thermal paste removal

[crazymonkee84]

i just bought a zalman fan and arctic silver 5 coolant paste but i read that if you mix it with the stock paste its basically useless but i also read in a hardocp article that using Permatex Blue Label cream you can remove it easily. the article is here http://hardocp.com/article.html?art=Nzg5LDI=. anybody ever try before on a cpu????im going to attempt on a p4 2.8 prescott probably next week when i get the thermal paste anybody have any experience if so can you tell me what you did and what you used???thanks

 

[Furystrike]

I recently switched to from stock cooling to a big typhoon and here's what I did-

Get a bag of cottonballs and the purest isopropyl alcohol you can find (rubbing alcohol). I was at a friends house and the best purity they had was 50% which worked, but higher would be better.

dab the cottonballs with some of the alcohol and rub the heatsink AND core to get rid of the excess grease. I went through quite a few cottonballs before the surfaces were completely clean (15 maybe? I donno) For around the edges of the cpu core (or IHS) you could use a cottonswap to reach better. The alcohol will quickly evaporate and your CPU will be ready to fire up.

Nonetheless, use as little as possible. No point in risking anything. Hope this helps!

 

[Furystrike]

Also, follow the artic silver instructions for appling the paste. You need only a small bit (the size of a grain of rice) on the core and then apply the heatsink directly on top, twisting a few degrees as you place it on to fill in air pockets.

DO NOT SMEAR IT ON EITHER THE HEATSINK OR CPU!!! let the grease find its way to where it needs to be.

 

[DangerIsGo]

Yes, just a small dab is all you need. Anything more and you have the chance of the paste going to places where you dont want it to. For example, too much will push it off the sides and makes it a b*tch to clean up, especially if it gets underneath and touches pins. If that happens, you must clean it off the BEST you can before you put that CPU back in the socket, else bad things may happen. One thing = no CPU. Get it? Too little paste and you might not cover the entire area needed for heat x-fer and your core temperature can be higher than you expected. Just do not let it get to the pins by putting too much on. ive had that happen w/ my 3200 and luckily I was able to clean it all off (wasnt much but still bad) with a paper towel and some patience.

As for removal, find the highest % of rubbing alcohol you can find (I just used 70% but I think theres higher..im pretty sure) and get the surface to shine then dry it off