9800 Pro problem post-AS5 application

[SpocksBrain]

I recently applied Arctic Silver 5 to the GPU of my 9800 Pro, after removing the original goop. I was careful to not get any AS5 on any areas outside of the raised area of the heatsink that contacts the core and the GPU core itself. I made sure the layer was as thin as possible with my trusty pocketknife, being careful not to scratch the core.

Since then, my system has had consistent video crashes, even when I've used WinClk to underclock my card, owing to the comments I've seen regarding the 'burn in' time AS5 seems to require.

What's going on here?

-SB

P.S. The crashes usually involve video corruption/screen going blank, followed by a reboot. My current hypothesis is that there's a heat transfer problem, but I can't figure out why. I re-mounted the cooler properly...

P.P.S. I've read on the boards here that some people don't use AS5 due to its supposed electrical conductivity. Should I just get some Ceramique for GPUs? Would I be able to avoid this problem? I've never had problems with applying AS to CPU cores.

 

[deadken]

Did you change the HS/Fan? If you did, did you remove the 'shim' that sits around the core? The stock cooler has a 'bump' on it that will allow it to make contact with the GPU core. If you switched to something like an Arctic Cooler (you can get on for $10 @ SVC.com), you will need to remove the shim in order to make contact with the core.

If everything else stayed the same, then I don't know what you did.

 

[SpocksBrain]

That's the thing...

Everything else stayed the same. I just re-mounted the stock ATI cooler.

-SB

 

[SpocksBrain]

bump

Anyone have advice on this?

 

[ArtisTClerK]

I would reapply with céramique. That would be the most logical assumption. AS5 is causing the problem if all other ideas have been cut out or you could reapply AS5 again to see what would happen.

 

[SpocksBrain]

Here are a few pics of the application I had on there...looks appropriate to me, in any case:

http://chiaroscuros.googlepages.com/9800.jpg
http://chiaroscuros.googlepages.com/core.jpg
http://chiaroscuros.googlepages.com/stockcooler.jpg

Grabbed some cheap Radio Shack thermal compound tonight...I'll try that as well; I don't have any Ceramique at this point, may have to get some soon.

Regards,

SB

 

[orangat]

Is that raised portion part of the heatsink or is it a thermal pad. It sure looks like a thermal pad to me - which should be removed if you want to apply thermal paste.
There is nothing wrong with AS5 and getting cheap paste or ceramique is pointless.

 

[SpocksBrain]

It's a raised portion of the heatsink. If it'd been a pad I'd have removed it first thing!

-just applied the cheap Radio Shack goop, will see if it does anything at all.

SB

 

[SpocksBrain]

Wow...now I just don't get this:

The card is working fine right now, O/Ced to 412/365 (9800XT speed), with the stock HSF and cheap-o Radio Shack goop, which I intentionally didn't apply with as much care as the AS5.

What could this be other than electrical issues with Arctic Silver? Another thought...what is the default heatsink compound ATI uses on the 9800 Pro...it sure looked metallic to me!

What a mystery.

-SB (looking at clock, it's 2:30 A.M.)

.zzz...

 

[wfbberzerker]

weird, i just started having that problem on my radeon with stock cooling, but i'm pretty sure that its not a temperature issue, as mine isn't showing any higher than normal temps, and i can consistantly reproduce the crash. hmm, go figure.

i'm RMAing mine, though.