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Arctic Silver Thermal Compound or Arctic Alumina Thermal Compound?

RussianSensation

RussianSensation

Elite Member
HI. I need to mount Zalman ZM-NB47J heatsink onto my northbridge and I was wondering which is the better compound to use performance wise?

 
If we're comparing AS and AA adhesives, I'm not sure. I don't know if they still use the Arctic Silver I formulation for the AS adhesive. If so, AA is a little bit better than ASI.

I usually make my own adhesive - AS2, 3, or whatever I can find, in the middle of the chip, and a few dabs of regular epoxy around the corners. This provides adequate adhesion, while still giving you at least some chance of removing the heatsink later, without ripping the chip off the board with it.
This lets the thermal compound work best, uninhibited by epoxy.

Does this Zalman heatsink have clips for the motherboard? If so, you don't even need adhesive - just plain old Arctic Silver 5.
 
The heatsink can only be mounted on motherboards that have holes and mine doesn't. That is why I need a thermal adhesive.

But Arctic Alumina is about $6 and AS adhesive is $9. Also AA is non-conductive, making it safer. I just need to see if the AS adhesive performs better because otherwise it just makes more sense to get AA.

Unfortunately I do not have any thermal compound, so i cannot just purchase epoxy alone and mix it with that.
 
You shouldn't see more than 1-2c temp difference between them and I would get the AA because it is less expensive and as you alluded to isn't conductive or capacitive.
 
even cheaper, works great too depending on the surface. i personally used it to epoxy a sanded down(a rough surface will make the epoxy hold much better,you should do so) huge P1 heatsink to my FX5200 graphics card. did wonders 🙂
 
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