Ok I got a question about arctic silver

[TravisW111]

Ok I got my heatsink and fan today and tomorrow I get my cpu and motherboard. I was reading up on the arctic silver 2 instructions on the official site, and it says that before you install the heatsink you should first spread some arctic silver over the part of the heatsink that will come into contact with the cpu to fill in the microscopic vallies. Then wipe it off. Is this really necessary? My heatsink didn't even come with a thermal pad, so do I need to do this?

 

[micron]

I sometimes do, it doesn't really matter. But it only takes a few seconds so why not .

 

[sohcrates]

When you wipe it off your HSF, you CAN see a big blotch left, no matter how hard you scrub...so it really IS filling in all those gaps. I think it's worth it to follow their instructions all the way through.

 

[ST4RCUTTER]

I really don't think that's necessary. I prefer to put a thin layer of AS on the CPU die and mount the HSF as I normally would. Then I take the HSF off and look at where the die was making contact. You should see a clear square or rectangular AS "print". If you don't, your CPU isn't making level contact with the HS and you could end up burning your money. If everything looks good, scrape it off with an exacto knife or credit card, apply a very small amount to make up for what you lost then carefully remount just like you did before. There's no excuse for burning up a CPU in my book...

 

[Jerboy]

<< Ok I got my heatsink and fan today and tomorrow I get my cpu and motherboard. I was reading up on the arctic silver 2 instructions on the official site, and it says that before you install the heatsink you should first spread some arctic silver over the part of the heatsink that will come into contact with the cpu to fill in the microscopic vallies. Then wipe it off. Is this really necessary? My heatsink didn't even come with a thermal pad, so do I need to do this? >>




I think its neither harmful nor necessary. I followed the instruction step per step, including getting everything degreased and sparkling clean, then spreading the stuff without using my finger. Turns out it makes no difference compared to my standard thermal grease. It wouldn't hurt to use ASII, but if you don't have it yet, I'd just use standard stuff.

 

[Jeff7]

I usually do it the quick'n'dirty way - just squeeze a long glob along the middle of the core and let the pressure direct it where it needs to go. It doesn't overflow over the edges of the core much, and I always get good performance out of it. When I take the heatsink off for whatever, then I wipe it off. That method so far is keeping my 750@866 T-bird at 38C with a cheap $10 socket A heatsink. And the case is closed too.