Video Card Thermal Compound Upgrade - Secret to Better GPU Performance?

Can you actually get performance gains by upgrading the thermal paste on your GPU?
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[@Syntaxvgm]

Is MAYONNAISE a thermal compound?

[@BoreBone]

No Patrick. Mustard isn't thermal compound either.

[@FearOmnicide]

No MAYONNAISE is not a thermal compound....HORSE RADISH is not a thermal compound either.

[@Bakexcake1]

cum is also a thermal compound

[@JakeShaefferr]

Mayonnaise is a gender.

[@Syntaxvgm]

Kevin Kim I tried that, I have a reference 970, couldn't help but cumming when I unboxed it. It is not, a thermal compound, as it turn out. hehe Thermal Cumpound.

[@TroubleKlef]

3 degrees is actually pretty significant imo.

[@DeathBringer769]

Definitely, especially if you're overclocking.

[@goobon]

Deathbrewer Yeah, 3 degrees means slightly more headroom and a little more comfort running something OC'd

[@1300l]

It is a difference that can be enough for people to get the OC they want/need with the ideal temperature. But it is not significant.

[@mikel.3470]

1300l "significant" is defined as "sufficiently great or important to be worthy of attention; noteworthy." so.. by that definition, being able to achieve an Overclock only because 3 degrees made it possible is, in fact, "significant" or "noteworthy"

[@1300l]

Mike L. 3degree is neither sufficiently grear nor important to be worthy of attention

[@Hugh_Hunt]

SERIOUSLY! I just did this like 2 hours ago... dropped my load temps 8c.

[@AlDabbas]

what card u use

[@Hugh_Hunt]

Ahmed Dabbas MSI r9 280 gaming 3gb. clocks are 1182/1495; which is pretty overclocked. Temps before in unigine heaven were 70-71 in furmark were 88. after applying ceramique 2, unigine dropped to 62-63 and furmark to 81-82.

[@McLovinPablo]

lol im sure when you first bought your card it was running 8c cooler aswell, thermal paste doesnt last forever so replacing it is always good.

[@Hugh_Hunt]

McLovinPablo actually the card was RMA's 2 months ago; after having fan issues from the first RMA... I had replaced the paste before but did make the same difference... more paste last time. I think MSI cheaped out the second err third time around.

[@Esthreel]

Quirkification I had a MSI Radeon replaced on RMA and it was loud and running like 81C. The one I had before it was 60C. I sent it back and claimed it was loud and overheating. They tested and send the card back, claiming the temps were not over the spec. MSI had stickers on the heatsink screws so I used tweezers to undo those, replaced the thermal compound (there was way too much IMHO) and bam! full load fan 30% temps around 60C. I think RMA cards are refurbs.

[@miketz8918]

Damn... After seeing this vid I decided to do it on my 2 year old 7870 that gets to 90C when playing BF4. When I opened the GPU I saw that there was almost no Thermal Compound left. Did the whole process and the end result was 76C when playing BF4. From all of this LMG you probably saved my card from frying so I guess thanks to all of you and keep up the great work :)

[@IIlIIlIIlII]

Mike Tz How tf lol? Did the thermal paste evaporate?

[@Oliver-bn7jt]

its like 90 degrees LOL

[@Terepin64]

@@IIlIIlIIlII Yes. It happened to my GTX 1080.

[@whitenoize6451]

I guess i shouldve listened to my bf and changed the thermal paste on my card, lol. mine is hitting 93°... i didnt realise that this method can actually make a big difference..

[@MrClaudiodonate]

You should have done a closeup of the amount of paste you used. I could barely see.

[@narutoxpein98]

basically just very little will do

[@narutoxpein98]

since when did i say apply the same amount as what you would on a cpu?!

[@Remmes]

***** Lol what? my gpu chip is smaller than my cpu heat speader and I think the actual cpu chip is about the same size as my gpu chip.. So it just depends on which card/chip your gpu is.

[@narutoxpein98]

lgbtTV5 thank you very much for seeing that XD Dont want to be 'wrong' because of nothing :(

[@ronnielopez295]

Just make a small little line that's small enough so that when you press the plates together it won't seep out

[@CornyPenny887]

6:11. I Was no joke dozing off a little (I've had a long day XD) and then "BOOM!"

