thermal paste and AMD's

[Nevin]

On the other hand, if no review site ever compared thermal compounds to thermal pads, you would get a bunch of thermal pad zealots claiming that the pads are really better.



Nevin

 

[kgraeme]

<< if i bought an oem cpu, does that come with a HSF and thermal compound..??
And....does CPU's have a HSF on them already? Just maybe no the thermal compound, rite?
>>



What the OEM CPU comes with is determined by the retailer. Generally speaking though, no, you are only buying the processor. Since the AMD warranty only covers retail processors, not OEM, the store will often offer their own warranty. The store warranty usually also requires you to buy from a selection of HSFs with your CPU purchase. And theoretically, you are supposed to use that HSF with the CPU in order to be in compliance with their warranty. These HSFs also often have the phase-change thermal compound.

The HSF is never connected to the CPU when you buy it, neither retail nor oem. That's because the HSF actually connects to the motherboard, sandwiching the CPU. There is no way to just attach the HSF and the CPU without the motherboard.

If a HSF is purchased separately, it's a crap shoot as to what it comes with. Some come with phase-change thermal compound, some come with some form of thermal grease in a tube, some come with nothing.

 

[evilerich]

Guys, my first time putting a new system together, so, bear with me please. My oem Athlon, and fan.. The heatsink fan has a piece of pink tape, that I must remove before installing on cpu. BUT. Do I need the thermal paste, also, in addition to the stuff under the tape? Or should I remove that stuff and use thermal paste ONLY? Please let me know asap. Thanx for your expertise.

 

[frankroh]

scrape off the thermal tape and use alcohol to get rid of any remnants.

Use paste only.

 

[igiveup]

You basically use the paste to fill in any gaps or grooves in the bottom of the heatsink so that the CPU gets good contact with the bottom of the heatsink (some people go so far as to sand the bottom of their heatsink to a smoother finish, called lapping). Bottom line is that you want as little separating your CPU and Heatsink as possible while still getting enough on to make sure that proper heat transfer happens. So, either go with the thermal tape (not my first choice) or go with Thermal Grease (this is my first choice). Thermal tape is questionable at best. I have heard that ThermoSonic's ThermoEngine ships with a decent one, but why play russian roulette with your CPU?

 

[kgraeme]

<< Guys, my first time putting a new system together, so, bear with me please. My oem Athlon, and fan.. The heatsink fan has a piece of pink tape, that I must remove before installing on cpu. BUT. Do I need the thermal paste, also, in addition to the stuff under the tape? Or should I remove that stuff and use thermal paste ONLY? Please let me know asap. Thanx for your expertise. >>



It's either/or. The pink tape is covering the phase-change thermal compound. If you choose to use it, just peel the tape and mount.

If you want to use a different type of thermal gunk, say the ever popular Arctic Silver II, then you will want to remove the adhesive on the HSF with something like alcohol or acetone (nail polish remover). Then follow these directions.

 

[Richardito]

<< The dumbest comparison test from AS's links is one that compares arctic silver to thermal pads. Yea! Now that's comparing apples to apples! >>


Wow, that is dumb. Thermal pads exists because OEM companies like Intel think that the public is stupid and will install a CPU without thermal compound. So if you 'forget' the thermal compound the thermal pad will keep the CPU from frying and you from complaining to them. The purpose is just to lower customer returns and disregards performance.

 

[Richardito]

...

 

[Carlton]

Richardito,
I'm putting a new system together and wonder what compound you recommend using. I'm new so bear with me. I would like to say that I may try Nevin's product if it really is worth the money. I see where you recommended early on that any commercial product would work fine. I'm curious to the one you would recommend if you were in my shoes. Thanks for your opnion.

 

[Richardito]

<< Richardito,
I'm putting a new system together and wonder what compound you recommend using. I'm new so bear with me. I would like to say that I may try Nevin's product if it really is worth the money. I see where you recommended early on that any commercial product would work fine. I'm curious to the one you would recommend if you were in my shoes. Thanks for your opnion. >>



It depends if you are planning in overclocking or not. If you are not going to overclock you can basically even use the pad that is included in some heat sinks or any thermal compound. If you plan on overclocking then you need to choose more carefully. Keep in mind that expensive products are not always better and base your choice on facts and not hype. Do some research around the net and get something you feel comfortable with.

You can get more information here: http://www.isjm.com/tst/heatsink/mainframe.htm

 

[Carlton]

I have decided to use the &quot;white goop&quot; that comes with my vantech fans and heat sinks. They are going to be mounted on a dual processor board. I think that in my case this is the safest solution for me. This is what comes with the fans and I would think that this is the best solution for me. If the manufacturer supplies it with my heatsinks, don't you guys think it would work? Later, after more research, I could use another thermal compound. There are just too many arguments about artic silver.

 

[Lore]

Disclaimer: I've never used AS/ASII, but just made a purchase of some. Should be coming shortly. I've always used Radio Shack compound.

The benefits from Arctic Silver and Arctic Silver II come when you intend to overclock your chip. If you intend on running your chip at stock speed - like I do for my dual processor - then there is no reason to invest in 1) a heavy duty heatsink and 2) expensive thermal compound. Similar to the comparison of Hyundai vs Honda, if you just need a car to get you around, I'm sure you don't care if you have a Hyundai that can be had for 2/3 less than a Honda. However, if you care about appearances, about acceleration speed, and the interior trim options, then go for the Honda. It'll cost you more, but might satisfy your higher standards.

I have been happily using Radio Shack compound for a while now, and when I used my fat Alpha heatsink on my Slot 1 P3-1 Ghz (before I moved to dual processors) it _always_ kept the CPU temp at anywhere from 26-30 degrees C. And during those cool winter nights, it would drop down to about 14 degrees C. Crazy, eh?

Now I'm using two Golden Orbs, with Radio Shack thermal greases, which keep the chips at about 50 degrees C, still 20 degrees below Intel's limit for the 1Ghz chips. Still acceptable; I'm not overclocking, and I've seen no problems whatsoever. The problems I have now are with my video card (Quadro 2 Pro) which for some reason cannot even maintain the stock core speed of 250mhz. As soon as I drop it down to 248mhz it's happy. Weird. So I bought a Blue Orb and some AS II to hopefully cool it down a bit more.

We'll see how effective it is.