Thermal Compound Conundrum

I'm looking to buy some thermal paste for my new Acer AS4820TG laptop (in the mail).
I'm considering AS5, Arctic MX2/3/4, IC7 Diamond, or a Shin-Etsu compound.

From all the tests i've seen online Shin-Etsu seems to make the best compound.
The one i'm looking to get G751 is hard to apply though.
Any tips?
Which should I get?

 

In the end, the high end pastes are going to be extremely close to each other. What it really comes down to is how well it is applied.

I haven't used it myself, but AC MX4 is supposedly easy to apply. I've used Tuniq TX-4 and Gelid GC-Extreme, and they're super easy to spread.


Personally, I'd stay away from AS5, mostly because it does feature a lengthy cure time and it doesn't perform as well as the other top pastes.

 

I've had great luck with IC Diamond 7, AS5 and Shin Etsu

 

I don't like that the Diamond could scratch the surface of my CPU, but I do want to try it..

AS5 doesn't seem like anything special.. 200hr curing time and risk of capacitative damage put me off.

I'm liking the shin etsu g751 and x23 though!
Good price, and seem to perform quite well.
I'm worried about longevity and spreadability though..
How do you go about applying? Bead in the center and spread with heatsink pressure?

 

I advocate spreading it around with a razor or similar tool.

 

IC Diamond is very good, I've used it for my previous laptop with a QX9300 and my current one with i7-720QM. Arctic MX-3 is good also, difference to ICD is ~1C under heavy load.

 

There are several posts about thermal pastes and generally any of the above aforementioned thermal pastes will do, even AS5. You will not notice much more than a few degrees difference with any of those pastes. The biggest thing to consider is cost since that is what can vary significantly depending on where you live. If paste X is better on average than paste Y by 1-2 deg C (ignoring the fact that there is variance even between the same paste X, ie. it could be slightly worse than paste Y sometimes but more often than not it's a bit better than X) but costs $15 vs. $5, then it's up to you to determine whether that extra cost is worth it.

 

Price for all of them is close enough in my area to not care.
It really comes down to which has the best performance on average.
Which is where all the uncertainty lies.

 

The problem is that all of the formulations are so close that it's really not the TIM anymore, but the application of it. And unfortunately, there's no real way for us to be able to tell you which of the TIMs you'll feel most comfortable applying correctly. For example, for me, say, ICD7 might be best, because I manage to get consistent applications with it (just a hypothetical, I've never actually tried ICD7). For you, ICD7 might be too thick, and a thinner paste like Shin Etsu might be better. There's no real way to tell until you try them out for yourself.

 

Thats true. I'll just go to microcenter tomorrow and pick the cheapest one of these .

 

i use a credit card or bank card to do the compound spreading.

 

I would say A MX-4, there was a review a while back on tomshardware or some other site. That review put it ahead of OCZ freeze and AC5 and IC7. Although really, it wont matter that much, maybe 1-2C at max load. Any of these would beast the standard thermal paste your laptop comes with.