What is currently that best thermal conductive compound?

Noetic

Noetic

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Apr 11, 2001
Messages
1,288
Having a megahelem (push pull fans) running warm with an o/c'ed 2600 (60c with 1.5v, 52c with 1.4v under full load according to the Asrock temp gauge), I purchased an H100, and the numbers are about the same (I will be testing push pull this evening). I noticed that the megahelem did not get particularly warm, and the h100 radiator feels closes to ambient. I am using Arctic silver 5, perhaps I need something different.

What is the best compound available these days?

david
 
I recently read a pretty good, recent comparison of pastes (2011 or maybe 2010) that showed the evolution of the technology. Ah! here it is: http://skinneelabs.com/2011-tim-results/ He's still working on some of them. If I recall correctly skinnee does high-quality testing.

Arctic Silver 5 is certainly respectable, but there have been developments since its introduction for pastes that run cooler and have near- zero curing time instead of 200 hours.

My understanding is that overall, "Indigo Xtreme" is far and away the coolest, but has a difficult installation (requiring you to allow the processor to heat up, uncooled, to melt and bond the TIM to your heatsink or cooling block). Also, it can't be used anywhere but a CPU so no touching up GPU contacts or elsewhere.

So far, "Phobya HeGrease" seems to take the performance crown for pastes, but there's still a lot of testing yet to do. Arctic Silver 5 and even Arctic Cooling MX2 have been outclassed by some of the newcomers. I'm not too well versed in Phobya gear, but they seem to be a high-end European manufacturer of a fair bit of hardware, given "http://www.phobya.com/eng/phobya.html" including a lot of euro-style watercooling gear. Prolimatech PK-1 seems to be just behind the HeGrease so far, and may be easier to get ahold of if you're in the states, as Prolimatech gear is now becoming nearly as common as thermalright in terms of high-end air cooling. There's also someone postulating that the HeGrease is a rebrand or similar to an upcoming Scythe paste - I'm very interested in that test and hope to see Scythe do well.

As for the stuff still to come on the TIM comparison, and there are some names that are worth watching. Cool-Laboratory's Liquid Metal series is similar to Indigo Xtreme in how its mounted, and I think had the performance crown for the "metal, have to melt" style TIM before Indigo. Tuniq is worth watching but last I heard they're similar to MX series, Feser and Gelid could be decent performers, Scythe I'm expecting high quality at a great price (They're great at being jusssttt behind the top performers at half or less the price, with their other cooling gear.), New Shin-Etsu, and finally IC Diamond which I believe used to be the 2010 "best paste style" TIM around, and pretty damn easy to apply at that.
 
Last edited:
Thank you for the thorough undertaking. The application of the metal solutions might be a bit out of my comfort zone and perhaps diminishing returns. Indeed it is the "curing" or settling time that is holding me back on the AS5.
It was easy enough to find the HeGrease, a bit pricey with shipping, but I am willing to give it a go.

Thank you again for your assistance and the education.
-david
 
the debate will rage on, but the difference between the top dozen thermal compounds is in the low single digits; meaning if you used the #1 best or the #8 best, your temperatures will be within a degree or two of each other. if you are having temperature trouble with AS5, you will have trouble with any other compound as well. if you are expecting to get 10 or 20+ degrees of temperature drop (or even 5...) from a thermal past, you are dreaming.
 
I went from AS5 to the AS Ceramique and really don't like it. To pasty and hard to work with. To me the best price/performance is still AS5.
 
I really like and have been using AS Ceramique for many years...its pasty a bit but perfectly workable..
clean up is alcohol or solvent..dissolves instantly..
temps varied very little using top quality paste...im a Ceramique guy..ive got like 4 big tubes of it here..
probubly last me the rest of my life....
 
Noetic said:
Having a megahelem (push pull fans) running warm with an o/c'ed 2600 (60c with 1.5v, 52c with 1.4v under full load according to the Asrock temp gauge), I purchased an H100, and the numbers are about the same (I will be testing push pull this evening). I noticed that the megahelem did not get particularly warm, and the h100 radiator feels closes to ambient. I am using Arctic silver 5, perhaps I need something different.

What is the best compound available these days?

david
Click to expand...

if you are looking for better temps, you need to do custom water cooling. the best AIO water cooling devices today are on par with the best air cooling devices, the H100 is not going to get any much better with any thermal compound.
 
I'm not normally one to cross-promote, but I've been known to favor (and resell) Shin-Etsu X23-7783D in the past. I'm working on getting some of their new paste as we speak.
 
Testing using GPUs instead of CPUs yielded different results, as can application methods(within a few degrees), as does testing cercumstances.
Likely any of the top performers will do well, how well may involve application, pressure, heat, and air flow.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top