How to judge how much thermal paste

tre4

tre4

tre4

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19 Mar 2007
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Okay, I've got a Freezer 7 and am using MX-2but I can't get the temps down and I suspect I'm over doing the amount of paste.

Thing is I worry about not getting enough paste on the thing and blowing it up! Now I know CPU's have some form of thermal shutdown so shouldn't damage? but what about chipsets, that really bothers me....

Logically if there is no paste at all but a heat Sink in place it should still provide some cooling, but would It be enough to protect from damage? Its this that means I tend to put enough on that I can be confident of full coverage, especially as the fit of the freezer 7 seems a little flimsy? (would much prefer some kind of more positive attachment like bolts or clamps than this hole clippy lark, couldn't be that expensive to put on an MB could it)

Anyway long an short is how do I Judge the right amount of paste?
 
Just enough to get a minimal layer over the entire integrated heatsink on the CPU. Either use a small blob (about a long grain of rice in size but depends on the CPU) and have a few practice goes, or you can spread it yourself with a sandwich bag over your finger tip before you put the HSF on.
 
RichL said:
Just enough to get a minimal layer over the entire integrated heatsink on the CPU. Either use a small blob (about a long grain of rice in size but depends on the CPU) and have a few practice goes, or you can spread it yourself with a sandwich bag over your finger tip before you put the HSF on.
Click to expand...

it depends on the chip you're using. Rich - I think if you used that method for your Q6600, then you might want to try again using this method, which is what's recommended for quad core chips:

http://www.arcticsilver.com/pdf/appinstruct/as5/ins_as5_intel_quad_wcap.pdf

for dual core chips with a heat speader (ie all core2duo) it's the same, but with a vertical line instead of horizontal.
 
For the heatsink itself it depends on the quality of the base, but I would suggest for the base of the heatsink you apply a small amount of paste and spread it in well making sure you cover the whole of the base and then with a lint free cloth or coffee filter (something similar) remove as much paste as you can, should leave the base of the heatsink looking "dull" but shouldnt appear to be any paste if that makes sense...

For the CPU would follow the advice given above by snow patrol, apply a rice grain sized amount to the CPU as per the articsilver instructions, place your heatsink on top of the CPU and twist it slightly from side to side, then screw the Heatsink into place...

Even a very poor mount shouldnt cause the CPU to overheat @ stock idle, load up Prime or something similar and stress the CPU, use coretemp or the latest version of speedfan to check the temps
 
Thanks all, the twisting of the cooler has proved to be an issue as the legs of the cooler are obstructed by components so only a few millimeters of twist can be applied. Its this that then worries me I don't have enough in the right places, I note though that thats all they recommend in the artic silver link so maybe I'm worrying too much again.....
 
The least amount possible, I usually use a credit type card so I get a thin flat layer, running at 27deg ATM :)

The aim is to provide a connection all over between the heatsink and cpu, if they are both totally flat you'll only require a small amount.

Also I can defiantly vouch what Pneumonic said, I left my AmdX2 4800 without thermal & fan for months because I was too lazy to take the mobo out again, it didn't really effect my temps much either as It was a good flat and new copper base on the heatsink.
 
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