Yeah, paste is just a bridge - one of 3 layers connecting the cpu die(s) to the cooler's cold plate. If you applied paste several times and nothing changed, you have to look elsewhere - like what's being suggested here:
hello guys I recently upgraded my 5600X to a 5800X3D. My understanding is that this chip due to the v-cache design runs a bit hotter than a 5800X per say. Now I won't compare it to my 5600X as that was a Ryzen 5, this is a Ryzen 7, so more cores, etc. CPU is the only thing that changed...
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See posts,
#10: "If you want to bring down the temps (and see if the contact is the problem), use PBO2 tuner to do your Curve Optimizer and set some lower power limits. eg. all-core -30 and ~100W should cut temps by 10-20C, if contact is not a problem. You shouldn't need more than 120W to achieve max all core performance at 4450MHz."
#18, with PBO2 settings in a snapshot that you can try...
#21: "You can adjust power to your liking, just keep in mind that all-core clocks stop scaling at 4450MHz. Only BCLK can go further. So adjust power as necessary to max out at 4450MHz, and make sure there's no major clock stretching (discrepancy between Core Clock and Effective Clock during test) or performance loss.
It's best to find a combination of PPT/TDC/EDC that works well. Adjusting PPT alone doesn't always work too well for actual performance."
TL;DR: Doing -30 on all cores in PBO2 and nothing else should see improvements.