Thermal pastes expire?

[Nebulous]

Hey guys having an issue here. I purchased a Tube of MX4 last year sometime and have been using it as needed. Couple of weeks back I noticed my temps where a bit on the high side (about 12-15c) above normal and during gaming. I decided to clean off the old MX4 and reapply and reseat the block. Temps dropped back down to their respected levels (28-30c idle, 42-48c load). Again it's been about 6 weeks and my temps started to climb again to the 40's range @ idle and mid 50's during gaming. It's ticking me off and I have to redo this again every few weeks and use a supposed good thermal paste. I never encountered this before.

I remember back in the day the cheap paste would get runny/watery and lose it's consistency. But this tube of MX4 is not 5 years old. Maybe 18mos which includes the 6mos it probably sat on the shelf before I purchased it.

Does good paste go bad?

 

[EarthDog]

Some pastes can go bad, yes. Not that quickly though. I would imagine that something changed in the system or your environment (ambient temps went up a couple C) to have those temps go up like that.

As a side note, who cares if it's in the 50s during gaming???!! Those temps are 30C+ where you need to worry about it.

 

[Nebulous]

Yeah I know, but still. My environment hasn't changed in years. I like my temps to be consistent. I just find it odd it does that even when nothing's changed in my house.

 

[EarthDog]

Something changed neb...be it a process on your PC that is running in the background or your ambient/intake temps different. Did you confirm ambients were the exact same? That is the only way to "know" is if you had a baseline and checked again. House temps can vary by a couple of C at any time.

 

[Nebulous]

I haven't turned on my heat since I moved here. I keep my windows cracked open. My pc is right by the livingroom window. My ambient temps stay @ 66f (18.8c). I know it isn't a big deal, but dammit it bothers me!

You might be right Joe. Maybe processes or something, but my temps seem to climb somewhat. I have a tube of Noctua NT-H1 on the way. Since I'm swapping cases and Cpu waterblocks, I'll swap TIM as well and hope my temps stay consistent.

I just wanted to know if good quality TIM has a shelf life.

 

[EarthDog]

Some do... but how long, I have no idea. Look it up on their website and see if that info is there, or email them and ask. I can't imagine it being 18 months though.

 

[Mandrake4565]

Just an FYI I purchased a 65g tube of MX-2 a least 18 months ago and it seems to be just fine. Though I do not watch my temps all that closely, as long as they stay below the danger zone I'm happy.

 

[Nebulous]

You know I've never had this issue with Ceramique or AS3/5. This is my 2nd MX4 tube as I've seem to have lost the first one. The first tube never gave me any issues like this. Really odd.

 

[WhitehawkEQ]

I have 1 PC that I use Type 44 from GC Electronics and it's been on for over 5 years and still runs cool.

Give this a try

 

[Kenrou]

Apart from having to re-apply every now and then, if this stuff had an expiry date wouldn't it have it stamped somewhere like any other perishable?

 

[Nebulous]

Apart from having to re-apply every now and then, if this stuff had an expiry date wouldn't it have it stamped somewhere like any other perishable?

Looked at the tube several times at different angles.....nope no expiration date

 

[BugFreak]

The last time I had a tube go what I would say bad it got super thick in the tube and wouldn't spread right. That was after 2 years or so in my non-a/c shop. Other than that I've never seen it.

 

[Nebulous]

Well after swapping cases and waterblocks, I used Noctua's NT-H1 on both the core and IHS. After running linpack overnite my temps maxed out @ 65c across the board.

With MX4 they were about the same after a reapply and remount. After a few weeks temps would start to get out of control and I would have to reapply and remount again.

We'll see how the NT-H1 will hold up after a few weeks.


And no there's no expiration date on the NT-H1 either

 

[JeremyCT]

I thought I had excessive dust buildup on my rad as I my dT was higher than normal. So I blew it out with some canned air and got very little change. Turns out I had a wayward process sucking down one core's worth of juice. In my case it was PrecisionX and uninstall/reinstall fixed it, but it was completely transparent in day to day operation. I didn't even notice a change in performance when gaming.

You may have already looked into that sort of thing, but I just thought I'd mention it. I smacked myself for not thinking of it initially.

 

[Tech Tweaker]

I do know that pastes can dry up over time (even in storage with the cap/lid attached). I once bought a brand new container of AS5 that was completely dried up, and the last brand new tube of Arctic Silver Ceramique 2 I bought was so dried up I could barely get it out of the tube, ended up just throwing it away.

I have noticed through using Arctic Cooling MX-2 and MX-4 that they have a tendency to dry out quickly when used with parts like GPU's that have a high TDP/high heat output. When I use either MX-2 or MX-4 with GPU's I usually end up having to disassemble the cards and reapply once every three to five months (same when I used it with my PS3 game console). For whatever reason this paste just can't remain stable for long periods of time when used with parts that have a sustained high heat output and tends to become dry quickly.

I recently reapplied the paste on my GTX 680, and prior to the reapplication I was struggling to keep the GPU temp below 80°C (76-82°C) with 65% fan speed (around 2730-2790 RPM). After cleaning off the old paste (which I just applied back in July, so ~5 months ago) and applying a new pea-sized dot of paste I was at 69-74°C while gaming at 60% fan speed (2460-2490 RPM). Then, I switched to Prolimatech PK-2, as I've read in reviews that it performs better when used with GPU coolers, and found lower temps than I got with MX-4 when the application was brand new (65-72°C at 60% fan speed).

 

[Nebulous]

Hmm, interesting. I'm glad I'm not the only one with the issue of the MX4 losing it's consistency. Thanks for pointing those things out. I redid the paste on my 290 with MX4 about 3 weeks ago so I'm going to hold off on the re-tim which I'll be using the NT-H1. I heard good things about that PK-2 paste, but I had already pulled the trigger on a tube of NT-H1. I might try some of that PK-2.

 

[GTXJackBauer]

I really don't think its the TIM. As ED pointed out, it something else. If you got the better temps prior to moving, that could play a obvious role or some driver/windows updates could have things running and heating up your stuff. That right there would give me an excuse to go custom liquid cooling. .

In my experience with out TIMs, MX-4 is the champ for me in my department. I have it on my CPU and re-TIM'd both the GPUs. Temps dropped.

FYI, MX-4 has 8 years on it.