Arctec Silver II results

[Guest]

I have been reading the posts here and appreciate all the helpful information. Here are what I feel are some objective results for Arctec Silver if your interested. ECS k7s5a/XP 1600/FSB147/147, 256MB Crucial 2.5 DDR, Fan and heat sink are apprived by AMD but were included with my mobo package, I think from the looks it is a volcano 6?
Using TOAST program my system was stable at 54c after 15 minutes and stayed there till 20 minutes where I shut the program down and let it coll back down to 43c where it normally runs at I repeated this 3 times with the same result.
I then removed the sink, cleaned the pink goo, it was like a square pad about 1 inch square, off the sink and cleaned it thouroughly with acetone, then did the same onthe chip, added a small dab of Arctec Silver 2 and fit them together.
Follow up tests showed a consistent result after 3 20 minute tests of a peak 51c with TOAST and a 41c rest state.
It's not the great #s I wanted to see but it was an improvement. Perhaps a better cooler would drop it down in the low 40s running but I wanted to see if the ARcted worked the way they advertised it.

 

[Cyprus]

How long after you put it on did you test?
on there site http://www.arcticsilver.com/arctic_silver_instructions.htm under instructions/reminder it says: Due to the unique shape and sizes of the silver particles in Arctic Silver II, it will take a minimum of 48 hours to achieve maximum particle to particle thermal conduction and for the heatsink to CPU interface to reach maximum conductivity. (This period will be longer in a system without a fan on the heatsink.) On systems measuring actual internal core temperatures via the CPU's internal diode, the measured temperature will drop as much as 2C to 4C over this "break-in" period.

Cyprus

"Beware of computer programmers that carry screwdrivers."
Leonard Brandwein.

 

[HonestJhon]

also, you said you put a dab of it on the cpu, and put it together..
did you spread it with a clean card, or razor blade?
did you rub a little of the arctic silver into the base of the heatsink with a gloved finger, or some other form of clean material?
and yeah, did you let it run for 24 hours before you ran the tests?
and did you put about 1/2 grain of rice ammount on there, and spread it....not a bunch..
when it is spread out, it should be about as thick as construction paper. and should be smooth, and even.
i noticed a 4°C drop in temps using my volcano6cu on my athlon 900 running at stock speeds.
idle, my cpu runs at 39°C
full load, it hovers at 45-46°C
but then again, mine is a volcano 6cu...with the copper base.


-DAvid

-Live, Learn, then build your own computer!-

 

[Colin]

The problem is the thermal pad melted into your heatsink. Cleaning with solvent won't remove it. You need to lap your HS. For more information read Thermal Interface Basics from Arctic Silver. http://www.arcticsilver.com/thermal_interface_basics.htm

The other issue here is the in-socket thermistor suffers from compression. What you see as a 1C drop in temp is probably closer to 3C. You can read about the problem here: http://mikewarrior.freeservers.com/

 

[HonestJhon]

if he put the solvent on there, and let it soak for a while, it sould dissolve the thermal pad.
set the bottom of the heatsink in a pan of acetone or something like that, and let it soak for a little while. like an hour or so. then clean it off with some rubbing alchohol.


if it still does that, then lap the base.

i slightly lapped the base of my volcano6cu with a scrubbin pad, and it got a bit shinier, and felt way smoother. theni cleaned it with rubbing alchohol, and made sure that it was dry as a bone, then rubbed some as2 into the base, and spread some on the cpu core, and hooked it all back up, and everything was fine.


-DAvid

-Live, Learn, then build your own computer!-