[@bliglum]

Cool story for you bros.. I purchased a used EVGA 970 SSC about six months ago.. Was mostly happy with it's performance, ran a few degrees higher than other people's 970's, but still around 69C. So not bad. Recently though, when I got Rise of the Tomb Raider and pushed the settings to the max. My 970 started hitting 80C+ even with a screaming custom fan profile (I do have a mild OC to 1490 or so)... Unhappy with this, I found this vid, and decided to do a compound swap.. I am so VERY glad I did! The old compound was hard and a bit crumbly. Seemed odd, as I thought EVGA used good compound and the card was like new when I bought it, but ehh. In any case, I replaced it with some cheap old AC5 I had lying around and BOOM!!! I saw a big drop of a full 10°C in RotTR!! Good enough to bring the fans down from screaming banshee mode to a modest whir.. So satisfying :)

[@Weech.]

bliglum I may needs to do this. my card was went fromc 68c to about 80c out of nowhere. also getting some artifacts. I have some AS5 and Gelid laying around. I'll probably pull it out tonight and do it.

[@ismaelravenlock6792]

my 660 ti could be used as a blow dryer i can relate

[@kevinyerkes8364]

Thanks Linus and Crew, I just replaced the thermal paste on a graphics card I bought used and dropped 20C because the old paste had completely dried up! You guys got me into PC building so it's all thanks to y'all. Keep up the awesome content.

[@BlackArtBMX]

These videos are great Linus. Nothing better than to have a cup of good coffee in the morning and seeing a new video from you in my sub box.

[@metalmikebot]

I did this years ago with, I think, a GTX 280. When I pulled off the blower cooler, there was a seriously thick glob of cheap-looking thermal paste. I cleaned it off and put a small amount of an aftermarket paste on there instead, and got more like 10°-15° difference. So, it's probably worth it to at least check your card, especially if you're wanting to really push the overclocking.

[@tyleraho2485]

the entire AD part of these vids dosent usually entice me but this one certainly does. hope to see more tech purchasing sites endorsing any of linus' videos.

[@willer87]

I must say thank you! My EVGA 980ti was allways on 83c+ when i was playing any game. Sometimes it went up to over 90c and the fans just activated some superpower fan speed! I have never touched my card before or even considered if the paste or the connaction between cooler and card/gpu was bad. Even my card couldnt use the mhz that it was ment to do. 1100-1150max! or so. I repasted the cooler and it went down to 60-70c in full load and not even that the gpu was on 1315mhz as its supose to be:P Man, thank you! Love your channel btw. Started to follow it like yesterday:P Already learned ALOT.

[@DumDumGameming]

why does the video look really white? or like bright

[@DumDumGameming]

ah ok

[@OMrkithO]

Oh My God, Exzanity, You Can’t Just Ask Someone's video why it's White or like bright!

[@DumDumGameming]

luminati

[@HapplyFace]

fucking racist

[@wooooowwe1]

theforsbergshow lol. Says racist with a Blackhawk as his profile pic. (I'm also a chicago fan)

[@ronnielopez295]

I just did this and my R9 390x is running about 10c cooler! This works very well! I can finally max my games without overheating issues.

[@shaunstheman2]

Same mine was 95 changed the thermal now have a steady 70 feels like a new computer now 😅

[@barronhelmutschnitzelnazi2188]

Opened up my Gtx 1080 G1 Gaming and reapplied thermal paste. The old one is still fresh and wet and I was hitting 62-63°C temps on stress test for 30min+ with the card overclocked. Reapplied a new thermal paste(Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut) and now temps are at 53°C while being stress tested for 30min+ at overclocked. Stock gpu fans but I have a really efficient airflow case setup.

[@jacksonsmith2918]

My max temp went down from 85 degrees Celsius to ~56 degrees Celsius! I have had this MSI GTX 1080 Armor edition for about 4 years now and the temps were incredibly high when I first checked them a few days ago (I know, I'm a terribly irresponsible pc owner). I was a bit nervous performing this "invasive" procedure but, damn, did it pay off. So thankful for this video, helping me so incredibly much 5 years after its publishing!

[@kyte8131]

Anyone watching this in 2019? The intro was pretty cool.

