Thermal interface material- tim

[Trytiped]

Hello all, this question is on the use of Tim's; now I have read numerous ways to apply them and have settled on the applying a pea or rather bb sized amount on the cpu, then applying the heat sink. Problem is I have purchased a tim called Shen etsu g751 which I have read is very difficult to apply. I have also read that simply laying some down and applying the heat sink with this Tim doesn't work. So my question here is will that method work with this tim? And should I purchase another instead? I have heard that indigo extreme and arctic silver 5 are both great but can't seem to decide which to settle for, thank you for any answer!
Also my cpu is an amd fx-8320

 

[bdiddytampa]

I've always used arctic silver 5, easy to apply, and works great. The pea drop in the middle works a charm every time 🙂 I'm not familiar with that particular TIM, but it reviews quite well. There seem to be many methods of applying it, most seem like too much trouble for me lol, all for a couple of points on the temp doesn't compute... I'd try just applying it normally, the paste will heat up and spread more when you run your PC, worst that can happen is it'll run a little hot, you won't damage anything. If it performs subpar try heating the tube a bit in warm water, apparently that helps it spread better. Otherwise go to Radio Shack and get some arctic silver for $7 and be done with it lol :-D Good Luck!

 

[Calculatron]

Shen Etsu is a good brand. Like mentioned above, if you think you may have issues applying it, you can try putting a bit on a plastic bag, and then warming it up in some warm water, or some such.

If you have enough, there is not harm is applying some, and then taking the heatsink off to see how it spread - just be sure to clean off both surfaces and re-apply new paste afterwards.

Arctic Silver 5 was - and still is - a product with good performance. Other thermal compounds have been made that not only perform better, but require no cure time and are not electrically capacitive. Arctic Cooling MX-4 and Noctua NT-H1 are good examples of this.

If you don't feel like spending $10 on a 4g tube, though, there is this alternative as well: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100017
It is also made by Arctic Silver, but has less cure time, and isn't capacitive. Performance is roughly the same.

 

[Trytiped]

Thank you guys for the answers! I decided to go with arctic silver 5, simply because everywhere I've read has stated that Tim's can only make an approximate 1-2 degrees difference (tops), and although I'm a perfectionist the ease of application in this case is more important to me.