Thermal paste question

[Grimreaper86]

So I got a new mobo and processor recently and applied a liquid cooler. I was curious about thermal paste application and wanted to make sure I had done everything correctly. After doing some research today on linustechtips youtube; I found I had certainly used "too much". That being said, I'm sure my application of thermal paste didn't leave the card; although it's likely hanging on the sides a tad bit. Regardless, I had powered up the build yesterday; but due to some errors on my part; Windows wouldn't boot up. However, the computer itself seems to be running quite quickly and the mobo hardware monitor appeared to be giving very good temperature readings. I'm something of a perfectionist but I'm also aligned with the school of thought; "if it ain't broke; don't fix it." 

So I guess my question is. Despite not showing any performance issues yet; should I just go ahead and clear it off and reapply a smaller amount or should I leave well enough alone?

[Oshino Shinobu]

If temps are performance are good, leave it be. Unless it's liquid metal stuff from someone like Coollaboratory, in that case you should clean it well and reapply a small amount. 

[Vapare]

If it's not conductive, then I would leave it. If you lift it off your die, then you would have to reapply it because of air pockets. Just clean up the sides and don't worry about it. I'm sure someone here will be like, "YOU CAN'T DO THAT BECAUSE BLAH BLAH BLAH!" It's fine. Don't worry about it.

[Vapare]

Here's a video that will give you some peace and silence the trolls.

[Godlygamer23]

If you have no issues, leave it. The more you mess with it, the more likely you could break something and make your system non-functional, or next time around you could make the thermal paste application worse. 

 

The idea that I'm pushing is to effectively "inspect to accept." Always be on the side of acceptance when inspecting something you or someone else did.

[Grimreaper86]

Thanks for the replies. I appreciate the reassurance.