No thermal paste for i5 9600k, can I just directly attach heatsink?

[PcMasterRaceNewborn]

So i bought an i5 9600k to upgrade my PC but I have no thermal paste... Can I run my PC without thermal paste and just a heatsink for a day?

 

If so, would it be safe for me to run games or more demanding programs?

 

[homeap5]

Yes, but control your temperature and do not use any heavy cpu programs. And for sure do not OC!

No, forget about games.

 

But I recommend to wait that one day.

[PcMasterRaceNewborn]

Ah, I see. Thank you

[Levent]

I dont think it will be running for a while so i highly suggest you not to use your CPU without thermal paste even if it's just for a day.

[PcMasterRaceNewborn]

IAh, I see. Thank you. Is it safe for me to just leave my components out?

 

[RejZoR]

Take a pencil, grind its core into a very fine dust, mix it with a bit of olive oil until you get a paste like consistency. Smear it on CPU. That should do it for the time being. Oil as bonding medium, graphite as thermal conductor.

 

Other method could be placing a piece of aluminium foil between CPU and cooler. Just make sure it's pristine without any creases. It should fill in the tiny gaps with pressure. Haven't tested it yet, but in theory, it should work.

[kla3]

1 minute ago, PcMasterRaceNewborn said:

Is it safe for me to just leave my components out?

Dont use it without paste!

And sure you can leave the components out, just unplug it, and keep them somewhere safe

[kla3]

2 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

Take a pencil, grind its core into a very fine dust, mix it with a bit of olive oil until you get a paste like consistency

you are smarter than, me, lol!

[Guest]

59 minutes ago, PcMasterRaceNewborn said:

So i bought an i5 9600k to upgrade my PC but I have no thermal paste... Can I run my PC without thermal paste and just a heatsink for a day?

 

If so, would it be safe for me to run games or more demanding programs?

 

Wow.

NO-

do not use the pc.

Get thermal paste. It's cheap. Easy to come by.

Wait the 2 or 3 days for the paste to arrive. leave it unplugged, yes you can leave parts open to the air. just be sure there is no dust accumulation. 

 

Any other suggestion than that might break your hardware. Please do not grind a pencil up. Poor mans tricks never pay off in the end. 

Pencil lead. It's conductive.

Metal to metal (no paste) has too much gap and atmosphere does not conduct BTU as well as thermal paste.

 

Please handle your electronics with care. Peanut Butter is not a good thermal interface material.

[RejZoR]

Ok, I've tested it today, because I was so curious.

 

Aluminium foil, while it works, it's not meant for heavy loads. AIDA64 quickly shot up to 100°C which makes it unusable. Windows did boot fine and temps were okay-ish for movies and web browsing.

 

However, pencil shavings (graphite dust that I scraped of pencil core using box cutter/olfa knife) mixed with a bit of olive oil to create paste like consistency yield pretty amazing results.

 

AIDA64 Stress Test, Room temperature 22°C, CoolerMaster Nepton 120XL with single BeQuiet Silent Wings 3 at 100%/2500 RPM (I've maxed it to really show the heat transfer capacity of the thermal solution):

CoolerMaster Maker Nano thermal paste gave me 69-70°C

Olive oil with graphite dust, 73-74°C

 

In both cases it was bouncing back and forth between those values after 15 minutes of load where it basically stabilized at given measured temperatures. One thing to note, graphite is electrically conductive so don't smear it anywhere where it can short circuit things.

 

So, here you have it guys, if you run out of thermal paste, all stores are closed, but you have some olive oil and a pencil, you can make a pretty damn good thermal paste yourself. If you happen to have silicone grease, use that as bonding medium, but I really wanted to use things you can find in 99% of homes. And it works so well it probably beats some commercially available thermal pastes lol. To only have a delta of 4°C between this home cooked thermal paste and one of better commercial thermal pastes, I'd say that's pretty amazing.