best artic silver spread..

[allcoholl]

I've got an athlon xp 2600+ barton at 3200+. It runs at around 37-39 idle and 40-43 full load. I've got an Extreme Volcano 12 cooling this down, along with two exhaust fans and one intake for the case. I just wanna know if there's possibly a way to spread paste better, because I'm not the best at doing it, I don't think.. so could someone give me a walkthrough on doing that? As stupid and nubbish as that sounds, it's important to spread it right.. contact with the heatsink and cpu is definitely important. I know that my temperatures are fine but I wanna see if I can get them lower..

 

[ManOfKnight]

Arctic Silver 5 is the best.

Use a VERY thin layer upon your cpu. Use a razor blade to put this very thin layer onto your chip evenly. I also put an even SMALLER amount where the chip contacts the HSF. Remember to clean off ALL of the old stuff before starting with AS5

 

[flixotide]

This guide pretty much explains it all step-by-step. Its the default Arctic Silver guide.

I recommend you use a straight razor, as the spatula that comes with the paste isn't that good if you ask me. The thinner the better if you ask me.

Give yourself plenty of time.... practice makes perfect.

Cheers, Flix

 

[Sharkman]

There are many different application methods. Arctic Silver recommends you follow thier instructions though.

You can just put a small dab about the size of a half cooked grain of rice, like Arctic Silver recommends on the cpu core. Another method is putting a small amount like before on the core then spreading it across with a sharp edged object. I used a half sided razor blade, at an extreme angle, to spread it across as thin as possiable.

Something else that will help your temps (and one of much discussion on these boards) is lapping the bottom of the HSF. I lapped mine to 2000 grit then polished it. A lot of people think that you actually lose the effectiveness of lapping if you go higher than 800/1000 grit.

If you do lapp the HSF you don't need much thermal compound on it at all. If you can see it visiably on the top then you have too much. When I applied mine you had to angle the base to actually see the compound.

Edit:
I need to be quicker typing these responces out. When I started there wasn't any comments yet lol.

 

[allcoholl]

I've been using artic silver 5, and yeah I can see the paste so I guess I put too much on there.. but what do you mean by lapping? I have no clue what that means. Inform me, if possible.

 

[Sharkman]

Lapping is taking different grits of sandpaper and sliding the HSF over top of them. Some do a figure eight, others do a circle and some just go back and forth. I bought a kit for mine after seeing this Thread. That had grits 400, 600, 800, 1000, 1500 and 2000 plus the polishing compound. You do each grit seperatly starting from 400 up. You should do a search on lapping. There is a lot more information on the forums than I can put into a post

 

[Xymurgy]

I thought they updated their instructions. I saw that they now recommend you put a rice grain-size drop on the center of the core, and simply attach the heatsink as normal.

 

[THunDA]

They also say to skip the step on putting some directly on the HS where the core touches if your using AS5..

 

[Sharkman]

I thought they updated their instructions. I saw that they now recommend you put a rice grain-size drop on the center of the core, and simply attach the heatsink as normal.

According to the Arctic Silver site it still says half a grain. Here's a Link to thier instructions page. The line your looking for is item #6 and its blue in color. Now if they changed it they should change thier site too

Edit:

They also say to skip the step on putting some directly on the HS where the core touches if your using AS5..

That is for P4 CPU's. He has an AMD

 

[specific]

HEY

Wrap some Cling Wrap around your fingertip, use a piece of shrink wrap, sandwich bag etc........ and smooth that rice grain size dab on the core with it. Take care not to get that stuff on the wafer, as it's especially hard to get clean compared to the core. Make sure you clean the core and heatsink with acetone, then with alcohol.

 

[allcoholl]

According to the Arctic Silver site it still says half a grain. Here's a Link to thier instructions page. The line your looking for is item #6 and its blue in color. Now if they changed it they should change thier site too

Edit:



That is for P4 CPU's. He has an AMD

Nope, it's for AMD's too.

 

[Xymurgy]

I'm looking for the source of the "new/recommended" way of putting on AS5, but I am unable to find it. I do know I saw a link in this forum... said it was better than the old way with the plastic bag. Maybe I dreamed it?

The instructions page I saw had a dark background, maybe someone can help me out.

 

[CCW]

I wrote a review for XtremeSystems on AS5 (which can be found here) and the correct method of application is to place a small dab on the thermal compound i nthe centre of the processor die and then let the pressure from the heatsink press it down. Th9is creates an air tight bond which allows the paste to conduct heat much better than if it was spread as spreading will put air into the paste. I really hate it when people say, "its so much harder to spread than other pastes" but thats because it isnt designed to be spread. It is a very viscous paste but this is due to the high level of silver in the paste. The paste mustve cost Arctic Silver a lot to manufacture and believe me in my opinion as I state in the review the paste does feel like its meant to be high quality. I really love AS5, I now only use Arctic Silver 3 on my Northbridge, Southbridge and Graphics Card GPU simply to get rid of it. Arctic Silver is best when its burnt in, so give it some time with maybe a bit of extra voltage and it will produce good results for you.

Craig

 

[allcoholl]

good point. I noticed how thick AS5 is.. it's much thicker than their previous pastes.. heh