Thermal Pad Alternative

Just wanted to share with you guys an alternative to thermal pads. I've been fiddling around with different size thermal pads for my 7970m. I tried .5, 1, and 1.5mm pads for the VRAM and VRMs and just couldn't get a decent fit. The .5 and 1mm pads did not interfere with the contact between the heatsink's heat spreader and GPU die, but they were too thin to make good contact with the components. Meanwhile the 1.5mm pads made good contact with the components but did not compress enough to allow the heat spreader to make solid contact with the GPU die.

Some pads I've used compress better than others, but as I was looking for better pads I stumbled across a product which is basically a paste that is designed to be used instead of pads. It is called K5 Pro and it's made by a company in Greece. I have used generic white silicone paste in the past in place of thermal pads but that paste is not thick and stable enough and tends to get runny, spreading everywhere. This stuff is nothing like that. It is really thick and viscous and stays intact. According to the manufacturer, this paste has a thermal conductivity of 4W/mk which is very good and on par with most thermal pads. It was cheap so I thought I'd give it a try.

First off, this paste compresses very well and takes the shape of the device it is covering when compressed so there are virtually no gaps. The good compression also means my heatsink's heat spreader is unhindered and makes solid contact with the die. This paste also adheres well to VRAM modules. The only issue I found with this stuff compared to traditional pads is that when the heatsink is removed, this stuff breaks apart where about half of it sticks to the heatsink and the other half to the card so it is probably best to remove the old paste and apply a fresh coat at that point. The good thing is that this stuff cleans easily with some cotton swabs and rubbing alcohol. Depending on how much you apply, It can spread a bit to neighboring components when it is compressed but once it is compressed it stays put and does not spread further as heat is introduced.

I have no way to test how well heat is transferred with this paste on my 7970m, but if the claims of 4W/mk are accurate I'd say it will do a fine job, or at least just as well as the pads it replaced. I know there are pads out there that are better, but they can get quite expensive. So you may want to give this stuff a try. I honestly don't think I'll be messing around with thermal pads after trying this stuff.

http://www.computer-systems.gr/en/products/k5-pro

This stuff is sold on Amazon and e-bay direct from the manufacturer (computer-systems.gr). Just search for K5 Pro.

 

Interesting post! Thanks. I just bought some Gelid GC Extreme and it says on the packet that it is suitable for VRMs and capacitors. When I get round to cleaning out dust and repasting I'm going to try some on CPU VRMs then potentially on GPU too but I also got some 1.0mm 7W/mk Phobya XT pads to try on GPU as these are good thickness are very firm. See how they compare to Phobya Ultra that do compress but not by enough.

 

Thank you so much for sharing this, kosti! I've been having problems getting my thermal pads to fit just right so that they make proper contact between the components and the heatsink. I've had some temperature issues in the past with my 920xm and 680m and assumed it had to do with the thermal pads. Will definitely have to order this stuff and see how it goes.

 

Would be interesting to see how you would remove this stuff

 

This is the tricky (and messy) part. Whenever you remove the heatsink to repaste, you will want to replace this stuff too because it breaks apart. This is the main downside for someone like me who repastes quite often. I use dry cotton swabs to get the bulk of it off, then alcohol to clean off any remaining residue. With alcohol, this stuff clumps up and comes off easily, but you will find that a lot of it spreads to surrounding components so that remaining residue will be a bit of a pain to remove entirely. If you don't mind a bit of white residue around capacitors and resistors, etc., this is not such a big deal.