Detailed study on AS5 break-in time; it only takes a few hours

graysky

Senior member
Mar 8, 2007
796
1
81
Purpose
According to the manufacture of AS5, there can be up to 200 hours of break in time required for temps to stabilize. This claim has been tested the results are shared in this thread.

Materials, software, and experiment
A delidded i7-3770k (over-clocked to 44x100 with fixed vcore) was treated with a fresh line of AS5 both under and above the IHS per the manufacture recommended procedure for application to Ivybridge i7 chips (see above link). The Intel stock HFS was then attached and the system was stressed using either mprime (prime95 for Linux) or burnP6 immediately after the HSF was seated to establish as baseline (time = 0) steady-state temperature for each stresser.

Core temperatures, vcore, and CPU fan RPMs were measured using a simple shell script harvesting the linux kernel's lm_sensors readings. Ambient temperature also also recorded using the average of two external thermometers.

Once the baseline temps were established, the experiment was conducted as follows: the stress tests were repeated every 2 hours for several days. This means 42 min of stress (12 min for burnP6 and 30 min for mprime) followed by 78 min of idle all day everyday for 3 days. Then the interval was lengthened to once every 4 hours (42 min of stress, 198 min of idle) for a few days. Finally, the interval was lengthened to once every 6 hours (42 min of stress, 318 min of idle) for the rest of the experiment.

The resulting data were normalized to the average readings for the initial run in order to study the temperature decrease and rate of decrease.

Mprime version 28.5 x86_64 running 8 threads preforming a FFT of size 440k.
cpuburnP6 has no settings for multiple cores but it was run in 8 independent processes so all cores would be stressed equally.



Conclusions
The temps basically stabilize after 8 hours -- no where near the 200 hours the manufacture claims -- in this particular test. The magnitude of the decrease was 3-4 C relative to the initial temps depending on the stress methods which is pretty good. How general is this result? The hallmark of a scientific experiment is a reproducible outcome. This is just an n of 1 but no plans are in the works to repeat the experiment. Perhaps others will do it and report back. Feel free to use this thread if you do.

Extra details
Calculating zero
Zero was calculated simply by stressing with the program (either mprime or burnP6) and waiting for the temps to stabilize. In the plot of core temp adjusted for ambient vs. time (seconds), the pink color indicates data points I excluded since the CPU was coming up to temperature while the blue color denotes datapoints that were included. The higher temp/shorter line is the temperature profile for burnP6 and the lower temp/longer line is the profile for the mprime run. Basically, cpuburnP6 was run for 12 min and mprime for 30 min, excluding the first 400 sec from each one. The 2nd plot just shows the same data unnormalized for ambient temp and split out by individual core:




Data
This plot shows the time since the HFS was seated (days) vs. delta temperature "dT" above ambient for each of the stress programs. Initially, they were run every 2 hours, but after 3 days or so, the interval was lengthened to every 4 hours, and finally to every 6 hours until approx 200 hours had elapsed. Both stress programs gave similar results with the average temp drop occurring sometime around 8 hours and stabilizing around 3-4 degrees less than the initially measured temps.

The first plot shows the average of all cores and the 2nd one shows the values for the individual cores.



Data table
The data table generated by the script linked above is available in csv format. A more elaborated table where I preformed some calculations needed for the plots (difference from ambient temp, which points are included or excluded, average for time=0 for each stresser, etc) is also available in csv format should you wish to plot anything yourself.
 
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BonzaiDuck

Lifer
Jun 30, 2004
15,785
1,500
126
Was AS5 an exception to the "pumping out" problem with de-lid solutions?

I think this is a useful exercise of inquiry, but you know what I'm going to say about TIMs in general and one in particular. Unfortunately, the "one in particular" poses risks cited by some because of the hardness of the particulate.

Look forward to your conclusions, Graysky!! You always did good work!
 

graysky

Senior member
Mar 8, 2007
796
1
81
Was AS5 an exception to the "pumping out" problem with de-lid solutions?

I didn't select the it intentionally. I happened to upgrade this machine and had this motherboard/CPU available for the experiment.

I think this is a useful exercise of inquiry, but you know what I'm going to say about TIMs in general and one in particular. Unfortunately, the "one in particular" poses risks cited by some because of the hardness of the particulate.

If you're asking if we can generalize based on an n of 1, I think that can be risky. I am not going to break it down and repeat the experiment, but others are free to do it
 

VirtualLarry

No Lifer
Aug 25, 2001
56,450
10,119
126
I'm a long-time user of AS5, although I didn't bother to remove the Intel stock TIM off of the copper-cored stock cooler for my G3258 and replace with AS5.

