Originally posted by: emblem
I thought Arctic Silver 5 was what most people recommended? Also, the one at radio shack is 9.99
Most of the pastes on newegg is around 5 bucks + 5 shipping. About the same price, but I don't have to wait for it to ship.
For whatever its worth, my experience with AS5, AS Ceramique, TX-1, and TX-2 is that they all perform with 2-3C of each other.
The bigger delta in performance is end-user controlled and that is whether you put it all together correctly. Use too much or too little and it won't matter which uber product you bought.
I think you are making a wise choice for yourself, you clearly value convenience and your time more than saving a few bucks or seeing a 2C lower CPU temp. In this case purchasing AS5 from Radioshack will bring you 100% satisfaction and you should run with it. I would too were I under similiar circumstance.
Others value seeing that 2C temp drop more than they value shipping costs and/or shipping time, and they will provide their opinions biased as such. I too have been under those circumstances as well.
There is no right or wrong answer, the hard part for you is deciding what question you are really trying to have answered and then determine which response post best interpretted your question as you intended.