Best thermal paste?

[kindlestone]

I am about to buy a Core 2 Quad Q9300 for my pc and want to know what the best or that makes a good bond with in the heatsink or maybe a bundled heatsink with thermal with at least a 100w TDP but preferably just the compound itself.

 

Thank You

[Spork829]

IC Diamond is the best, but really as long as it is supposed to be used as thermal compound for computers, it will work just fine. Using the most expensive stuff will only get you a couple degrees lower than the cheapest.

[ArmswieldTheHero]

Tuniq TX-4

http://www.pcgamer.com/geek-tested-17-thermal-pastes-face-off/2/

[kindlestone]

Just now, Spork829 said:

IC Diamond is the best, but really as long as it is supposed to be used as thermal compound for computers, it will work just fine. Using the most expensive stuff will only get you a couple degrees lower than the cheapest.

Ok Thanks!

[m0k]

off topic , but how much are you paying for this Q9300 ?

[aisle9]

8 minutes ago, kindlestone said:

I am about to buy a Core 2 Quad Q9300 for my pc and want to know what the best or that makes a good bond with in the heatsink or maybe a bundled heatsink with thermal with at least a 100w TDP but preferably just the compound itself.

 

Thank You

MX-4 is imo the best stuff for PC. AS-5, CP7, NT-H1 and IC Diamond are also solid and easily available, although IC Diamond can scratch up your CPU and heat spreader if you ever have to wipe it off. Generally, though, the best paste and the worst are only separated by a couple of degrees, so unless you're delidding and going for warp 9 on your OC, whatever comes with the cooler is fine.

[Dabombinable]

Just now, aisle9 said:

MX-4 is imo the best stuff for PC. AS-5, CP7, NT-H1 and IC Diamond are also solid, although IC Diamond can scratch up your CPU and heat spreader if you ever have to wipe it off. Generally, though, the best paste and the worst are only separated by a couple of degrees, so unless you're delidding and going for warp 9 on your OC, whatever comes with the cooler is fine.

MX 4 is right up there with the expensive (and best) thermal compounds-its got the best value of all thermal compounds as well.

[kindlestone]

5 minutes ago, mok said:

off topic , but how much are you paying for this Q9300 ?

$17 USD

[Zyndo]

MX-4 and AS5 (arctic silver 5) are the two most affordable used and reliable thermal pastes as far as I'm concerned. Linus himself gave IC Diamond his vote for best thermal paste, but pretty much anything is good.

[Maxxtraxx]

Toms Hardware giant thermal paste review: here

 

BTW i use noctua nt-h1, great performance and value imo

[Dabombinable]

9 minutes ago, Zyndo said:

MX-4 and AS5 (arctic silver 5) are the two most affordable used and reliable thermal pastes as far as I'm concerned. Linus himself gave IC Diamond his vote for best thermal paste, but pretty much anything is good.

Just an FYI, from personal experience, AS5 is overpriced for how well it performs and how much you get.

[GDRRiley]

4 minutes ago, Maxxtraxx said:

Toms Hardware giant thermal paste review: here

 

BTW i use noctua nt-h1, great performance and value imo

me too

[Zyndo]

19 minutes ago, Dabombinable said:

Just an FYI, from personal experience, AS5 is overpriced for how well it performs and how much you get.

I USE As5. its plenty fine.  got mine for like 7 bucks. if that's "overpriced".... then you need to go get a job

[Dabombinable]

7 minutes ago, Zyndo said:

I USE As5. its plenty fine.  got mine for like 7 bucks. if that's "overpriced".... then you need to go get a job

Yes, it is over priced:

http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2050601.m570.l2632.R2.TR4.TRC1.A0.H0.Xarctic+silver.TRS0&_nkw=arctic+silver+5&_sacat=175673

http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?_odkw=arctic+silver+5&_osacat=175673&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l2632.R2.TR2.TRC1.A0.H0.Xarctic+mx+4.TRS0&_nkw=arctic+mx-4&_sacat=175673

Look at the amount you get.

