Thermal Paste effect on GPU

[dylanjp1234]

Hey

I came across this article when researching thermal paste: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/thermal-paste-comparison,review-33969-11.html

I see that the Cooler Master Thermal Compound I'm currently using performs poorly, so I've ordered MasterGel Nano. When I applied the current cheap paste it didn't really improve temps from the factory paste, and this is quite an old card.
Should my gpu temps really drop by 10°C with the MasterGel Nano?

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[-=sT3V3=-]

I found changing the thermal paste on my gpus in the past did have some effect, 5C give or take. However it can void your warranty so research first.

thermal grizzly FTW

 

[Ebrahim Ali]

Also it depends on airflow and the type of cooler your card has.Blower type coolers are just kak and you won't see much of an improvement,if you have good airflow over you GPU and a nicely designed cooler then changing the stock paste will improve temps

 

[dylanjp1234]

I found changing the thermal paste on my gpus in the past did have some effect, 5C give or take. However it can void your warranty so research first.

thermal grizzly FTW

The Kryonaut looks good, but costs double what the MasterGel Nano costs, and is only slightly better. My cards' warranties have already expired.
I'll post my results once I receive and test the thermal paste.

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[JollyJamma]

It does make a difference but I agree with the above, your actual cooler needs to be good for it to make a difference.
My Gigabyte Aeroforce thing cooler keeps my 1070 mining at 50 degrees or so.

 

[dylanjp1234]

Results:

With Cooler Master HTK-002 (0.8w/m-k) my GPU got to 80°C and throttled. When I removed the temp limit, the card got to 90°C then I stopped the testing.

With my new Cooler Master MasterGel Maker (11w/m-k), my gpu gets to 65°C, all settings the same.

So thermal paste quality can make a huge difference in GPU temps. In my case, it dropped the temps by 25+°C. Definitely recommend this thermal paste. I'm not sure how Kryonaut does, but this is less than half the price.

Thanks all

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[kenny'sgh05t]

I use to have some Crap Coolermaster stuff on and my 980 ran at 75c Switched to some artic silver I had from a few years back. and now I see temps of 65c underload..

Im changing to thermal Grizly Kryonaut as soon as I get around to it. ( not really trusting the old Thermal Paste atm)

 

[J2J]

Factory thermal paste is usually the cheapest they can find so at the least changing it to a better compound will help

The main factor with age is that these cheap factory thermal compounds dry out and do not contact both surfaces (CPU/GPU and Heatsink) effectively enough to transfer heat which is why you're seeing such huge temperature improvements. Better quality thermal compounds are more stable over a longer period of time than the factory garbage. Artic Silver claims something like 8 years if I'm not mistaken.

In terms of expensive thermal compounds when compared to cheaper after-market alternatives, the differences is usually around 1-3 degrees Celsius for the better known brands.

The key is to buy whatever you can afford, it will still be better than factory thermal compounds! The procedure when applying the new thermal compound also makes a huge difference to observed results, so take your time.

This works well on older laptops too

 

[dylanjp1234]

Factory thermal paste is usually the cheapest they can find so at the least changing it to a better compound will help

The main factor with age is that these cheap factory thermal compounds dry out and do not contact both surfaces (CPU/GPU and Heatsink) effectively enough to transfer heat which is why you're seeing such huge temperature improvements. Better quality thermal compounds are more stable over a longer period of time than the factory garbage. Artic Silver claims something like 8 years if I'm not mistaken.

In terms of expensive thermal compounds when compared to cheaper after-market alternatives, the differences is usually around 1-3 degrees Celsius. A simple Google search can reveal the charts.

The key is to buy whatever you can afford, it will still be better than factory thermal compounds! The procedure when applying the new thermal compound also makes a huge difference to observed results, so take your time.

This works well on older laptops too

The card was 2 years old. Changing from factory paste which was hard to my crappy Cooler Master paste made no difference. Keep in mind this stuff goes for R20. I could find literally nothing with less than its 0.8w/mk thermal conductivity when researching recently.
Changing from it to my new paste improved far more than 3°C. As I said, 25+ degrees.
The Tom's Hardware link in the first post seems pretty realistic to me now.

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[dylanjp1234]

Those results were on my EVGA GTX 970 SSC.

On my MSI 970 Gaming 4G I was getting 85°C with stock paste, 72°C with the crappy paste, now it's getting 62°C.

I tested each card individually in my rig, so SLI isn't a factor in the temps.

So the improvement depends on the cooler I guess, but thermal paste quality does affect thermals.