[@haroldz123]

1.5 years later. EVGA screwed their heatsink design for acx series

[@mike-t3775]

Changed Thermal Paste of MSI GTX 1070 ARMOR OC 8G after almost 3 years from purchase. Usually it ran 78-86 under full load playing graphic intensive games(Max temp locked to 82/83 by default by Msi Afterburner), not to forget I have a shitty case with bad airflow less space for cable management (Thermaltake Versa N21). When I opened the gpu when 2months warranty was left, not gonna lie I was tensed. The gpu vrms and insides were covered with lot of dust, the paste was dried. I cleaned the dust carefully and removed dried thermal paste as shown with isopropyl alocohol(70%) cotton swabs and tissues. After reapplying the thermal paste, Temps dropped down to 65-75 under same load as before (10-15 degrees drop). Amazing change I cant believe how I hesitated all these years to open and clean the gpu. Cheers.

[@power2daaplayer304]

Same, my gtx 1080 did the same. Dropped like 20c overall temps

[@tsuzuku6427]

Thank you for this video, I fell into the category of people who have an old card they want to breathe some new life into and yesterday I took apart my old Asus ROG Styrx 980TI and was shocked to find an absolutely obscene amount of thermal paste applied to it from the factory.. With Linus mentioning that too much paste actually works as a conductor to make it hotter, a light bulb went off in my head as to why this card has always ran so insanely hot(average 83C under load, going as high as 88C sometimes. probably 50C idle) I tried many different things over the years to try and cool it down including getting a new case and fans, but nothing worked. After applying the new paste in a much smaller amount I'm happy to report that the card is now running around 60-70C under load and at around 36C idle. (A considerable improvement IMO) So another user case for this would be if you get a new card and its running hotter than you think it should, there's a good chance your card is like mine and they globed on too much paste at the factory.

[@DoomWalker42]

This one says that a bit of Skooma on your GPU will work very well!! :)

[@pimpmasterx7]

no need to oc shit runs fast af after a skooma hit

[@chini2W0]

5:27 *fresh cloth... yeah, i also use my shirt

[@themightypizzadevourer6018]

6 years later and still useful, thank you linus

[@iCalifornia95]

Yesterday I was searching this exact topic and look what video popped up! Just perfect.

[@noobielameo]

Hey Linus, can you do a as fast video about static electric discharge or whatever the correct name. How to properly discharge with or without the extra equipment. What to do if the PC already has static electricity. Thanks! Help thumbs up if you wanna to know too!

[@amshermansen]

Hand on grounded radiator. You're good.

[@esaedvik]

Mansen No. That would discharge you to the wrong potential.

[@grazzitdvram]

touch the case, and if you're worried maintain contact with the case. its really that simple. Now if you're talking discharging electrical charge from your components just unplug power supply, power on and it should drain all your capacitors, this doesn't apply to the PSU, don't fuck with that unless you're willing to unplug it and leave the PSU unpowered for at least a few days.

[@amshermansen]

grazzitdvram Your case isn't necessarily grounded when you're assembling it. Hence the radiator "trick".

[@esaedvik]

Mansen And if the computer is plugged in and has faulty wiring (touching the case from inside etc), this "trick" will kill you.

[@StevensSounds]

6:10 gave me a heart attack

[@DeViLzzz2006]

I did this recently with my brother's 7850 but it didn't improve the temps at all. Still it was nice to get this done for the first time ever and it is nice to know if I need to look at a video card that is overheating I know I can get the job done in trying to fix the possible problem.

[@ziaride]

Not just for CPU and GPUs, I've had to refresh thermal compounds on several vintage motorcycles diodes/rectifiers and ignition modules that were performing poorly or not at all. Some makers like BMW have service bulletins to remind owners to refresh the thermal compound ever 5 or so years as basic maintenance. On those thermal pads, I replaced the pads with copper shims of the same thickness along with thermal compound on both sides and am getting 10c cooler on my embedded fan less pfsense routers, works great.

[@antonmarkov2893]

LINUS YOU MUST TRY UNLOCKING R9 290 to r9 290x because you are extreme and it is going to be awesome and no one have done that so the people will like it please. :D

[@antonmarkov2893]

***** changing the bios unlocks locked stream processors from 2560 to 2816 like the old hd 6950 to 6970 it worked with some cards this will not work with all of them but some are perfectly fine and they are as strong as 290x

[@XxFieryXProductionxX]

i actually want to see this

[@antonmarkov2893]

XxFieryXProductionxX i would like too but more people have to see the comment and it will be good for the channel

[@_fR8]

They did this when the 290 first launched, I think it was the Sapphire one.

[@antonmarkov2893]

Suoerz nope LinusTechTips does not have video about r9 290 unlocking

[@twokidsmovies]

How about you finish the home water cooling video

[@Wind1000100]

Thankyou for another insightful video, Linus and crew.

