normal exhaust airflow. This was carefully removed with a brush and the fins then cleaned with a little alcohol wipe. I had a close look at the rest of the heat sink and motherboard as well, before closing up everything and screwing the covers back in place.

Motherboard compartment opened up to investigate overheating issues.

Dust clogging the radiating fins at the exhaust vent and reducing airflow

Cleaned exhaust vent.

The final stage was to run the Ubuntu 18.04 installation image that had been put on a USB flash drive, and go through the installation process as with the gazp6. The base installation process went smoothly, and the panp8 seemed to be working well.

The final and last stage was to simultaneously automate the configuration of custom applications and system configuration for both the panp8 and gazp6, which I will touch upon in the next post.

See you then!    

REFERENCES:
[1] HGST Travelstar TS-7k1000-1000