Gadgetory

so everyone knows that for a CPU to last longer and perform optimally it needs to stay cool which makes it all the more confusing that Intel over the last few generations at least according to comments from the tech community has been using seemingly the worst possible thermal compound between the dyes of their processors and the integrated heat spreaders that go on top of them but the problem is that the only way to evaluate that thermal compound that we have now is to take off the spreader replace it with something else and check the results but we're actually changing a lot of variables when we do that so we devised a test to find out once and for all just how bad is Intel's thermal paste Alex here has got an entire bag of Intel CPUs with their junk thermal compound and we're going to be harvesting all of it and then comparing it with the well-respected n-th one from Noctua a premium thermal paste on a deleted liquid metal deck stream edition cpu so come along for the ride tunnel bear makes really simple privacy apps so people can enjoy a more open Internet to try it out for free visit tunnel bear comm /l tt to get a baseline we first needed to apply some nth one thermal paste from Noctua and mount the NHD 15 cooler that we'd be using for our tests it performs as well if not better than large a iOS but is way easier to mount all of our testing was done in our conference room to keep em bein temperatures locked at 24 degrees at stock speeds with multi core enhancement turned off and the CPU fan at full blast while our control thermal test was running we had some time to begin what we're calling the Grand Tim the harvest we aren't totally sure if these processors work but we don't want to just destroy them like so many things deleting is pretty simple when you have the right tools place the CPU in the little vise tighten until the top moves a bit and then remove the lid which normally you would do by hand but these ones seemed pretty reluctant to let go and we wanted to get this over with once all the CPUs were opened we scraped off all the thermal interface material we could get at with a guitar pick and then carefully placed it on an ESD bag now you might be thinking guys those are third gen core series chips that came out six years ago how can this be a fair comparison well the longevity of Intel's pastes is one of the main justifications that we have heard for them using it also it's a heck of a lot easier to get a bag of third gen chips than 8th gen chips oh the savagery look at this this is like they came in and wrecked up the place well you don't have to do that to them wow that's a fair point ok so oh so this is it yeah that's all of it right there don't blow on it I'm not gonna blow on it so this is our harvested thermal interface material from four CPUs this looks like it should be more than enough for our 79 80 XE after inspection we found that our first application of thermal paste was excellent so these results should be perfect for our comparison do you think there's like a good way to get this on there I think we're in uncharted waters here right now I hadn't really given it a lot of thought to be perfectly honest with you several methods of applying the old thermal goop were considered including just placing it onto the CPU but without a way to spread it around we were concerned that we wouldn't get adequate coverage mashing it into a ball seemed promising but it just kind of flaked out and turned into a weird powder finally we turned to what seemed like the soberest idea soaking it in alcohol not doing anything yet Alex although this doesn't seem like the best of ideas it's actually not the worst ever either the alcohol should allow what is currently thermal dust to turn back into more of a paste for application and then quickly evaporate away our spudger ended up being too fine of a tool so we swapped it out using the allen key from the deleting tool as a makeshift pestle for our bottle cap mortar making a reconstituted thermal paste here spilled the alcohol so ridiculous this alcohol spill might have been a blessing in disguise this may be one who can tell this things we've ever done yeah I was trying to think of Dumber things but this is really up there and we try to spread it out more I mean we've got the particle size pretty small with the tin spread out to the best of our abilities all we could do was wait for the alcohol to dry thank you I guess we should just go for it now we've committed this much time and energy to the initial temperatures at idle had a set just over six degrees over ambient meaning that our application worked at least to some degree well it might just be more idly now so like 30 walks before Philippi okay so you don't think it's the material heating up and spreading yeah I think it's just windows is all the way started but we wouldn't know how well it works until we hit it with an intense load didn't I mean it didn't instantly overheat but this is now our earlier test gave us a maximum temperature of 60 degrees and an average temperature across the course of 50 degrees while maintaining a CPU power of about a hundred and fifty watts with our reconstituted Intel Tim we almost immediately blew past that reaching a maximum of up to 89 degrees ouch before settling into an average of 75 degrees to be clear this is a totally acceptable number that shouldn't harm the processor within its expected lifespan but 25 degrees more than the enthusiasts solution still isn't great but is the problem the paste or the application this is the real moment of truth because we weren't expecting it to perform as well anyway right did it spread actually it did I think if we described that as suboptimal but adequate it doesn't seem to have liquid it up at all so with our decent-enough application we feel at this point that it's safe to say that the 25 degree difference was at least largely due to the poor thermal conductivity of the paste that is inside the CPU and supporting our theory is the fact that this difference is actually pretty close to the temperature difference that you can achieve after deleting a CPU and replacing that stock thermal interface material so to answer our original question there are a number of variables that you end up changing when swapping out thermal paste in your dealin and processor including mounting pressure the thickness of the application the silicone seal the flatness of the heat spreader but as everyone expected its Intel's choice of a longevity optimized Tim rather than a performance optimized one and their decision to eschew solder that makes up the bulk of the difference speaking of difference maybe you're looking for a way to make a difference to your small business or you do freelance work well FreshBooks is the online cloud-based accounting solution that's built for how you work it allows you to create and send professional-looking invoices in just a couple of clicks set up online payments easily so you can get paid up to four days faster see when your clients has seen your invoice putting it into the guessing games and take the full functionality of the FreshBooks platform out with you on the go so you can track expenses and track hours and all of that good stuff on Android and iOS so check them out at the link in the video description that's FreshBooks comm slash tech tips and just enter tech tips in the how did you hear about us section you can get a free 30-day trial so thanks for watching guys a huge shout out to freebies Vancouver for providing us with all these CPUs to harvest the thermal interface material from if this video sucked you guys know what to do but it was awesome get subscribed hit that like button or check out the link to where to buy the stuff we featured in the video description also link down there's our merch store which has cool shirts like this one and our community forum which you should totally join