I use it for pretty-much every other installation I've done, and it seems to work fairly well for me. Though I can't say I've ever known this whole "curing" thing to be true. I've never noticed a marked drop in temps after using it.

Then again, they claim that you have to heat your CPU past a certain point, and then run it for a bit, then cool it back down again, and run it for a while like that, then repeat a few times. I've never really done that. I generally assemble a system, OC (if applicable), and then run DC 24/7. I don't often give my systems "time off".
 

Idontcare

Elite Member
Oct 10, 1999
21,118
59
91
This is a great thread!! Please keep the updates coming

Was AS5 an exception to the "pumping out" problem with de-lid solutions?

I can't say for recent times, but back when the whole "delid your IB processor" fad was in full swing the collective feedback was that AS5 was one of the most susceptible TIMs for pump-out problems.

Personally I didn't wait to see if it was true with my IB, having experienced the pump-out issue with AS5 on both a delidded Nvidia GPU and my laptop CPU, so I went with CLU for my longterm bare-die TIM of choice (with no issues since).
 

graysky

Senior member
Mar 8, 2007
796
1
81
I can't say for recent times, but back when the whole "delid your IB processor" fad was in full swing the collective feedback was that AS5 was one of the most susceptible TIMs for pump-out problems.

Pump-out?

EDIT: I googled that and find it to be an urban legend. I have dismounted an Athlon XP a few months ago to replace the HSF with a newer, quiet one. The thing had been together since 2004 and I saw no evidence of this effect nor had I observed any increase in temps while the server was running for that past decade... which it was and continues to as I type this.
 
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Idontcare

Elite Member
Oct 10, 1999
21,118
59
91
Pump-out?

EDIT: I googled that and find it to be an urban legend. I have dismounted an Athlon XP a few months ago to replace the HSF with a newer, quiet one. The thing had been together since 2004 and I saw no evidence of this effect nor had I observed any increase in temps while the server was running for that past decade... which it was and continues to as I type this.

You can read up on it here:
http://www.innovationcooling.com/reliability.html

Void formation from pumpout during thermal cycling is a fairly well understand (mechanically) and accepted phenomenon. So much so that TIM makers actively work to develop TIMs which are resistant to it.
 

ratjacket

Member
Oct 5, 2013
120
0
76
to study the AS5 break in did you turn off the comuter and allow it to cool to room temp

" This break-in will occur during the normal use of the computer as long as the computer is turned off from time to time and the interface is allowed to cool to room temperature. Once the break-in is complete, the computer can be left on if desired. "
 

graysky

Senior member
Mar 8, 2007
796
1
81
@rat - Yes, I shut is down for ~1 h once per day for the first 4 days... should have included that bit in the write-up. Just FYI, room temp was 61-64 F through out (it is in my basement which is very consistently cool as I do not have HVAC down there). The coldest the internal temps read was 18C which is about room temp so I don't think it really mattered.
 

graysky

Senior member
Mar 8, 2007
796
1
81
OK, ran out to ~200 hours and as expected, no change in the conclusion. The original post was updated with these results.
 
Dec 30, 2004
12,554
2
76
Pump-out?

EDIT: I googled that and find it to be an urban legend. I have dismounted an Athlon XP a few months ago to replace the HSF with a newer, quiet one. The thing had been together since 2004 and I saw no evidence of this effect nor had I observed any increase in temps while the server was running for that past decade... which it was and continues to as I type this.

I'm pretty sure I've seen it before but you are right, it's been a while since I've seen it, and I'm still on my original tube of AS5 from 10 years ago (maybe that's a good thing )
 

BonzaiDuck

Lifer
Jun 30, 2004
15,785
1,500
126
Before Joe Citarella and associates created Innovative Cooling, or before Innovative Cooling had released IC Diamond, I had read his article on some established overclocker's site. I spent more than $80 on 5 grams of diamond powder of the same grain tested at Overclockers. I was trying it out, but quickly switched to the IC product.

I've still got a tube of AS5, and I have a tube of the Noctua TIM. I need something to be a base for the nano-diamond. Something that would allow the same loading and consistency of the particles. I saw a web project-page demonstrating use of your two-part plastic case for contact lenses. You drill a small hole in the cap dead center. Then you work with a paper-clip to turn it into a paddle with crank. You put the diamond in the lense-case cup, add your base, close it all up and turn the crank.
 
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