How long have you gone without reapplying thermal paste?

[lazerin]

As far as I know, thermal paste like Artic Silver III will run out of its original position after some time. How long have you gone without reapplying ASIII or any other thermal paste. Remember, pads don't count!

The longest I've gone is about 3 and a bit months.

[Krazeee]

Crap! You mean you have to re-apply ASIII?! Hmm, now Im tryin to figure out when it was that I put my new HSF on........Owell, got a new PS and Burner comin in the mail, when I have it opened up, Ill just take a look.

[roYal]

people usually do it every 3-6 months.

[kev82]

I probably do it about once a year until recently :)

I hardly ever bother to remove the hs from my mobo, but when I do, I always reapply the as...

Hasn't given my any heat problems if I ran it for a year though.

[Illah]

I'm always messing with something in my machine, so the longest so far is like 2 months. That wasn't because I though I needed to re-apply it. I was installing a new chip. I plan to get an nForce2 and some DDRII400 a little after they come out (so the initial price drops a step or two) so I'll be re-applying it then as well. After that, who knows.

--Illah

[glass]

hmm, what counts? i think my k6-2 had the sink on for 2years(?) with paste.

seriously, there's no need to reapply the paste if you don't have to remove the sink. maybe if you have some asIII that turns to liquid but other than that..

[looktall]

when i bought a PII last year, it still had the original heatsink on it.
when i finally got around to redoing to the thermal paste on it, early this year, i found it was the original intel thermal paste. :D

so considering my PII came out sometime in 1998, it had been using the same thermal paste for over three years. :D

[12am]

All I say is apply it and then if you aren't removing your heatsink often, monitor the temps to see your average load temp. then every now and again check into the temps to see if your average load temp from before has raised (assuming your system has remained constant). Usually when my temps take a 1-3c raise from my average load temp I reapply the as3 and the temps go back down the 1-3c.

[Ridenow]

I use AS2 and have not changed it in months, almost a year. I did it right the first time, less is more with AS.

[PhobMX]

i don't ever reaply any thermal paste by the fact i dunno how to duh... i have like 5 comps, one is 7 years old and i think it has still working the crappy intel thermal paste in retail pack. lol

Not even this rig, it has been 2 years since built and i doubt it has anything but intel thermal paste...

[SkiFletch]

longest i've gone for paste has been currently on my old Duron box, 1 year. for thermal pads, my old pee2 350 is still kickin with the pad on it, 4 years old now methinks, maybe 5