Arctic Silver Thermal Adhesive

Henrik · Post by **Henrik** » Thu Aug 07, 2003 5:02 am

I'm thinking about passive cooling for my Radeon 9000. As I see it now, I have three options (thanks to everyone on the forum for helping me out before):

1) Use the ZM50-HP.
2) Use an old PII heatsink that I've managed to remove from an old machine with Arctic Silver Thermal Adhesive.
3) Use an old PII heatsink that I've managed to remove from an old machine with cheap "plastic steel"-epoxy

Has anyone used the Arctic Silver Thermal Adhesive, and if so, with what results?

The Arctic Silver Thermal Adhesive is only slightly cheaper than an ZM50-HP (at least where I live), so I am thinking about buying another epoxy (is says "plastic steel" on the tubes, whatever that means) from a local hardware store for about 1/8 of the price of the Arctic Silver Thermal Adhesive. Which of the three alternatives would you recommend, the easy but expensive 1), the almost as expensive 2) or the most risky and cheapest 3) ?

(More at: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewto ... highlight= )

cliche · Post by **cliche** » Thu Aug 07, 2003 5:25 am

Using artic silver ther. adhesive on my 4600 modded with Zalman NB heatsink (placed upside down due to card). Handles the heat well. Also my NB on my Abit IC-7 G has same set up (due to IC7-G having duff NB hooks).

In other words, both get hot, am using non-standard config (one where temps reach 55-60 C and is upside down) and my machine gets knocked about a bit (no pun intended). Still works perfectly well.

Recommended and reasonably priced from retailer in UK which I used.

futureweaver · Post by **futureweaver** » Thu Aug 07, 2003 4:07 pm

I've just done the same on my 9100 with this http://www.thecoolingshop.co.uk/tcs/com ... roduct=491 - the price seemed unbeatable. I still have over half the Zalman thermal adhesive left - if you'd like it, let me know your address and I'll mail it to you. Some people say it's not as good as AS, but it should be better than ordinary epoxy.

SometimesWarrior · Post by **SometimesWarrior** » Thu Aug 07, 2003 8:42 pm

I used both epoxy and paste: some Zalman thermal epoxy on hand, and some good ol' Arctic Silver paste. The epoxy went around the edge of the GPU to keep the heatsink on, and a small mound of ASIII went in the middle to get good heat transfer. I glued a 350g copper heatsink to my Geforce 3 this way, and it's held for a couple months so far. Knock on wood for it to stay on for many more!

Henrik · Post by **Henrik** » Fri Aug 08, 2003 5:45 am

Well, here goes...

I've decided to go ahead with alternative 3)! Thanks for your input, and the very generous offer! I've put my R9000 in the freezer now to be able to remove the old heatsink. I might get back in a few hours to let you know the results, if I dare...

Henrik · Post by **Henrik** » Fri Aug 08, 2003 2:17 pm

A few hours in the fridge at -30 degrees C and some (mild) violence with a knife separated the heatsink from the GPU. Scraped of the old epoxy and put on some new, pressed for a minute or two.Two hours waiting and that's it! It works excellent now. I guess I'll just have to wait and see about the long term effects!