Who would sell thermal tape locally?

Gorilla

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The adhesive on vram heatsinks turned out to be crap and I ran out of thermal tape in the middle of putting a universal block on my gtx 680. I can order some online, but who knows how long it will take to show up. I'm in Portland, Oregon. Can you think of any store that would sell this kind of thing? I checked Fry's but no go.

My only thought is maybe a RC hobby store.
 
The thermal conductivity of thermal tapes is so extremely low that you wouldn't notice much difference just using double-sided scotch tape in low-heat applications like RAM. You could certainly get by with it until an online order arrives.
 
The thermal conductivity of thermal tapes is so extremely low that you wouldn't notice much difference just using double-sided scotch tape in low-heat applications like RAM. You could certainly get by with it until an online order arrives.

That depends on exactly what thermal "tape" or rather thermal pad material is ordered.

Sure it is all still pretty crappy compared to what you would get with just good thermal paste, but there is a huge difference in performance between different thermal pads.

The better stuff can get pretty expensive though.

If you are buying stuff that is thin enough to use thermal tape, then you might as well just use some nice thick thermal paste such as IC7.

If you actually need pads, then you want to make sure you either get some of the exact thickness and of the higher grade stuff.. or you can get the really nice expensive stuff that is more like a putty.
 
Pads and pastes won't work. He is trying to put aftermarket heatsinks on the ram chips themselves. Without a proper double sided tape the heatsinks will fall off.

An RC hobby store might work, or if Radio Shack was still open, or anyplace like that might be a good option.

There are some on ebay:

eBay item number:
271799308203

You can search that ebay category for "tape" and get a lot of hits
 
That depends on exactly what thermal "tape" or rather thermal pad material is ordered.

Sure it is all still pretty crappy compared to what you would get with just good thermal paste, but there is a huge difference in performance between different thermal pads.

The better stuff can get pretty expensive though.

If you are buying stuff that is thin enough to use thermal tape, then you might as well just use some nice thick thermal paste such as IC7.

If you actually need pads, then you want to make sure you either get some of the exact thickness and of the higher grade stuff.. or you can get the really nice expensive stuff that is more like a putty.

Thermal tapes range from .5 to 1.5 Watts per meter Kelvin on their thermal conductivity. Compare that to the thermal conductivity of metals like silver and copper at 400+ W/m*K, and I think most pastes are around 5-10 W/m*K or so. Their other thermodynamic properties are also pretty poor. They have their use though.

Again any double sided acrylic-type tape should hold the guy over until he can get something else. The only thing to worry about is the type of adhesive used and if is strong enough to continue to adhere the heatsink to the memory when it gets warm.
 
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Well I tried regular double stick tape and they fell off after a couple minutes of the system being on.

I ordered some thermal tape off ebay last night but it won't arrive until the end of next week (if I'm lucky). Oh well. At least the little aluminum VRM heatsinks stayed on the VRMs. It's only 3 VRAM modules that are missing and those should be ok without any cooling for a week. I mean, a lot of stock coolers don't even make contact with the VRAM.
 
Another option is to use regular thermal paste on most of the chip, with a tiny dot of superglue in the corners. The TIM will do the heat transfer as usual, and the superglue will hold the heatsink on securely, while still popping off easily if you're specifically trying to remove them. The Zalman STG1 I had around worked well for this, allowing me to spread a very thin layer in a very precise location.
 
Another option is to use regular thermal paste on most of the chip, with a tiny dot of superglue in the corners. The TIM will do the heat transfer as usual, and the superglue will hold the heatsink on securely, while still popping off easily if you're specifically trying to remove them. The Zalman STG1 I had around worked well for this, allowing me to spread a very thin layer in a very precise location.

That's actually a pretty good idea I think, though..... if my past luck with superglue is any indication I would probably end up with my card stuck to the side of my face and my hands stuck in clenched fists, or at the very least with a lot of superglue fingerprints all over my card.

I do have some more thermal tape coming from ebay. Hopefully it makes it here by the Friday estimate as I have a lan to go to.

I never did find any place locally that sells it. No go at Fry's Electronics, Radio Shack, local computer shops, or anywhere else. I did almost call Platt Electric Supply as they sell a lot of that kind of stuff, but I suspect that even if they do sell it, it comes in quantities far larger than I would use in a lifetime.
 
I have used the superglue method a few times before. The heatsinks tend to fall off after a while.
 
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