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IC Diamond vs AS5


DiveDr

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Hello to all,

I recently had occasion to disassemble my M860tu in order to replace component. This required removal of the CPU and GPU heatsinks. When I initially assembled the laptop sometime in 2009 IC diamond was all the rage and as such this is the thermal compound I went with. On removal of the heatsink and cleaning the CPU etching of the die from the diamond thermal compound was significant. This does not appear to have damaged the cores however in reassembling the laptop I went with Arctic Silver 5 and have noticed no significant changes in CPU core or GPU core temperatures (Using real temp GT to monitor) they hover around 49°C on Idle and can reach as much as 78°C on full sustained load. There appears to be no difference with respect to heat dissipation of the two compounds. Perhaps IC diamond is best reserved for desktops where the actual die is not exposed and a thicker layer of thermal interface material is required.

I will likely be assembling a new system in the not-too-distant future probably core I seven based also probably another Clevo chassis. Any comments Or suggestions from the forum with respect to the best thermal compound to utilize for this project?

Best regards to all.

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I have always favored ICD7 over AS5 because of it's total non-conductivity. Even if it somehow flows over the edge of the die after it's installed, it will not short your pins. It's also a lot thicker and tends to flow less. I've used both and YMMV. I have been exclusively ICD7 on my laptops since 2012-ish so take that with a grain of salt

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Duuuuuude... AS5 is completely non-conductive as well. It really annoys me when people keep telling this internet legend. It might be slightly capacitive, but that's a whole different story.

Besides, AS5 is old, there are better pastes.

ICD is a mess imo, great performance but it will scratch surfaces, you need to be pretty careful when wiping it off.

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The only paste I've noticed some real difference with is phobya nanogrease extreme, beats every paste except for liquid ultra and so on.

Suoah,

Are you referring to this stuff: Phobya HeGrease Extreme 3.5g Thermal Comound / Paste at Xoxide!

I was looking at this and wondering if it was any good, any experience with this?

Thanks

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So, got a tube of NanoGrease extreme, cleaned and applied the new TIM in the M860TU. Tried all three aplication methods Pea in center, Line down the middle and plastic spatula spread. Of the three the best result was from the Pea in Center application method. The temps are unfortunately no better than AS5. 50-55 at idle 70+ on full prolonged load. So far not impressed with Phobya NanoGrease Extreme...

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Okay so discouraged with my results I decided to scrub down and reapply the Phobya NanoGrease Extreme one more time. I went with the "Pea in Center" method as it gave the best results in previous applications. This time going with the less is more approach I applied smaller dollops of the TIM in fact very small. After 24 hours curing and several power cycles I now see temps of 49-50 C on the CPU at idle and about 50 C on the GPU idle. On load things get hot with both GPU and CPU at full load temps creep north of 80 C after about 15 min with an ambient temp of about 22 C. This is about what I had with IC Diamond and AS5 after curing. Of all these high end TIMs I don't see any significant "real world" difference. So at $3.00 US for a tube of AS5, $7.00 US for IC Diamond and $14.00 US for the Phobya NGE I will go with economy as the deciding factor in this equation. As always YMMV!

Hope this comparison is of some help to all.

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Honestly the difference between all non-metal TIMs will be 2-3 C at best, so it's definitely not worth the extra premium. If you want an all-round general purpose hassle-free paste I recommend the MX-4.

However, if you're after the absolute lowest temps possible, then there is simply no substitute for Liquid Ultra. I too was skeptical when I saw the disappointing results from desktop CPUs, but having tried it myself, I can say with 100% confidence that Liquid Ultra is THE single best TIM for laptops bar NONE. Nothing on the market right now even comes close to what Liquid Ulra can do. Sure it won't drop your idle temps by a whole lot, but under load is where it really shines. Previously while playing Crysis 2, my 4900MQ would routinely run up to about 75 C. Now with Liquid Ultra, it never goes a hair above 63 C. And this paste is a MUST HAVE if you're serious about benching. With MX-4, no matter what I did, when benching XTU at 4.2 GHz my 4900MQ would run right up to 95 C and throttle like mad. After repasting with Liquid Ultra, it can manage to pull through XTU without throttling once, and topping out at 93 C. To say Liquid Ultra is amazing is an understatement, it is a godsend to gamers and benchers alike.

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  • 4 weeks later...

2nd Liquid Ultra - pretty scary to put on the CPU though, don't like the idea of melting it on the IHS/DIE.

Haven't used IC Diamond but I've got a tube of AS5 and it hasn't failed me - a little less messy than some pastes too.