[Zyndo]

11 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

Yes, it is over priced:

http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2050601.m570.l2632.R2.TR4.TRC1.A0.H0.Xarctic+silver.TRS0&_nkw=arctic+silver+5&_sacat=175673

http://www.ebay.com.au/sch/i.html?_odkw=arctic+silver+5&_osacat=175673&_from=R40&_trksid=p2045573.m570.l2632.R2.TR2.TRC1.A0.H0.Xarctic+mx+4.TRS0&_nkw=arctic+mx-4&_sacat=175673

Look at the amount you get.

Based on the link you sent you can get

AS5: 3.5g for 10.80 AUD. That works out to be $3.09 per gram

MX-4 4g for 12.76 AUD. That works out to be $3.19 per gram

 

Your link proves MX-4 is more expensive. And you also linked ebay prices which can fluctuate A LOT. so lets take a look at PCpartpicker for for some more normalized prices.

 

http://pcpartpicker.com/product/HBXfrH/arctic-cooling-thermal-paste-acmx4

http://pcpartpicker.com/product/6RrG3C/arctic-silver-thermal-paste-as535g

 

AS5 3.5g for 6.88 USD. That works out to be $1.97 per gram.

MX-4 4g for 7.28 USD. That works out to be $1.82 per gram.

 

MX-4 is a SLIGHTLY better deal there, but we're talking about pennies here. You could try to argue that Mx-4 is the better paste, but their cooling performance is about the same.

 

They perform about the same, they cost about the same. Right now if you REALLY looked at it, MX-4 IS the better deal, but I'd hardly call that "overpriced"

[Dabombinable]

1 hour ago, Zyndo said:

Based on the link you sent you can get

AS5: 3.5g for 10.80 AUD. That works out to be $3.09 per gram

MX-4 4g for 12.76 AUD. That works out to be $3.19 per gram

 

Your link proves MX-4 is more expensive. And you also linked ebay prices which can fluctuate A LOT. so lets take a look at PCpartpicker for for some more normalized prices.

 

http://pcpartpicker.com/product/HBXfrH/arctic-cooling-thermal-paste-acmx4

http://pcpartpicker.com/product/6RrG3C/arctic-silver-thermal-paste-as535g

 

AS5 3.5g for 6.88 USD. That works out to be $1.97 per gram.

MX-4 4g for 7.28 USD. That works out to be $1.82 per gram.

 

MX-4 is a SLIGHTLY better deal there, but we're talking about pennies here. You could try to argue that Mx-4 is the better paste, but their cooling performance is about the same.

 

They perform about the same, they cost about the same. Right now if you REALLY looked at it, MX-4 IS the better deal, but I'd hardly call that "overpriced"

Arctic MX 4 is  better value. http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/thermal-paste-performance-benchmark,3616-17.html

[Zyndo]

Mx-4 after their test was 32.4 AS5 was 33.0. half a degree difference, and that's assuming for NO human error, margin of error, or slightly different ambient temperature. It accounts for NO variables, and its that damn close.

 

Not to mention AS5 is unique in thermal pastes as it has a cure time. AS5, after its application, isn't at 100% right away. It has a cure time before it reaches peak performance. According to Arctic Silver, that time is about 200 Hrs. Most people say you can get pretty much the same results after only 5-25 hours depending on how you go about burning it in. I'm going to assume that your tester did a proper burn-in but if its even half a degree better going out to those 200 Hrs, then MX-4 and AS5 are the same performance according to your chart. Half a degree can EASILY be the difference in ambient temperature. its very unlikely that testing was done in a close room with temperature control to the nearest .1 degree.

 

 

But if you still believe MX4 is a significantly better value, lets take a look at it this way... in a 3.5g or a 4g container, you're going to get about 2 applications out of it. that half a gram difference isn't going to amount to anything. SO, based on the prices I listed above MX-4 is about 6% more expensive overall than AS5. and according to the link that you shared, and ASSUMING a 0% margin of error (which lets be real here, that's just not possible), then MX-4 performs 1.8% better than AS5.

In the battle of price to performance, MX-4 loses based on the available information. How is that a "better value"?

 

 

 

I'm not trying to state that AS5 is the best paste out there, or that MX-4 is garbage. I'm saying stop spewing your nonsense. They perform about the same, they cost about the same, just get whichever you want or is more affordable at the time of purchase.

