Ultimate Question

[SoulSeeker]

We all know that heatsink plus fan and thermal cooling is all a bit experimental and that different combinations work for different systems and people,some say just the pink thermal pad that comes with the heatsink is best others(most) Artic silver so my question is what would happen if i used both? say i put artic silver on the cpu core AND left he thermal pad on the heatsink,i'm assuming the pink pad would melt into the artic silver and make a 'new' compound..the best of both worlds or just a complete mess?

Another question is i have decided on a TaiSol CEK734092 or 002 because of its (supposedly)quiet fan and bloody big heatsink lol but i'm at aloss on a motherboard i'm swithering between an Abit KT7 (non raid) and a MSI K7T Pro2 or 'a' both are roughly the same price and both have equally disadvantages to them.I have a Duron 650 and i want to clock it to say atleast 850-950 but i want to be able to get that 1Ghz chip when the prices fall and push that too so a bit of future proofing is needed in advance.Why non raid?because i dont need it same as udma100 support,sure it would be nice but not essential.I'm sort of a beginner i've built 2 systems but never an Athlon/Duron system,i know its never straight forward p'n'p with motherboards but a board with the minimum of hassle would be great..anybody got any thoughts?

ss

 

[paulip88]

There is no reason to use both. Best case is that it'll just be mess. Worse case is that there may be a chemical reaction between the two. Don't want that. Either way, I don't see any increase in performance because if you add grease to the pad, that would only be that much more material to traverse for heat to get to the HSF.

As for the mobo, get the MSI K7T Pro2A. I'm pretty sure that the Taisol fits on it, but I don't know about the KT7. As far as I know, the MSI should be a bit easier to setup too.

 

[ArkAoss]

yeah the 2 would be messy, i've heard of people who use liquid cooling having the chip too cool, and the chemicals leech into the silicon and mess up the chip internally, very worry some,

(my gold post wahhooo)

 

[longhorn]

To have a heatsink with both paste and pad would be worse
than having one or the other. The only purpose of thermal
paste or a pad is to fill the microscopic gaps in the processor
and the heatsink with something that conducts heat better than
air. If you had a perfectly flat processor and a perfectly
flat heatsink, then you would want neither the pad nor the paste.

Air is a lousy thermal conductor. Metal is a great thermal
conductor. Thermal paste and pads are somewhere inbetween.
If you're confident than you can get a paper-thin layer
of thermal paste on the heatsink, that is the best solution.
A pad is a better solution than a thick layer of paste.

 

[Mikewarrior2]

Longhorn,

you probably have never used Arctic silver. It has been shown numerous times that sometimes a little bit thicker layer is better, since Arctic silver is so "thin", that it compresses rather easily into a paper thin layer when the heatsink is applied.

For example, on my taisol heatsink, i put a little bit more than what is required. I clip the heatsink on, and it flattens out the grease. When I pull the heatsink off, what's left is a very thin layer on the cpu, and an equally thin layer on the heatsink. Excess has been pushed off the side of the core.

This isn't like your old MPU3.7 or silicon greases that were too thick that htey wouldn't compress from the heatsink clip. Especially with today's high-pressure clips, Arctic silver is sometimes(maybe half the time) better with a little bit thicker layer.


Mike