That said, I don't change my compound that often tbh...

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  • 4 weeks later...
I bought the IC Diamond upgrade from XoticPC. I hope it helps my temps.

Prepare to redo it yourself. I, too, had them apply IC Diamond to my system and my temps were high. I repasted and they're 2-3C lower on idle and 4-8C lower on load (one of my 880Ms is about 6C hotter than the other one no matter what I do, it appears to be a design flaw in the cooling system of the P377SM-A).

I was using MX-4 on my GPUs and I don't think that there is enough pressure on the heatsinks to use such a thin paste, my temps hit the max of 92C and the GPUs throttled and I applied it six times.

IC Diamond is not the easiest thing to apply to a CPU though... I messed that up a few times and I *still* have one core that's hotter than the other three after doing a small line across the entire middle of the die on the last application but its only a 1-2C difference from the other cores and still is a 3-4C drop from the stock paste job.

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Prepare to redo it yourself. I, too, had them apply IC Diamond to my system and my temps were high. I repasted and they're 2-3C lower on idle and 4-8C lower on load (one of my 880Ms is about 6C hotter than the other one no matter what I do, it appears to be a design flaw in the cooling system of the P377SM-A).

From what I understand from their correspondence, my Sager will undergo "24-72 hours" of benchmarking and stress testing before it is shipped, to ensure it operates within spec. I do believe them about this; they wrote a short essay about it. Also, I think the slave GPU is supposed to run cooler than the master.

I was using MX-4 on my GPUs and I don't think that there is enough pressure on the heatsinks to use such a thin paste, my temps hit the max of 92C and the GPUs throttled and I applied it six times.

IC Diamond is not the easiest thing to apply to a CPU though... I messed that up a few times and I *still* have one core that's hotter than the other three after doing a small line across the entire middle of the die on the last application but its only a 1-2C difference from the other cores and still is a 3-4C drop from the stock paste job.

Thankfully I'm also experienced in applying thermal paste, so if it comes down to it, I can do it. Appreciate the heads up, and I hope your case was a one-off =/

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From what I understand from their correspondence, my Sager will undergo "24-72 hours" of benchmarking and stress testing before it is shipped, to ensure it operates within spec. I do believe them about this; they wrote a short essay about it. Also, I think the slave GPU is supposed to run cooler than the master.

Thankfully I'm also experienced in applying thermal paste, so if it comes down to it, I can do it. Appreciate the heads up, and I hope your case was a one-off =/

My temps were still in spec... But conditions happened that caused me to have to open up the machine and pull a video card which meant a repaste. Pulling the video card revealed a pool of IC Diamond underneath the heatsink. It was only a few degrees drop but it was still a drop.

As for the slave running cooler than the master, that's correct but not usually that large of a disparity. Either way, one maxes at 89C now and the other at 87C and that's with the unlocked vbios - spec is anything under a sustained 90C according to Sager and when the GPU hits 89C, the fan hits almost max and it will stay around 82C-83C after that. Watch Dogs is the only game that pushes it up anyway, my other games I limit to 60 FPS with nVidia Inspector and see temps in the 70s.

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My temps were still in spec... But conditions happened that caused me to have to open up the machine and pull a video card which meant a repaste. Pulling the video card revealed a pool of IC Diamond underneath the heatsink. It was only a few degrees drop but it was still a drop.

Yeah that's no bueno.

As for the slave running cooler than the master, that's correct but not usually that large of a disparity. Either way, one maxes at 89C now and the other at 87C and that's with the unlocked vbios - spec is anything under a sustained 90C according to Sager and when the GPU hits 89C, the fan hits almost max and it will stay around 82C-83C after that. Watch Dogs is the only game that pushes it up anyway, my other games I limit to 60 FPS with nVidia Inspector and see temps in the 70s.

So that unlocked vbios is working out for you? I'm still on the fence about flashing the GPUs of a brand new $3500 system.

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Yeah I bricked mine initially but that was a test BIOS. I don't think there is a real risk of bricking with the final release unless you lose the power or get a corrupt file but since it's archived, that's doubtful too. I lucked out and had my old Alienware M17x that I stuck the master in and reflashed then used that to flash the other one. You can also flash a single card to make sure the worst case scenario you'd have to make the master a slave and boot from what would normally be your slave card to reflash. It's a 15-20% performance boost though and if you get lucky, you'll be able to overclock (my cards are unfortunately quite weak and can't muster even a slight undervolt so my overclocking was limited to +450 on the memory) or at the very least, you might be able to undervolt and shave the temps.

Sent from my HTC One_M8 using Tapatalk

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