[@TheKyleReality]

When I had my msi 670s in sli i did this and it really improved the temps. I have been thinking about doing it to my msi 970s but they run cool now so might just wait a while intill the suckers start getting hotter

[@StarAgentRXA4682]

Is thermal paste good for lube?

[@vincentjones1014]

Best comment ever

[@LimebreedUK]

no.... trust me.... unless you would enjoy having a very dry and very grey porksword i sure didnt....

[@ernststavroblofeld1961]

Depends on how hot the girl is …

[@SometimesBuddha]

+Ernst Stavro Blofeld OMFG IDK IF YOU MEANT THAT PUN BUT IM FUCKING DYINGG. HAHALNDLWSSD.AS

[@Exachad]

+Ernst Stavro Blofeld When your reply gets almost 3x as the comments itself...

[@martijn415]

I want to upgrade my motherboard but then i need to get the fan of my cpu, but do i need to put new thermal compound on it? or can i just use the same that was on there.

[@PokeyDoggo]

You should put new thermal compound on it. Or it won't cover every part of the cpu and have air bubbles.

[@prgnify]

If you ever remove any heatsink from the thermal compound, you need to reapply. Simple as that. So when changing CPUs, coolers or whatever, you need to reapply. Because air. And stuff.

[@sparkss_]

Any idea when you guys will drop the next whole room water cooling project?

[@kaiser98berlin]

Been Having Code43 on my 4 year GPU, heard about applying new thermal paste would solve the issue, even after DDU, reverted to stock CD drivers installed, factory reset win7, still having issues. haven't checked on other PC compliance yet but thermal would be my last chance. Keep Up the work Sebastian.

[@TheXanUser]

now put some toothpaste in there and compare!

[@ismaelravenlock6792]

ive done this lmfao

[@timbirch5445]

TheXanUser well Linus did this many years later

[@ImReadyAyu]

You should watch JayzTwoCents video titled, "Don't try this at home...seriously!" He was replacing the thermal compound on a GPU die and purposely put all of the thermal paste in the tube on it lol

[@themotivator2587]

I'm sure you've had other people mention this, but thermal compound has a so-called "curing period" wherein it sets more securely after several thermal cycles. Have you ever gone back and tested anything say a week or a month later (assuming the device was used during that time and had the opportunity to heat up and cool down several times) to see if the temperatures dropped further after the curing period?

[@JomariBatitis]

Thanks for the info will try it now.LinusTechTips

[@Skydogg5555]

Test aftermarket compound on an intel CPU by removing the ihs and placing your own thermal on it, I heard it's like a 15-20c difference, not sure if it's just the sort of old i5s or if it affects the newer cpus or not.

[@CptMorganHD]

For usually CPUs don't come with thermal compound pre installed. It could be on the cooler itself but not on the CPU :)

[@Dash199t]

RacistPandaGER he means the intigrated thermal paste, between the chip and the metalplate. And yes, it is like this also nower days, but I would do that really carfully!

[@amshermansen]

15-20 degrees? Hah! At most you'll feel a couple of degrees.

[@noxusrevenge3994]

yea ive been thinking about doing that to my i5 cpu.. heard the temp drop would be around 10-20 degrees. hopefully linus would do a video about that :)

[@TundralTV]

It was a problem with the first Haswell CPUs, though the 4690K and 4790K have the thermal compound problem fixed

[@coccoborg]

I replace thermal compound on EVERYTHING I buy, my MacBook Air, my PS3, HTPC and of course my desktop I built myself. Is it always necessary? Nope. But it makes my 650 ti boost run a few MHz higher, my CPU cooler run quiet, stops my MacBook Air from running at 90°C and prevents my PS3 from burning itself to the ground and ending up with a YLOD.

[@333dae]

You can do that to ps3??? Wtf

[@coccoborg]

Of course you can ;)

[@TUnit959]

Ivanderjsk You axe the warranty by doing so, but yes. It can also be done to Xboxes, Nintendo machines and anything else that uses a heatsink/thermal compound setup.

[@coccoborg]

Exactly, but if your machine survives 2 years (that's how long warranty is by law here in europe), the day after that I usually do this. On hardware where there's no way to detect an "intrusion" by the user, I just do it anyway right after I got it.

[@Navhkrin]

Francesco Barbieri Damn man you are maniac. Have you tried usng thermal compound as sun cream?

