7970 temps increased by 10C after applying new thermal paste?

[ragingazn628]

I opened up my 7970 to put on new thermal paste *(Artic Silver 5) and now temps are 10C higher.. wth? Do I have to wait until it's cured?

[Roadhog2k5]

1. As5 is horrible paste by todays standard and isn't ideal for use on gpus.
2. the paste on the 7970/6990 is the best you can get.
3. you probably fucked up remounting it

[Unacceptable]

I swear by Ceramique,10c drop on most all applications.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100018

[DeathAndTaxes]

2. the paste on the 7970/6990 is the best you can get.

Lolz.  The paste on my (granted only one) 6990 was the worst pieces of shit I have ever seen, plus it was applied so thick it looked like someone was making a peanut butter and thermal paste sandwich.

Every 5970 I have opened up looked exactly the same and I doubt the 7970 is any better.

[goxed]

1. As5 is horrible paste by todays standard and isn't ideal for use on gpus.

Using AS5 on a bunch of 6950s with good results. The trick is not to put gobs of it and prior cleaning of the mating surfaces with IPA.

[DeathAndTaxes]

1. As5 is horrible paste by todays standard and isn't ideal for use on gpus.

Using AS5 on a bunch of 6950s with good results. The trick is not to put gobs of it and prior cleaning of the mating surfaces with IPA.

I had decent results w/ AS5 but there are likely better TIM today especially for use on a GPU.  I just kept using AS out of habit.  You are right.  TIM higher thermal conductivity than air but worse than metal.  Putting too much on acts as an insulator trapping heat in.

It should be thin, very thin layer.  If someone is unsure it is best to do a trial run, where you apply it, attached heat sink, then remove and take a look at how thin it was.  Be sure to clean and re-apply.

[Roadhog2k5]

I swear by Ceramique,10c drop on most all applications.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835100018

Nope.
http://skinneelabs.com/2011-tim-results/

2. the paste on the 7970/6990 is the best you can get.

Lolz.  The paste on my (granted only one) 6990 was the worst pieces of shit I have ever seen, plus it was applied so thick it looked like someone was making a peanut butter and thermal paste sandwich.

Every 5970 I have opened up looked exactly the same and I doubt the 7970 is any better.

The TIM is machine-silkscreened onto the heatsink as a powder, which then melts and re-hardens as solid when the board is run. No TIM you can buy off the shelf is more efficient than what we put on the 7970.

http://icrontic.com/discussion/95001/radeon-hd-7970-qa

[goxed]

http://skinneelabs.com/wp-content/uploads/TIMCPUTemp3.png

Thanks!  

http://icrontic.com/discussion/95001/radeon-hd-7970-qa

Thanks again!

[DeathAndTaxes]

The TIM is machine-silkscreened onto the heatsink as a powder, which then melts and re-hardens as solid when the board is run. No TIM you can buy off the shelf is more efficient than what we put on the 7970.

http://icrontic.com/discussion/95001/radeon-hd-7970-qa

Yeah I don't care what a marketing guy from AMD says.  I have opened the cards and seen with my uses they look like ass.  Literally the worst TIM application I have ever seen which is kinda hard to believe given we are talking about ultra high end prices.

Now "maybe" the 7970 is better but that would mean they are finally getting their act together ONLY on the 7000 series because 5000 & 6000 are horrible.  Since I am curious 1 BTC open ended bounty to the first person to post a high resolution screenshot of 7970 right after heatsink is removed.

[Roadhog2k5]

The TIM is machine-silkscreened onto the heatsink as a powder, which then melts and re-hardens as solid when the board is run. No TIM you can buy off the shelf is more efficient than what we put on the 7970.

http://icrontic.com/discussion/95001/radeon-hd-7970-qa

Yeah I don't care what a marketing guy from AMD says.  I have opened the cards and seen with my uses they look like ass.  Literally the worst TIM application I have ever seen which is kinda hard to believe given we are talking about ultra high end prices.

Now "maybe" the 7970 is better but that would mean they are finally getting their act together ONLY on the 7000 series because 5000 & 6000 are horrible.  Since I am curious 1 BTC open ended bounty to the first person to post a high resolution screenshot of 7970 right after heatsink is removed.

http://itlounge.eu/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/5a93a__P1020757.jpg I don't want your BTC though. :p

And, my 6970's had excellent TIM application too...

[jake262144]

Nope.
http://skinneelabs.com/2011-tim-results/
...

Since everyone seems to be posting their favorite thermal goop benchmarks, let me hop into the fray:
thermal compound roundup @Hardware Secrets
AS5 kicking some major butt here.
On a more serious note, the Arctic Silver 5 needs up to 200 hours to fully cure, RTFM at leisure.

