tips on thermal paste for gpu,s

[chopper.uk]

hi i have just ordered an artic cooler for my 6990 which i will hopefully be fitting at the weekend. i have googled how to apply the thermal paste but get a whole load of differen waysto apply it what is the best way ? theres a couple of vids on youtube with the actual card one has sticky thermal pads already fitted to the gpu cooler the other one paste is supplied. so i dont know if mine will come with thermal pads fitted or not ? any info appreciated thanks

 

[C64]

An arctic accelero ? well brace yourself the stuff it comes with (G1) takes I would say at least 10-24 hours to set I have used it in the past and it definitely didn't set for well over 10 hours for me

you mix the two sachets together they supply mix it for about 5 mins until it's smooth then apply on to the chips and vrm chips press down the sinks and leave overnight to cure.

They claim it takes 60 minutes which is just laughable it takes at least 10 hours I would say but does work well

alternative is to buy adhesive tape http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=TH-001-AK&groupid=701&catid=27&subcat=

 

[chopper.uk]

yeah it a arctic accelero are the pad any good ? one of the cards i saw on yt had them fitted outa the box

 

[gaz1971]

An arctic accelero ? well brace yourself the stuff it comes with (G1) takes I would say at least 10-24 hours to set I have used it in the past and it definitely didn't set for well over 10 hours for me

you mix the two sachets together they supply mix it for about 5 mins until it's smooth then apply on to the chips and vrm chips press down the sinks and leave overnight to cure.

They claim it takes 60 minutes which is just laughable it takes at least 10 hours I would say but does work well

alternative is to buy adhesive tape http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=TH-001-AK&groupid=701&catid=27&subcat=

Just a thought on this, I odnt know if its a fact, but wouldnt using the card and therefore it getting hot, speed up the curing process?

 

[C64]

it doesnt come with pads it comes with two sachets one glue compound and other some form of thermal compound you mix them up and set them like cement if you want to fit the cooler and use straight away you are going to have to use adhesive tape yes the akasa stuff is sworn by on these forums if however you dont mind waiting for it to set the g1 will work better

 

[chopper.uk]

what is the best method of applying the paste ? and when you say set like cement ? am i going to be able to get it off if/when i need to ?

 

[eddyr]

I use the same stuff I use for my cpu, and the same method. A small rice grain size in the middle and leave the pressure from the cooler to spread it out.

 

[C64]

what is the best method of applying the paste ? and when you say set like cement ? am i going to be able to get it off if/when i need to ?

Not literally no it turns in to stuff similar to thermal pads but it conducts heat better than pads and is pretty easy to get off as anything is just slide a stanley blade under the heatsinks and anything comes off easy

 

[3t3P]

When I applied my waterblocks to my 470's I followed the EK instructions and did a union jack pattern which surprised me but has worked fine. (see my sig build log, first page about 3/4 of the way down I block up the 470)

I think generally the tolerances with GPU die and heatsink interfaces are lower than CPU and HSF. Therefore expect to use more paste and not necessarily a grain of rice in the middle approach, but each their own

 

[tommybhoy]

Good info from C64.

On the subject of using the card to dry the glue- that's a no go as they'll most likely fall off, even worse they could set with small air bubbles between contact as well.

I have seen some posts where hairdryers have been used, but if your going to use the glue then just leave it over night and plug it back in in the morning.

The only thing I would add is just use the paste that arrives on the AC, it's MX 4 they use anyway, problem solved.