[Dabombinable]

2 hours ago, Zyndo said:

Mx-4 after their test was 32.4 AS5 was 33.0. half a degree difference, and that's assuming for NO human error, margin of error, or slightly different ambient temperature. It accounts for NO variables, and its that damn close.

 

Not to mention AS5 is unique in thermal pastes as it has a cure time. AS5, after its application, isn't at 100% right away. It has a cure time before it reaches peak performance. According to Arctic Silver, that time is about 200 Hrs. Most people say you can get pretty much the same results after only 5-25 hours depending on how you go about burning it in. I'm going to assume that your tester did a proper burn-in but if its even half a degree better going out to those 200 Hrs, then MX-4 and AS5 are the same performance according to your chart. Half a degree can EASILY be the difference in ambient temperature. its very unlikely that testing was done in a close room with temperature control to the nearest .1 degree.

 

 

But if you still believe MX4 is a significantly better value, lets take a look at it this way... in a 3.5g or a 4g container, you're going to get about 2 applications out of it. that half a gram difference isn't going to amount to anything. SO, based on the prices I listed above MX-4 is about 6% more expensive overall than AS5. and according to the link that you shared, and ASSUMING a 0% margin of error (which lets be real here, that's just not possible), then MX-4 performs 1.8% better than AS5.

In the battle of price to performance, MX-4 loses based on the available information. How is that a "better value"?

 

 

 

I'm not trying to state that AS5 is the best paste out there, or that MX-4 is garbage. I'm saying stop spewing your nonsense. They perform about the same, they cost about the same, just get whichever you want or is more affordable at the time of purchase.

I bought 1 tube of MX 4, then bought 4 tubes over 2 years as people told me to get it over the MX 4, and despite letting it cure its performance did not increase at all, and I only ever got good results from it when using it on my Pentium III and on a Phenom III N970, with MX 4 when I first used it having my i5 4440 idling at ambient with my Seidon 120V-and my 4790K at 4-5^oC (more recent, and due to it idling at 4GHz 1.25V-4.7GHz OC). I know what I'm talking about with the AS5 and MX 4. The fact that the AS5 apparently needs to cure is a reason not to get it BTW-even if following the steps provided.

 

[aisle9]

9 hours ago, Zyndo said:

I'm not trying to state that AS5 is the best paste out there, or that MX-4 is garbage. I'm saying stop spewing your nonsense. They perform about the same, they cost about the same, just get whichever you want or is more affordable at the time of purchase.

My one and only problem with AS5, and this honestly doesn't keep me from using it if it's what i have within reach, is that it's capacitive. Only slightly, yes, but if you manage to smear some on the board, bad times can ensue. That's the only reason I recommend MX-4 over it.

 

I actually think the burn in time can be a good thing. AS5 does improve, in my experience, about 2-3C once it's cooked. A first time overclocker is probably using AS5 because everyone and their mother recommends it, and they probably didnt read the part about burning in. If anything, it might keep them from pushing too far on their first OC. I've actually recommended AS5 to a couple first timers I know for that exact reason. Dickish? Maybe, but their CPUs will thank me later. 

[Delicieuxz]

I did a lot of researching about this recently, and in the end it seemed to me that Arctic Silver MX-4 is as good as it gets, without getting into liquid metal.

 

IC Diamond is pretty good at cooling, though not necessarily better than Arctic Silver. But it has the big downside of scratching surfaces that it's applied to, and also being difficult and messy to work with (though the paste can be heated beforehand to make it softer and easier to work with).

[vagabond139]

Gelid Extreme for your normal paste and for the absolute best Coolaboratory Liquid Pro.

[AoeAoe]

Gelid Extreme for normal uses, Coollaboratory Liqui Pro if you want the best (you will absolutely have to delid to get anything measurable out of it).
CLP is capable of making prime95 small FFT (or other fpu heavy crunching) at -20C lower temperatures, especially on haswells/skylakes which have small die (e.g. small contact with IHS).

[dreamhacking]

i use Arctic Cooling MX-4