[goxed]

Now "maybe" the 7970 is better but that would mean they are finally getting their act together ONLY on the 7000 series because 5000 & 6000 are horrible.  Since I am curious 1 BTC open ended bounty to the first person to post a high resolution screenshot of 7970 right after heatsink is removed.

Here's a pic 7970 Heat sink (bottom) and the 7950 heatsink removed from production cards.

P.S. The Sapphire 7950 has a vary crappy heatsink fan combo IMO . I have a HIS 6950 card with this same heatsink / fan and it sucks as hell.  

Pic of the 7970 chip.

[goxed]

http://itlounge.eu/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/5a93a__P1020757.jpg I don't want your BTC though. :p

And, my 6970's had excellent TIM application too...

Thanks. Is this a pic of a card with the reference cooler?

[goxed]

Nope.
http://skinneelabs.com/2011-tim-results/
...

Since everyone seems to be posting their favorite thermal goop benchmarks, let me hop into the fray:
thermal compound roundup @Hardware Secrets
AS5 kicking some major butt here.

Why would someone use chocolate as a TIM is beyond me!

[Roadhog2k5]

Now "maybe" the 7970 is better but that would mean they are finally getting their act together ONLY on the 7000 series because 5000 & 6000 are horrible.  Since I am curious 1 BTC open ended bounty to the first person to post a high resolution screenshot of 7970 right after heatsink is removed.

Here's a pic 7970 Heat sink (bottom) and the 7950 heatsink removed from production cards.


The Sapphire 7950 has a vary crappy heatsink fan combo. I have a HIS 6950 card with this same heatsink / fan and it sucks as hell.  

That's actually a 6970 on the bottom and a 7950 on the top.

[goxed]

Now "maybe" the 7970 is better but that would mean they are finally getting their act together ONLY on the 7000 series because 5000 & 6000 are horrible.  Since I am curious 1 BTC open ended bounty to the first person to post a high resolution screenshot of 7970 right after heatsink is removed.

Here's a pic 7970 Heat sink (bottom) and the 7950 heatsink removed from production cards.


The Sapphire 7950 has a vary crappy heatsink fan combo. I have a HIS 6950 card with this same heatsink / fan and it sucks as hell.  

That's actually a 6970 on the bottom and a 7950 on the top.

Yup you are right. Here's a reference design 7970, with cooler and card. TIM application doesn't look out of the world here.

[Roadhog2k5]

Nope.
http://skinneelabs.com/2011-tim-results/
...

Since everyone seems to be posting their favorite thermal goop benchmarks, let me hop into the fray:
thermal compound roundup @Hardware Secrets
AS5 kicking some major butt here.
On a more serious note, the Arctic Silver 5 needs up to 200 hours to fully cure, RTFM at leisure.

Guess you didn't read my link. If you did you would see that with a great contact mount(which is rare), it actually does rather well.

I don't recommend it for use on GPUs mainly because its a capacitive paste and shouldn't be used anywhere near traces or SMD's.

EDIT: Also, all of your results are pretty much invalid because they tested at widely different core and room temps. We all know that the temp diodes in a cpu aren't linear right? I hope so...

[goxed]

I don't recommend it for use on GPUs mainly because its a capacitive paste and shouldn't be used anywhere near traces or SMD's.

Thanks for the tip! Very interesting fact. Actually I would imagine most TIMs would be capacitive when compared to air.  I would be interested in looking at any scientific tests or anecdotal evidences of TIM's dielectric constants.

[sveetsnelda]

For what it's worth (from Tom's Hardware):

"Concerned about a possible heat sink seating issue, I took the card apart and put it back together again with fresh thermal paste. Now, AMD doesn’t recommend this because it claims the phase-changing thermal interface material it uses enables a few-degree advantage over normal thermal paste. In light of our negative results, though, we had little to lose by at least trying. In the end, my surgical procedure made no difference, and we recorded the same acoustic output playing through Battlefield 3."

I'd wager that reassembling the card with some decent thermal paste would cause you to end up with something very close to stock though (certainly not 10 degrees higher).

[jake262144]

Guess you didn't read my link. If you did you would see that with a great contact mount(which is rare), it actually does rather well.

Guess Skinneelabs didn't read Arctic Silver's manual. That TIM requires up to 200 hours of curing which they never bothered with. A shame really as it blows the objectivity of their tests out of the water.

I don't recommend it for use on GPUs mainly because its a capacitive paste and shouldn't be used anywhere near traces or SMD's.

Never have I managed to use quantities excessive enough for the goop to squeeze out from where it belongs and onto the surrounding components. Therefore, I can hardly accept that as a valid argument against that paste. That having been said, it's a valid data point.

Remember, we're trying to help OP, not argue about world's best TIM