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Following on from our previous articles about fan configuration and static pressure vs airflow fans, today we are looking at thermal paste. Specifically, we are hoping to find out whether or not choosing different types of thermal paste actually makes any difference. To do this, we test 7 products from 6 companies to see how much difference thermal paste really makes.
In another article aimed to help out confused PC builders out there, we are answering the age-old question of whether thermal paste really matters. I remember building my first PC and wondering if it really matters – there is certainly a lot of conflicting information about this online. So we are here to help by showing you if there really is any tangible benefit to using different types of thermal paste.
For this test today, we are comparing the following products:
- Arctic Silver 5 – info HERE
- Arctic Silver Céramique 2 – info HERE
- Arctic MX-4 – info HERE
- Cooler Master MasterGel Pro – info HERE
- Cryorig CP15 – info HERE
- EKWB Ectotherm – info HERE
- Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut – info HERE
What thermal paste do you use?
— KitGuru (@kitgurupress) January 9, 2017
Incidentally, we also ran poll on Twitter recently which found 41% of you use Arctic Silver 5, while 25% of you are happy to use whatever comes with your CPU cooler of choice. In this article we will find out if spending just a few pounds extra on 3rd-party thermal paste is worth it.
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Thermal Grizzly and Gelid GC-Extreme . (period)
You forgot the Mayo!
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I think you needed to consider amount and cost, that Grizzly is £4.99 for 1g when EK Ectotherm is 5g for £4.49 which makes it one of if not the best performing for the money
Yep. Kryonaut.
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The Extreme Fusion X1 is better than the GC-Extreme on the real-time average of the HWiNFO64. The GC-Extreme is only marginally better taking the max values. Tests taking the max average incur in a lot of oscillation / imprecision. Not to mention that during most of the test the CPU is running way below the max values. Considering the price of both, the Fusion X1 is a bargain. The GC-Extreme is only better in the consistency. It is easier to apply. But it is not worth the price whatsoever.
“We repeated this process 5 times per paste, taking the average of those figures to present here.”
Are you re-mounting the cooler 5 times per paste or just running the test 5x/paste? Seems to me that since mounting and paste application is so critical, the results above could just be due to variations in application/mounting pressure if they aren’t remounted between tests.
Who honestly needs 5 grams of TIM?…Not the average consumer, that’s for sure. Not even the average PC builder.
Liquid Ultra between die and IHS, and some AS5 that I’ve had for 4 years or so between IHS and block.
I certainly have used half of it on numerous builds for me and for family and friends. Is it hard to understand that if the average consumer has the need then they won’t have to buy it again? For years even? For less money? Whilst sacrificing negligible temperature differences? Seems like a better deal.
The average consumer doesn’t build PC’s for their family and friends. I have a 1G tube of AS5 that I bought 4 or 5 years ago…it’s kind of watery now, not the same consistency as when new. The stuff doesn’t last forever.
But I’m also the guy with a syringe of Liquid Ultra that cost me 15 bucks for .3CC. I don’t care about price if the performance is there.
So what’s your point? I’ve had my Ectotherm for a few years also. Why would the “average consumer” even need thermal paste?
It’s pretty clear that it is the best value for money in this test. You’re mad for spending 15 dollars, the “average consumer” doesn’t really care if it performs as long as it works.
Mad? No. I have a 7600K at 5GHz that runs at 50 degrees under full load. Your junk TIM isn’t going to get me that. My 6700K rig runs around the same temp at 4.8. This stuff exists for a reason, not to put on your Ryzen 3 or whatever.
The average person who would need to buy TIM doesn’t need a 5G tube. Just because you can buy a large amount of something that doesn’t mean you should…That same person will probably use that 1G tube just as many times as the 5G tube before it gets thrown out or replaced with something newer.
Hahahaha whatever man, spend that money!
i trust tomshardware testing way more then this and they even state its not that big of a deal between the pastes yet here a few degrees it’s like it’s a massive things
I like Arctic MX-4 because its nearly as good as Kryonaut TG and when you build or reassemble computers as much as I do it is a lot more cost effective. ($1.75/g as opposed to $12/g)
But yeah there is less than a 3 degree difference between most thermal pastes. and less than 2 degree difference between MX-4 and TG. What matters more is proper application.
My only issue with MX-4 is that it seems to perform slightly worse when temps are higher than something like Noctua and Grizzly Kryonaut. This difference is negligible, but still something that seems to be overlooked. Also, I haven’t had the best of luck with it on water coolers either for some reason. It’s still my preferred paste. Never have I taken any build apart and found any parts of the paste looking dried out at all.
Would be nice if Best Buy actually sold these brands rather than their terrible Insignia brand or the useless Thermaltake TG-7. They used to sell Antec Nano Diamond Formula 7 which was the best in their store, but this stopped a few years ago unexpectedly. For those who have never tried TG-7, it’s pretty bad and dries up extremely fast. As for their Insignia brand, well “paste” isn’t the term for it at all as the thing looks like it’s a melted blob in a tube and also dries up rather quickly.