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[J2J]

I tried the crappy R20 paste too and saw a difference when changing to better known pastes but not 25 degrees difference. That was on a 280X mind you which was one hot card

I then got Artic MX 4 I believe and now use the Phanteks paste from Wootware

The card was 2 years old. Changing from factory paste which was hard to my crappy Cooler Master paste made no difference. Keep in mind this stuff goes for R20. I could find literally nothing with less than its 0.8w/mk thermal conductivity when researching recently.
Changing from it to my new paste improved far more than 3°C. As I said, 25+ degrees.
The Tom's Hardware link in the first post seems pretty realistic to me now.

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[Bearman]

Reseated my Hyper 212x the other day. Did a blobby mess of what I had left- phanteks mixed with some leftover arctic mx from a few years back.

Best temps ever. Go figure.

 

[Ebrahim Ali]

Changing from stock paste does definitely make a difference.How much of a difference depends on a few factors. In my case when I had my 970 I changed paste after a couple years and like you I saw a big temp drop. Now when I got my 1070 it was fresh still, only like 8 months old. Changing to kryonaut still dropped temps but not the huge drop I noticed with my 970.

Still if it doesn't void your warranty the first thing you should do with a new card is change paste. The card will run cooler for longer and fans will be quieter as well.

 

[Valheru]

On my MSI 970 Gaming 4G I was getting 85°C with stock paste, 72°C with the crappy paste, now it's getting 62°C.

I could only find the MasterGel Pro, but boy did that make a difference. I can concur with your results, mine being a single Gigabyte Windforce 3 GTX970. I have not seen idle temps like this outside a youtube video (28c). Note: I have not done any stress testing on it. If you can let us know, I can run some on this side for shits and giggles.

Changing from stock paste does definitely make a difference.How much of a difference depends on a few factors. In my case when I had my 970 I changed paste after a couple years and like you I saw a big temp drop.

In addition to the above - this is a very valid point, the TIM on my card started to go hard and was kinda crusty upon removal. And was also maybe some utter shit they put on there. I am actually thinking of changing the paste on my other machines too.

 

[souljazk]

Cooling, overclocking, life etc is the sum of all parts. That said, it comes down to cleaning the existing product properly (I use 90% & > , alcohol to remove the current paste, then I let some alcohol sit on the die and cooler's contact points for a while. Pure lemon juice / vinegar / acidic liquid will help remove oxidation on the metal) , applying a healthy amount of new paste (dont be shy, unless its conductive. Any excess will be forced out by the weight of the cooler+mounting pressure. If you get "all" of the air out, thats great).

Then look at case cooling - front mounted CPU rad's drop CPU temps by ~10 degrees, and this drops the cases internal temp. The cooler the inside of the case is, the cooler the intake air for the GPU/cpu is, so the cooler the resulting air is. Also make sure you're extracting as much hot air as possible to avoid "heat soak". Filter intake fans, and not exhaust fans on the case.

 

[J2J]

My work laptop has been annoying the hell out of me with its fans. It's an HP ultra-book workstation (i7 HQ CPU and Quadro Graphics) which has a pair of thin whiny fans. Decided to take some action and replace the thermal paste myself, easy enough with a few screws and some careful cable removals.

Alas! Near silent operation! It used to spin up even on idle with temps sitting in the 60 degree range, now its between 35-40 degrees so the fans barely spin. I am pretty sure these would affect boost clocks, but not to the point where it is noticeable.

Its sad that a R50k laptop has such terrible thermal paste that it cant keep itself cool over time... Shocking. I am sure even if they charged R1 more per device to use better thermal paste, nobody would mind considering how much it affects a device's real world use.

 

[souljazk]

"the first thing you should do with a new card is change paste. "

Respectfully this is very bad advice. Some reasons you got such good temp drops on the 970 - It runs hotter and ran hotter for longer than the 1070 you have. The "extreme" heating & cooling (AKA heat-cycling) of a GPU, is what causes degradation , not only of the paste, but also of the card itself. It's better to *try* and control the cooling process in the long run.

Changing from stock paste does definitely make a difference.How much of a difference depends on a few factors. In my case when I had my 970 I changed paste after a couple years and like you I saw a big temp drop. Now when I got my 1070 it was fresh still, only like 8 months old. Changing to kryonaut still dropped temps but not the huge drop I noticed with my 970.

Still if it doesn't void your warranty the first thing you should do with a new card is change paste. The card will run cooler for longer and fans will be quieter as well.

 

[JollyJamma]

Going to apply liquid metal to my laptop this weekend, or next, depending.

I’m hoping my hand is steady and it helps the temps. Otherwise, bye bye laptop.

 

[nightshade2109]

Some GPU's are badly thermal pasted or are using that cheap white thermal paste, I did my 980ti and the temps dropped from 88 under load to 72, it's definitely worth doing if you have unexplainable high temps.