[@foxman105]

Manufacturers usually use good quality thermal compounds on their high end cards. When I was replacing stuff on a 3 year old GTX 470. It actually looked like they used IC Diamond on that thing. although there was so much there it was overflowing off the sides. I did the spread method on the heat pipe cooler its self with AC MX-2 and the temps were almost the same... within 2 Celsius.

[@connodude5]

I like the new plugs for upcoming videos, they are very proffesional

[@jespernielsen5464]

is the thermal compound the same as cpu cooling paste? or is it different?

[@jacobmccauley613]

tis the same

[@Sofala]

Same

[@BaronVonBeef]

It's getting a bit silly when the entire last TWO MINUTES are adverts..

[@Kurupt-Seven-Six]

When linus says "speaking of" exit the video or pause it and continue to read the comments.

[@BaronVonBeef]

And i don't mind that up to the point where nearly a quarter of the video is advertisements.

[@Tuhopolttaja]

At least it's in the end of the video

[@ezforsaken]

The conclusion is perfect; I had even high end GPUs that came with a poor application out of the box, over 5°C improvement, with a basic thermal paste change, nothing fancy. And I had improvements of over 20°C changing the thermal compound on a pretty old notebook.

[@NicoIsntHere]

It's gotta be midnight for Linus when this goes up lol... Damn dewddddddd.

[@Gixxer983]

I have an offtopic question. I use intel and nvidia combo, BUT why do we never see radeon products on this channel?

[@ismaelravenlock6792]

cause theyre too cheap for linus lol

[@HolyDemonRune]

I used this guide and took my video card apart. I was successful! My original temps: Idle: 52C/Load: 90C. My New temps: Idle: 47C/Load:82C Not much of a huge difference but hell, when I opened it it looked like soda was spilled INSIDE thee video card! Around the CPU was crystalized syrup. I don't know how the video card was working before this! There was some syrup on the GPU itself! (BTW, I don't allow drinks on/near my Computer so I don't know how it got there.)

[@TheGreatNathan]

what thermal compound did you use? I have noctua!

[@HolyDemonRune]

I used a Noctua Thermal Compound, actually.

[@TheGreatNathan]

You should also take off the backplate too

[@terrencedoyle5513]

Definitely worth replacing. I bought a refurbished Matrix 980 ti. It was running extremely hot. Opened up and found paste all over the place and hard as a brick. Cleaned it up and put proper amount of mx4 and the card is running perfect now.

[@giannitridaofficial]

Can't wait for the CM 652 s review I own a 550 but want to change and mod it with a custom watercool loop so it would be great to find out how it is goint to work.

[@rrook88]

I use vodka to clean off my gpu/cpu with gunk. one small swab shot for gpu/cpu 3 big shot for technician afterwards.

[@KarrasBastomi]

noice

[@MTGOnlyOnPC]

OMG 2 degrese difference for me!!!!! ...great

[@enisylo]

For a tiny amount of work, a 3°C improvement isn't bad at all.

[@vgamesx1]

eni tiny? yeah it isn't hard but it will take at least half an hour or so... which is quite a bit of effort to have roughly the same effect as just lowering your clock by 100-200mhz..

[@enisylo]

Time ≠ Effort. Not to mention the point of doing this is to avoid having to change your clock speed at all. Also, this is something that you ought to be doing on cards that you've owned for a while, rather than brand new ones. You'd be amazed at the temperature reduction you can get by doing it. What with thermal throttling, by changing the compound on an older card you could make it last a little longer between upgrades.

[@vgamesx1]

lgbtTV5 how is that even remotely similar...? or even crippling..? first and foremost if you had to lose 100mhz or so on your OC to get it stable, then you're barely losing anything.. on average that's going to be just a few fps and you're more likely be bottlenecked by the amount of voltage you can give it and clock it before you hit a thermal wall anyway.. so most of the time doing this wouldn't suddenly change that or did you not even think about that before you commented..? secondly its not an EASY fix, that's like saying that deliding your cpu is an easy fix even though its also fairly easy to fuck it up in a several different ways, (especially if you're inexperienced and have never done it before) then you're up shit creek all because you had to have that tiny extra gain.. I'm not saying don't do it, just don't pretend as if it was an absolutely amazing and encourage everyone to go do it right away, you might just get some kid to go and accidentally ruin their expensive $200+ GPU.

[@Surms41]

vgamesx1 That was an idiotic statement.

