Question Question about ASUS (or any) motherboard's M.2 thermal pads ?

[Andrew_C1]

I have the ASUS z590-plus wifi motherboard and just recently bought an m.2 so I could have much faster and larger storage. I installed it on my top M.2_1 slot, as the manual suggested and everyone on the internet said it was the fastest spot to install it. I've spent the last 3 days scratching my head trying to figure out why it's not showing up even in my BIOS, despite re-seating it and trying every single troubleshooting step.

According to what I'm now seeing others say, the top slot m.2_1 only works for CPU's that are 11th generation and newer, and mine is 10th generation. That's all well and good, and I can move it down to the 2nd m.2 slot, however, my motherboard has heatsink bars that go over the M.2 slots, and they come with thermal pads that have plastic over them saying "remove," which I did when I installed it.

Now that I have to move my M.2 SSD to the 2nd slot, I'm worried about if I should:

A) leave the thermal pads exposed without the stickers over them now that I don't have them. b.) remove the thermal pads altogether.

OR

B) remove the thermal pads altogether

OR

C) not even put the heatsink bar back on since I don't have use of the top M.2 slot. This is probably a stupid question but I just want to make sure I don't get thermal goop all over the inside of my pc or remove something I don't need to.

Thanks!

 

[Lutfij]

I would replace the sticker peel on the pads and then carry on. If that peel is now in oblivion, you can try and use tweezers to gently pry it off the heatsink and replace it one that has the peel from the factory.

 

[Andrew_C1]

I would replace the sticker peel on the pads and then carry on. If that peel is now in oblivion, you can try and use tweezers to gently pry it off the heatsink and replace it one that has the peel from the factory.

Would it do any harm to my motherboard/pc in general to have the unused heatsink on without the pads until I have something to put there? Do they need the thermal pad if there's nothing to connect it to?

 

[dwd999]

You could have read page viii of the manual which is pretty clear: slot M.2_1 Only Intel 11th Core processors support PCIe 4.0 x 4 mode, this slot will be disabled for other CPUs.

Also read page xiii and refer to the chart which indicates that if you are using slot PCIEX_1 and want it to perform in the x16 mode slot M.2_2 is disabled. There's a bios setting for that. So you may have to use slot M.2_3.

 

[Andrew_C1]

You could have read page viii of the manual which is pretty clear: slot M.2_1 Only Intel 11th Core processors support PCIe 4.0 x 4 mode, this slot will be disabled for other CPUs.

Also read page xiii and refer to the chart which indicates that if you are using slot PCIEX_1 and want it to perform in the x16 mode slot M.2_2 is disabled. There's a bios setting for that. So you may have to use slot M.2_3.

Definitely have a different manual cause those pages are different. Even if it does show that in the pre-build summary it should be put in the m.2_1 installation page, no reason it shouldn't. Either way, that is not what this post is about, if you read it properly I was asking about thermal pads and whether I should keep them on the unused heatsink or not if they don't have the protective sticker.

 

[Andrew_C1]

Update: I contacted ASUS support and after a long phone call trying to explain what I meant, they answered my question. If anyone else needs to know this in the future, you can remove the protective film that's covered in the word "remove" (don't say duh cause it's not that simple) BUT, as I read others mention, this can lead to a build up of dust on the exposed thermal pads if they are not connected to an m.2 or whatever the pads you are using are for. I was worried about it melting and getting everywhere (I don't know much about thermal pads or paste so I guess the pads are far less melt-able) or if I should just remove the pads altogether to get new ones in the future. If you made a mistake in where your component are to be installed, like I did, and no longer have the sticker, don't panic, just clean the pads of dust if you ever have use for that part in the future, but don't remove the pads, they said.

 

[Andrew_C1]

You could have read page viii of the manual which is pretty clear: slot M.2_1 Only Intel 11th Core processors support PCIe 4.0 x 4 mode, this slot will be disabled for other CPUs.

Also read page xiii and refer to the chart which indicates that if you are using slot PCIEX_1 and want it to perform in the x16 mode slot M.2_2 is disabled. There's a bios setting for that. So you may have to use slot M.2_3.

Also I did much more digging into that chart and my SSD and HDD are connected to the SATA6G_5 and 6 slots, which the manual says would be disabled if I install my m.2 into the m.2_3 slot, meaning I had to go with the m.2_2 slot and hopefully that works perfectly fine.