First time thermal paste application

[cleric_warlock]

The link below has images of my first thermal paste application, I took the CPU out for relidding and wanted to get some more experienced input to help spot any issues I might be missing. I know that I used a bit too much thermal paste and have read that apparently intel IHSs are slightly convex which would explain the extra pressure in the middle along with the fact that my cooler's cold plate is also very slightly convex. Any and all insights on my first thermal paste job are more than welcome!

 

https://imgur.com/a/rDlgfh2

[For Science!]

3 hours ago, cleric_warlock said:

The link below has images of my first thermal paste application, I took the CPU out for relidding and wanted to get some more experienced input to help spot any issues I might be missing. I know that I used a bit too much thermal paste and have read that apparently intel IHSs are slightly convex which would explain the extra pressure in the middle along with the fact that my cooler's cold plate is also very slightly convex. Any and all insights on my first thermal paste job are more than welcome!

 

https://imgur.com/a/rDlgfh2

Looks fine to me, a common misconception is that you expect to see thermal paste on the whole surface of the cooler/IHS after unmounting a cooler. This is incorrectly, and you want to ideally have the majority of both surfaces to be clean, which indicates a good metal-to-metal contact, which is what you want, and a remaining fractal/lightning pattern for where contact was inadequate. That more or less looks like what you have, and so I think you application and mounting pressure was adequate.

[cleric_warlock]

On 6/28/2022 at 2:06 PM, For Science! said:

Looks fine to me, a common misconception is that you expect to see thermal paste on the whole surface of the cooler/IHS after unmounting a cooler. This is incorrectly, and you want to ideally have the majority of both surfaces to be clean, which indicates a good metal-to-metal contact, which is what you want, and a remaining fractal/lightning pattern for where contact was inadequate. That more or less looks like what you have, and so I think you application and mounting pressure was adequate.

Great! Thank you for the input!