Check your card before running it!

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mohammedtaha

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I just got my card today from RMA and I'm too cautious to just throw it in the computer before checking it out. Thank god I did ...

Makes me wonder if ATi's RMA people read the procedures and if they perform tests on the cards before shipping them out ...

:eek:



how about a closer look ..

Fuzzy but you get the "picture" ..

 
Im assuming that its conductive? If not, then whats the big deal? They over applyed, but the guy was probably 12 years old in some random country in the Phillipines.
 
im not saying it supposed to be that way, but my X800GTO was the same way when i went to put the zalman vf-700 on it, it took a while to clean up all the goop... but by the looks on yours it seems they did a bad clean up job
 
When I took the heatsink off my Sapphire 9800Pro, I was suprised to see that they did a nice job putting the paste on. They also used a silver based compound
 
Yes. It's AS5 ... and it's extremely conductive.

I could've done some serious damage to my card by turning it on. I don't think they turned the card on after applying the AS5. It looks like they just slapped it on turned it on .. off and that was it ..
 
i dont think its conductive, therefor it shouldnt matter.

its is very sloppy though, and i would clean it and slap some AS5 on it...but i would have been doing that anyway. :)

good luck with the card. hope it works!
 
Bleh... it doenst make much of a difference changing it to AS5. I just dont think its worth the extra time to change the thermal junk on my video card... Ide rather slam that baby into my computer then mess with thermal paste.
 
Tengis said:
Bleh... it doenst make much of a difference changing it to AS5. I just dont think its worth the extra time to change the thermal junk on my video card... Ide rather slam that baby into my computer then mess with thermal paste.
Click to expand...

Could make your card run that little bit cooler
 
HighwayAssassins said:
i dont think its conductive, therefor it shouldnt matter.
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You're right about the conductivity but it still sounds dodgy.......


Arctic Silver Website said:
Not Electrically Conductive:

Arctic Silver 5 was formulated to conduct heat, not electricity.
(While much safer than electrically conductive silver and copper greases, Arctic Silver 5 should be kept away from electrical traces, pins, and leads. While it is not electrically conductive, the compound is very slightly capacitive and could potentially cause problems if it bridges two close-proximity electrical paths.)
Click to expand...
 
mohammedtaha said:
Yes. It's AS5 ... and it's extremely conductive.

I could've done some serious damage to my card by turning it on. I don't think they turned the card on after applying the AS5. It looks like they just slapped it on turned it on .. off and that was it ..
Click to expand...

NO, it is not. I have TRIED to get it to fuck up an old chip (tried to get it to short out) just to see if it was conductive. I had an entire cpu covered and it did nothing. In theory it may be, but in real life it does not do jack...Atleast when i tried.

When you have to much thermal compund on a chip it makes the transfer of heat go down a bit, but it would not do anything to your card.
 
When they say AS5 is Capacitive on the website, they really mean in close contacts. I have gotten it to give a reading using a multimeter, but I had to place the pins in the AS5 EXTREMELY close together. Closer than the two sides of the capacitors/resistors on that GPU. No problems that I can see, man.
 
My recent RMA from ATI. I got a used card back. I questioned it, but did not get very far. It does work though...

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mohammedtaha said:
I just got my card today from RMA and I'm too cautious to just throw it in the computer before checking it out. Thank god I did ...

Makes me wonder if ATi's RMA people read the procedures and if they perform tests on the cards before shipping them out ...

:eek:



how about a closer look ..

Fuzzy but you get the "picture" ..

Click to expand...

i accidentally spreaded AS5 like that on my old x800xtpe and it didnt do anything bad to the card. still works
 
Some of you guys are totally off base. If the card is coming from ATI, the stuff they're using is NOT AS5. I've seen that silverish paste crud on other ATI cards and my Sapphire, and I highly doubt they'd be so foolish as to include anything with the possibility of conductivity. Same reason why AMD and Intel don't approve the use of AS5, and using it will void your warrenty. So I'm sure the generic joe blow ATI paste isn't AS5, and I doubt it's a AS knock off. If you look closely at the gunk, you won't see any silver particles.

I can't believe you guys missed this, I guess I'm getting old enough to remember back when there was no AS, kids these days just assume AS comes with everything. ;) :p While AS style pastes are big with the enthusiast market, which has grown larger, you'd still never ever catch a major OEM or equipment manufacturer using anything with conductive material in it on electrical components.


Of course it comes like that from the factory some of the time. I'd bet many cards look like that underneath. Then again, isn't it standard to not only replace the thermal paste (which is crap to begin with, and applied poorly), but also lap the HSF? The HSF is crap, the one you have pictured probably has little machine bumps that you can feel, almost "ribbed", but not the good kind your gf likes.