[@ReCodeDetro]

Legit just replaced my GPUs thermal paste. Was averaging an idle of 45-52c It dropped to 39-44c with Arctic silver 5. Only reason it got this hot was because I RMA'd it for performance issues and they sent it back fixed but with higher temps (terrible thermal paste application). I saw how bad it looked when I replaced it. Thanks to this video for pushing me to do it.

[@ItsNiqv]

Wow I'm actually awake for this LTT video, haha loved the video Linus and keep up the good work LinusMediaGroup!

[@Eihei]

Too bad you didn't do it on reference R9 290X, there would be more sense :P

[@Skylar7s]

I still have that card and plan to do this now lmao

[@jamesb1221222]

Linus looks beautiful in 144P!

[@gavintumlinson9196]

Everyone looks beautiful at 144 p

[@kepeter97]

My r9 270x was reaching 62-66 degrees in the last week or so. I decided to reapply the TIM, even though there was a "warranty void" sticker. So far, I've got the same results, ~5 degrees lower temperatures. 55-56 max under the same load. (I used Arctic cooling mx-4)

[@iamdamo]

Just replaced my MSI GTX 780ti paste and it was throttling on load at 85 deg, is now rock solid on 73 under full load for 30 mins straight. Done the CPU as well while I was there and that has seen a drop of average 5 deg at idle and maxes out at 60 deg on full load using Aida64

[@shanaa483]

I opened up my laptop once and had no idea what the paste was for. So I threw away both cpu and gpu paste and my laptop seems to be fine. :/

[@alirayhan1]

It should be fine but it should run a bit hotter

[@ivanurban2383]

finally a video where my gpu is better than linus' (yes i know it was from 2015 but i just found it)

[@Excel_Fox]

I never even thought about this. I might want to try someday.

[@Jediahgames]

I just did this for the first time on my 4 year old card, the drop on the max temp was just 2Cº but what I noticed was that it took about 5 minutes longer than usual to get to the max temp, pretty cool (also dropped my idle temp in about 20Cº lol)

[@Rocky-rm4bc]

do some laptops come with liquid cooling? just curious.

[@OatmealTheCrazy]

Rokas Getautas Do you really want to be sloshing around a pump and res?

[@Rocky-rm4bc]

OatmealTheCrazy if it works alright, then yes :D

[@OatmealTheCrazy]

Rokas Getautas I was saying that you're risking damaging your components and possibly ruining water flow just by walking. Also the computer would weigh like 20 pounds and would not even be usable on your lap unless you want first-second degree burns.

[@MarkSmith-lg7dk]

OatmealTheCrazy it sounds like a good idea for desktop replacement if the res and pump were on one unit on the outside and it just pumps all the heat outside the laptop

[@OatmealTheCrazy]

Potato Slayer5478 you sure you want the hottest part of the computer where your hands/desk would be? Also, who wants a 15 pound laptop?

[@ashscott6068]

The paste is only there to replace any air. If the metal were perfectly flat, it would be better to not use the paste. So, the thinner the layer the better. It only has to fill in the irregularities. metal > metal will always transfer more heat than metal > something else > metal

[@Pong-Lenis]

+Ash Scott yup, but it's impossible to make them exactly flat, and the mounting hardware won't make it easier.

[@ashscott6068]

ILIKECATZNCHEEZBURGERZWITHCHEEZSHAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAICOULDGOONLIKETHIS4EVERBUTIHAZTOGONOWBYE No, but you already have one thermal junction beween the actual chip and the metal housing it's in. Why not just have that housing include the heatsink and do away with the second junction? It would be far more efficient and only a little less convenient. It would make sense for high-end processors

[@Pong-Lenis]

Not all cpu's has silicone between the die and the housing, some are soldered - metal to metal is after all the best solution. And if you really want to cool the die directly you could just delid it.

[@forestR1]

+Ash Scott you mention irregularities which is true, bear in mind a metal surface which looks flat and smooth, is jagged and rough under a microscope. I would be surprised if contact without TIM was even close to 50%. but I don't know.

[@whymac543]

TIM has the same conductivity if not more than the top of the cpu. don't say metal to metal always transfers better when most TIM is metal.

[@1NOTEGBEATZ]

that intro, was gold.

