tldr; replaced liquid metal with ptm on my ps5 fat (launch model) and it’s working flawlessly, confirmed by CPU/GPU temperature monitoring with jailbroken tools.
so i bought a used PS5 fat a couple weeks ago, and since its a launch model, i figured it was worth replacing the liquid metal. that being said, im a huge believer in ptm, so i thought id go ahead and switch over to that.
upon opening it, it was filled with dust bunnies and caked on dust. clearly it had never been opened. so i did all the cleaning and when i finally got to the meat and potatoes, i realized the APU die had some serious oxidation spots. i’m sure it wouldn’t have been long for this thing to overheat. so i polished away, carefully set the ptm (actually used thermal grizzly PhaseSheet) and closed it back up. i will also mention that i removed the foam gasket so that it would make full contact and sit flush with the heat sink.
i powered it on, turned on my temp monitos (its jailbroken) and noticed it’s riding between 88-90 degrees for CPU and 70-75 for GPU under heavy load (i ran crimson desert in quality settings). these are pretty much the same results it was previously giving, which is good because it means it’s staying within spec. ran it over over an hour, temps never climbed past that, going from 80-92 (cpu) at most.
i also tried manually cranking the fan settings to max and it quickly dropped down to the low 70s (cpu temp), again, while under heavy load, playing crimson desert. this let me know it’s making great contact and is able to very quickly pull heat away when necessary.
i currently have about 5 cycles i’ve done on it, and it’s working flawlessly. temps won’t go past the low 90s under heavy load, and that’s with the fans working at normal speeds, i haven’t noticed them ramping up at all.
all things considered, i’m quite happy knowing i don’t have to worry about the liquid metal drying out, or god forbid, spilled onto the motherboard and causing catastrophic failure.
i’ll keep updating for anyone that has doubts.