Thermal Pads or Paste?

[linesma]

I am in the process of cleaning up my 5 year old laptop, an Asus G75VW. As a part of this cleaning, I plan on replacing the thermal compound on both the CPU and GPU. While taking apart the nVidia 670M GPU, I noticed that the VRM's and RAM chips had thermal paste on them instead of thermal pads. The question I have, should I use thermal paste on them like they did from the factory, or should I use some thermal pads instead?

 

Thanks!

[tikker]

Technically you could, although practically you can't. Thermal pads are thick(er), so putting paste on there will cause them to probably not make (good enough) contact with the heatsink.

Oops, misread. I thought you meant replacing pads with paste. Thicnkess argument probably still holds though.

[Jurrunio]

Paste for them as well, because it's easier, unless you use electically conduction thermal paste (liquid metal).

[AngryBeaver]

For the VRM and RAM chips, I would just go back with pads. You don't need the thermal transfer of paste for them and it would just be a mess going back with it. The VRM and RAM really don't need a ton in the way of cooling... as long as they are able to transfer some heat away from them and to the heatsink then they will be fine.

[ARikozuM]

I would just do paste. Apply enough paste and the pressure will fit the paste to the necessary thickness. 

[AngryBeaver]

19 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

I would just do paste. Apply enough paste and the pressure will fit the paste to the necessary thickness. 

This would be a nightmare to clean up... and some TIM's are conductive which would make this an even worse choice. Pads offer a much cleaner solution and since we are talking about the VRM and RAM here, they don't require much cooling.

[linesma]

8 minutes ago, AngryBeaver said:

This would be a nightmare to clean up... and some TIM's are conductive which would make this an even worse choice. Pads offer a much cleaner solution and since we are talking about the VRM and RAM here, they don't require much cooling.

Normally I would agree with you, but the card came stock with paste already. That is why I was wondering it I should switch from paste to pads.

[ARikozuM]

7 minutes ago, AngryBeaver said:

This would be a nightmare to clean up... and some TIM's are conductive which would make this an even worse choice. Pads offer a much cleaner solution and since we are talking about the VRM and RAM here, they don't require much cooling.

VRMs require quite a bit of cooling. You would have to search for a non-liquid metal TIM that is electrically conductive, nearly no commonly recommended TIM is conductive. Unless the OP plans to have leftover pads there's no need to purchase something that will likely go bad by the time it's used next.

[Sack]

14 minutes ago, AngryBeaver said:

This would be a nightmare to clean up... and some TIM's are conductive which would make this an even worse choice. Pads offer a much cleaner solution and since we are talking about the VRM and RAM here, they don't require much cooling.

The thing is though, pads will be thicker than paste so getting the cooler back on will be a nightmare, and very rarely are thermal compound actually electrically conductive.

[AngryBeaver]

9 minutes ago, Sack said:

The thing is though, pads will be thicker than paste so getting the cooler back on will be a nightmare, and very rarely are thermal compound actually electrically conductive.

You can buy the pads in many different thicknesses and the good ones are very squishy so they will just expand out as mounting pressure is applied. As to thermal compound being electrically conductive... it is true that a lot aren't, but some of the better ones are conductive.. all of the liquid metal versions are, the silver based ones are, etc..

 

Just spraying a ton of paste on the components and then squeezing on the block is going to be terrible. Chances are you will have air pockets with this method and air does not conduct well at all. Also the more paste you have, the less conductivity... which is also why I am suggesting the thermal pads.  If you buy the correct ones, then you will get better results I feel. 

[linesma]

43 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

I would just do paste. Apply enough paste and the pressure will fit the paste to the necessary thickness. 

Thanks for the reply. I am thinking that I will stick with paste then. Since that is what they used from the factory. I have a brand new tube of the Gelid GC Extreme that I was planning on using. It is not conductive.