[@LikkanC]

Watching the "opportunity" bits at the end of the video, then accidentally pressing 1 when exit fullscreen to hear Linus talk about the case mod opportunites, lol

[@MahmoudMaguid]

This should only be done after a minimum 3 years of using your gpu because the thermal paste will eventually start to loose its performance. Everytime I did this on my old gpu's it has worked but I had those gpu's for 7 years, 6 years and 3 years before doing this. I don't recommend doing this unless your card starts to overheat. Its not worth the risk and time.

[@KoningWoelieWoelieYo]

Do you even care for your videomcards?

[@KoningWoelieWoelieYo]

Video cards

[@HimmelWeint]

I usually do thermal pad/thermal compound upgrades when I have owned a piece of hardware for over a year. I do those upgrades on everything from consoles to laptops to PC motherboards. Oh and I only use Arctic Cooling MX-4 and Fujiploy 17.0 W/mK thermal pads.

[@1cme1]

its not really very risky.

[@0Wayland]

Soullessnut Riskier for inexperienced users.

[@ZonaALG]

i think ill do this with a used sapphire r7 260x oc

[@thecanadianlanboy8132]

if its used, you should always replace the paste...

[@Deathless2288]

Is Arctic Silver ok to use on bare Silicon?

[@ZonaALG]

+TheCanadianLanBoy agree with that

[@thecanadianlanboy8132]

+Deathless2288 bare silicone?

[@ZonaALG]

TheCanadianLanBoy no, the thing about replacing thermal paste. I dont understand the bare silicone question

[@martinstedtler]

yesterday I changed thermal paste on my GTX 770 from the original to arctic MX-4 and i went from 86 °C (oc) to 72°C (oc) while stress Test. My plan was to mount an aio-cooler from arctic cooling, but some parts were missing. But I have to say that I am impressed!!

[@SilvaDreams]

+Melvin Gimp I personally use the Arctic MX-4 as well, great stuff and better than the Arctic Silver 5 personally (It use to be king 10 years ago)

[@jccarriedo309]

did this a few months back; shoved at least 6'C off my GPU load temps. nice video linus.

[@promi4259]

I use semen, it works great and ultra cheap...

[@forestR1]

+E MaC - I tried it. now my computer has a virus :(

[@epizzoli6104]

me too, now my pc is having a son

[@philippe5249]

+E MaC Lol I saw a guy on a forum spreading the thermal paste with a condom

[@forestR1]

Philippe52 that wasn't thermal paste :(

[@MrBigdiesel2010]

+E MaC I heard tomato ketchup is a good choice

[@MaksimYuryev]

Hey Linus Tech Tips video editor, You guys forgot to add some contrast or a lut to this video in post, its really flat.

[@Chiggalus]

fuck u

[@spazzwazzle]

Fuck you, Max

[@Psittac20]

Not an enthusiast video, but I can appreciate getting quality video's out there for anyone interested

[@AshLordCurry]

Love how old videos were so simpler.

[@casedistorted]

Ugh $1,000 monitors, I have a $150 23-inch 1080p monitor, blah.

[@TheStormsChannel]

I have a £120 23-inch 1080p monitor.

[@uetzel]

+Chris Anderson i have a $700 1440p monitor......damn those 4k freesync ones i wish i had one of those.....(if it has an IPS panel)

[@PhoenixNL72-DEGA-]

+Chris Anderson I use a 720P Beamer from time to time. Res might be lower but you can't beat a 118 inch screen :-P

[@buizelproductions-movedtob7799]

+Chris Anderson +Assassinguy102 I have a 1080p 6ms 24 inch monitor that I bought for $400 Canadian Rupees. (Around 387 US) #CanadianDollar

[@TedBackus]

this angry little lesbian gets under my skin.

[@bulletlottery]

Yes hes a big nerd looking guy who gives a shit

[@SyntheticFuture]

I hate you for how taggy (?) you are but that's also what keeps me coming back xD Those slip ups and bad jokes are amazingly entertaining xD

[@russelninoangelorocha1879]

always a commercial after every review, lol! but this was really helpful for me as i have a Palit Geforce GT 610 2GB DDR3, and it had a slight performance improvement when i did this! really great!

[@niwatorimeat]

I remember how my MSI HD6850 Cyclone had TONS of thermal compound on it out of the box. Wiping it off and reapplying it actually helped in this case.

[@AdventSeph]

Can we get an updated version of this video to see if manufacturers use better TIM now?

