CPU thermal paste?

[BoSSPEED]

Hi, I have ordered a i5-6600k CPU and a arctic freezer 13 limited edition CPU cooler. Since the cooler has pre applied thermal paste (MX-4), would I need to put any on the CPU cooler when I'm going to install it?

Any help is appreciated.

 

[Bakua]

The cooler has thermal paste applied to the cooler, so no, you are not going to need to put on any thermal paste. If you remove your CPU cooler, though, you will need to re-apply thermal paste (after wiping away thermal compound with rubbing alcohol)

 

[BoSSPEED]

The cooler has thermal paste applied to the cooler, so no, you are not going to need to put on any thermal paste. If you remove your CPU cooler, though, you will need to re-apply thermal paste (after wiping away thermal compound with rubbing alcohol)

When I look online, I always see people saying that it should be applied to CPU. Since the cooler has it applied, I don't need to put it on the CPU? So I can put in the CPU into the motherboard, and then install the CPU cooler?

Thanks.

 

[Solandri]

From an application standpoint, it is easier to put the thermal paste on the CPU. Since the heat sink is usually bigger than the CPU, putting the paste on the CPU insures that the paste will be where the CPU and heatsink meet.

From a shipping standpoint, it is easier to put pre-applied thermal paste on the heatsink. It's a big object whose edges you can hold in a plastic shipping packaging, with a bubble in the plastic to prevent it from contacting the pre-applied paste. The CPU is much smaller and doesn't have as much margin to create a bubble.

So pre-applied paste usually comes on the heatsink. Manually-applied paste comes in a tube and it's easier if you apply it to the CPU. The paste only needs to be on one surface, since you're going to be mating the two together.

 

[Bakua]

If your cooler didn't already come with thermal compound applied, then you would need to. But in this case you just need to place the CPU in the motherboard and apply the cooler. If you mess up the installation or remove the cooler, then you'll need to re-apply thermal paste.