Either way, what I'm trying to say is that factory stock cooling solutions often suck! Even many of the "premium" solutions now offered with enthusiast model cards also suck. The problem is that in any mass produced setting, quality control often slips by the wayside, and the prep/lap/installation job you and I can do in 1hr would cost far too much in a factory environment. This is why, when you buy hardware, you should always expect to re-apply the thermal paste, and probably lap the HSF, if you don't have a replacement picked out already.
 
HighwayAssassins said:
we are talking about replacing the bunk shit with AS5...
Click to expand...
I wasn't talking about your discussion about replacement, look at the posts above your own, a variety of them talk about the thermal conductivity of the paste, the silver content, the fact that major manufacturers use silver content pastes, and the OP directly calls the paste in the picture AS5. Regardless, my point is that just because it looks silver, doesn't mean it has anything to do with actual silver/metal content.
 
mikelz85 said:
look at the posts, a variety of them talk about the thermal conductivity of the paste, the silver content, the fact that major manufacturers use silver content pastes, and one directly calls the paste in the picture AS. Regardless, my point is that just because it looks silver, doesn't mean it has anything to do with actual silver/metal content.
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It is AS5. I have used AS5 enough to know what it is.

I take back my statement on it's thermal conductivity.

It's still an extremely sloppy job.
 
mohammedtaha said:
It is AS5. I have used AS5 enough to know what it is.

I take back my statement on it's thermal conductivity.

It's still an extremely sloppy job.
Click to expand...
It's not AS5. Nobody would use AS5 in a factory setting. If ATI has a contract with AS, then I guess you can call me a fool. Personally, if that's the same gunk (and it looks the same, and came on similar cards) I've handled, it is far thicker and nothing like AS5. It also doesn't have any particles, if you get a magnifying lense out.
 
mohammedtaha said:
Yes. It's AS5 ... and it's extremely conductive.
Click to expand...

Are you on crack? Dude. I've purposely connected metal areas on my old 9800XT for shits and giggles. It worked PERFECT. No artifacting or anything.

Honestly, I think someone people over exaggerate the "Conductiveness" of AS5.
 
TehRoflcopter said:
Are you on crack? Dude. I've purposely connected metal areas on my old 9800XT for shits and giggles. It worked PERFECT. No artifacting or anything.

Honestly, I think someone people over exaggerate the "Conductiveness" of AS5.
Click to expand...
he said above that he takes that back.

Either way, it's not a silver based paste, and it'd be easy enough to find out for sure if somebody really wanted to prove it one way or the other.

AS5 and AS epoxy aren't very conductive, if anything what I've heard is slightly capacitive. They shouldn't be confused with real silver epoxy which can be used to reconnect traces etc.
 
TehRoflcopter said:
Are you on crack? Dude. I've purposely connected metal areas on my old 9800XT for shits and giggles. It worked PERFECT. No artifacting or anything.

Honestly, I think someone people over exaggerate the "Conductiveness" of AS5.
Click to expand...

Still doesn't mean you should just slop the shit everywhere you see fit. Keep it clean people.
 
mikelz85 said:
he said above that he takes that back.

Either way, it's not a silver based paste, and it'd be easy enough to find out for sure if somebody really wanted to prove it one way or the other.

AS5 and AS epoxy aren't very conductive, if anything what I've heard is slightly capacitive. They shouldn't be confused with real silver epoxy which can be used to reconnect traces etc.
Click to expand...

If you open your eyes and READ what he said above. He says that he's aware of its THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY. Not electrical conductivity. Big difference there man, sorry I had to be the one to point it out to you in such a manner.

And Mister E, of course we know that were not supposed to slop AS5 anywhere we please. But I was proving a point, AS5 is not as conductive as everyone thinks it is. I am not saying that "Hey, its not that conductive, maybe we can get more m3g4hurtZ out of 0v3rcl0x if we put AS5 everywherE LOLOLOL". That would be insane now wouldn't it? Can you imagine how incredibly difficult it would be to clean all of that up? A lot, thats what.
 
That isn't AS5, and AS5 isn't conductive. It's overapplied, yes, but poses no risk of damage to circuitry.
 
Thermal compounds are mostly silicone, which is not electrically conductive. And if it's slightly capacitive, that means it's an electrical insulator.

In short, quit being a puss and boot the thing up already.
 
I cleaned it up, cleaned out Windows' old drivers, installed the maze4 within 15 mins of taking that picture.

I guess people for some reason like to bash, especially in this Video card section. Seems like everyone here "knows" what they're talking about and know how every company works inside and out. In order to prove to me that it wasn't AS5, bring out another thermal paste that perfectly resembles AS5 but isn't AS5, or a statement limiting ATi from applying AS5 to video cards. Maybe then I'll believe you. However, I will not allow this thread to continue, start your own thread.

Have a good day.

Mohammed
 
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