[@heribertoalortadeo7529]

Great video man! cheers

[@Kinadon]

Thermal paste actually helps a LOT! My EVGA GTX 680 was reaching high 80's ºC almost 90ºC and by applying a new paste (arctic silver 5), just a dot on top of the chip, temperatures fell to high 60's, 70ºC . So yea, it helps for those who are skeptical about it. Just make sure the cooler is well screwed and tight against the chip.

[@FoodOnCrack]

Still have some noctua thermal compound lying around and my gtx 660 is a few years old. might be worth considering

[@phillipnunya6793]

My processor was kinda old when I used it with other parts lying around to build my computer, and it ran at 79 C before I got all of the paste off (if you could even call it paste at that point, considering that it was dry and glued the processor to the cooling unit). After that, it ran at an average of 43 C..... Yeah, definitely worth it.

[@kendog0013]

Bought a used 770 from someone for $20... said they didnt want it anymore as they 'had a new gpu' and just wanted to get rid of it. turns out, it was overheating (90celsius in even just game main menus). watched this video, and it was the same steps for my ASUS 770 card and now load temperatures are 72c when at full load folding :)! Great vid, and saved me a great card for $20!

[@rezz5570]

It's not the best because most 770s run at an average of 60c ( not overclocked) while running Crysis.

[@GMCLabs]

Recently I was at Fry's I saw they had some type of phase change thermal compound. I never saw anything like it before. I wonder if you will ever review such a product and get some opinions about it.

[@interrogator9437]

I changed my 670's thermal paste for noctua's NT-H1 and it runs like a charm now

[@hikaru-live]

After I accidentally removed the heat sink on my Adaptec 6805, a hot-running RAID card, I replaced the thermal interface material (some pink sticky one, probably too low performance) with Cooler Master one. This pretty much eliminated thermal instabilities I was getting and gave me a more stable server. I wonder if my LSI 3ware 9750-8i card need a similar TIM upgrade too.

[@ollieellwood2268]

Lol when i put my CM hyper T4 on my FX 6350, which had had the stock cooler on for a week but got way too loud so needed a new one, i never removed the previous thermal compound and it still is working.

[@mikedante8471]

yes linus ic diamond 7 carat is one of the best thermal compound for my gtx 880m..reducing 10-12 degrees during online gaming everyday for 10hrs.. tried arctic mx-4, tuniq tx2 before but the ic diamond is the best..until now i still use it for my cpu and gpu..

[@andre963]

I tested my GPU after watching this video yesterday and man! my GPU was reaching 100 C and idling at 50! I rush to the store to buy some Thermal compound, Alcohol(isopropyl of course) and loads tissues. after following instructions here(as remembered) my GPU's max temp only reached like 70C. and idle's at 30. good thing my GPU doesn't have thermal pads cuz they're hard to find in my country. This video helped a lot. not only to decrease my GPU temp for OCing but for fixing my overheating GPU

[@scubasausage]

Just did this, dropped around 10 degrees on the core. Definitely worth it!

[@GrnArrow092]

As for replacing thermal paste, that could be a good solution for fixing cards with a crashing issue. I recently replaced the thermal paste on my GTX 1070 FE because the GPU was crashing due to heat. I replaced the original thermal paste with Antec Nano Diamond and tried to crash it, but it held its own with a maximum temperature of 53*C. It seems to me the original thermal paste from the factory dried out and lost its ability to effectively pull heat away from the GPU. I hope replacing the thermal paste in my card was the end of a 6 month struggle the crashing problem I’ve been having with it.

[@brandonion5647]

I went from 85-86c to 75-76c on my Evga 980 ti by doing this, using a custom fan curve. Stock fan curve runs around 79-80c now. Before stock curve would hit around 88c. This is with an +109mhz overclock.

[@garthvater]

A while ago I did this to my laptop and I'm swear there was a good 1/16 inch coating of grey idk what on its CPU... I dusted the thing out and replaced the thermal paste and it stopped overheating on idle (and full load). Besides who needs warranty...

[@Sonarctica]

I had the LG 34UC87-B in use for 2 weeks, had massive vertical tearing right in the middle of the screen in games, had to return it.

[@allensnyder7751]

After 1.5 yrs with my asus gtx 760 I was reaching temps of 98C+ under moderate load conditions. A simple thermal paste change brought that down to ~60C. I definitely recommend anyone with temp problems to do this, it isn't hard and the results can be significant.

[@John-qc1zv]

I had to replace a fan on my GPU and it came with a thermal paste in box. Why do I need that ? Than I found your video. I decided to clean it and apply a new grease and it work perfectly. Thank you for this video.