CPU Upgrade Guide

[Leonadavinci]

Hello,

I have an old socket-939 based Athlon 64 3000+ and I have found an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ that I want to use in order to upgrade my PC. But I want a guide in order to do the upgrade alone. My main concern is about the thermal paste that is used with the heatsink. How can I clean my old processor and how I will put new paste on my new processor? I have googled but I don't know which of the sites to trust. I know that AnandTech is a good site and for that reason I ask for a step-by-step guide.

Thanks.

 

[aigomorla]

tim application is pretty simple and straight forward.

Just make sure you clean all the old paste off.
Use rubbing alcohol if you cant get the reside off completely.

Its okey if you have slight scratches on your cpu silver top shell, or your sink.

If the scratches are Deep, and i mean like someone took a driver and etched your name in it deep, then you might need to lap the surface.

However i doubt you will have those kind of scratches...
These scratches will be a different color, like redish gold... its actually the copper being exposed under the nickle plating.

What i do is put a rice grain size drop in the middle, and then apply pressure with the sink.

This will leave an imprint that looks about the size of a quarter.
Your imprint does not need to cover the entire silver IHS (intigrated heat spreader) that is the silver top/cap on the cpu.

The only important part that imprint needs to cover is the actual die.
And the actual die is only about 40% of the IHS.
So the key thing is that your imprint is in the center.