Thermal Paste
 

I will be building a PC within the next couple of days, and I'm concerned about applying the thermal paste. I purchased some Artic Silver Ceramique. I was reading the instructions on their website, and it says for the AMD 64s, to just put a very small ( 3/4s of a BB ) onto the center, and just mount the HSF. Will this be fine? Anyone have any tips? I'm worried I will mess it up somehow. :lol: :hmm:

Thanks for any help. :)

Yeah, that sounds right. It doesn't take much. I like to take a piece of paper or plastic and smear the thermal grease across the core to ensure it's covered. In all actuality, the process of putting the heatsink on will cause it to smear correclty. :) Remember: it really does only take a BB amount. Putting more won't decrease temps!

-Lasereth

Thanks. :)

In fact as I understand it, applying liberal amounts of thermal paste may, in fact, increase temps. My impression is, and please correct me if I'm wrong, that thermal paste is designed to be used in small amounts. So, by not using it as it was designed to be used (a la globbing it on) can cause poor heat dissipation and overheating.

I believe that is true, but I would think that the pressure of the heatsink would tend to squeeze out the excess. So aside from making a mess, it wouldn't do any serious harm.

Also, don't spend extra for the fancy stuff. The differences between them are minimal.

The other thing to keep in mind is that if you put too much on it can leak out the sides and cause problems with your board. Not pleasant.

My Artic Silver was only $3.95. :crazy:

Putting on too small an amount of thermal paste will increase heat. Putting on too large an amount will make it spill onto the motherboard, which *can* be bad if the stuff is conductive (newer types of Arctic Silver are not).

You just need to remember that only the center of the Athlon64 needs to be covered with thermal paste for it to work - the sides don't really get that hot. In my experience with Coolermaster thermal paste, you just put on a bit (2 or 3 grains of rice at most), then put the cooler on, twisting it around a bit to force out the air. That usually is good enough to spread the thermal paste. I'm not sure about Arctic Silver, but I suppost it works pretty much the same - could be wrong, though.

By the way, I assume you'll be putting on a non-standard heatsink? All AMD coolers come with thermal grease pre-attached. That doesn't cool as well as Arctic Silver (or coolermaster), but it does the trick.

http://www.heatsink-guide.com/compound.htm

heres a nice guide to follow if you not really sure about what to do.

make sure you clean the bottom of the heatsink and rid of any dust/finger prints/oil residues...

apply sparingly, not too little, but not too much. make sure its even. too little, and it wont conduct well, too much, and it will end up insulating and cause your processor to heat up more than it should.

I use thermal compound from a company called TechSpray. Can either come in silicon or silicon-free. It works quite well.

I love how the toothpaste scored better then the artic silver....himm maybe if I mix it with some oil based substance......