How much thermal paste do I need for my GPU and CPU?

[Tazor]

I asked someone and he said I should get a 10 gram tube. That seems like a lot. I never changed the paste on the GPU. Does it need that much?

[sage2001]

CPU's need no more than a pea drop of thermal paste.

[m662]

Originally posted by sage2001:

CPU's need no more than a pea drop of thermal paste.

I concur thin layer as possible but while making sure you cover the entire area.
They are usually sold in 1.5 gram and you will waste almost the entire tube unless you have more than 1 PC by not using it.

[Caldari Ghost]

i tried ptm7950 for my latest upgrade and it works great. best option for longevity too, if you dont plan to upgrade often.

[Tazor]

Originally posted by m662:

Originally posted by sage2001:

CPU's need no more than a pea drop of thermal paste.

I concur thin layer as possible but while making sure you cover the entire area.

Yeah, that's what I did for the CPU a while ago. But I never bothered to change it on the GPU. Absolutely no idea how much I need for that.

[m662]

Originally posted by Tazor:

Yeah, that's what I did for the CPU a while ago. But I never bothered to change it on the GPU. Absolutely no idea how much I need for that.

The same as with a CPU unless the surface area is much larger if you have a irregular GPU.
There is no further science to it for consumers.

Here is a recent guide
https://www.wepc.com/how-to/correctly-apply-thermal-paste-cpu-gpu/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6CRuNogKzo

[Tazor]

Also, I got some thermal paste lying around. Opened it 3 years ago. It still seems fine. Not dry, comes out of the tube. But from reading it seems that it does go bad after a while. Especially if it was opened.

Can I use this instead or should I get a new one?

[m662]

Is it still easy to spread does it not look like two separate liquids? You can test spreading on a piece of plastic or metal. If it looks fine just use it and see what temperature difference you get. (Do a baseline first)

Because unless it dried out or separated that is the only way to know for sure. Some have shelf life of 4 years opened.

We used tubes that were 10 years old sealed when we had to replace CPU's. Though these days we don't even bother because they can go for a decade and we have to replace systems than anyway.

[aka]

Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut, or peanut butter.

[Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...]

Originally posted by aka:

Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut, or peanut butter. :pipchicken:

mayo, but i add a dash of paprika

[Triple G]

I bought fluid metal the last time. So i took a bush and covered everything with it nicely as a thin layer. Fluid metal always sounds superior. Can´t go wrong with it.

But i´d always buy new one when i buy a new CPU, as this doesn´t happen too often.

Usually the small tubes last for at least 3 uses if not more.

[IGX]

Put a pea sized amount onto your cpu. Alternatively make a tiny cross or similar then attach the cpu fan or aio cooler to the cpu as it spreads out evenly in between them. There are a few products available and as you only need a small amount get the smallest tube available.

[Sir Dookface McFerretballs]

Originally posted by Tazor:

How much thermal paste do I need for my GPU and CPU?

ALL OF IT!!!!!!!!!

Get a 5-gallon bucket and just pour it in the computer, your temperatures will be so low you could use it as an air-conditioner!.

[Rumpelcrutchskin]

Most are sold in 3g-5g tubes, this is plenty for several times. You wont usually use more then 1g for CPU.

[Goose]

put a pea-sized dot on the center, press the cooler into place to splat the thermal paste, then pull the cooler off to check if it's spread over the die.
if it is, put the cooler on and you're off to the races.

[Haruspex]

An old Linus Tech Tips video tested different thermal paste application methods. The results were interesting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2MEAnZ3swQ
There's a lot of discourse surrounding this topic to where tech Youtubers will usually just censor how they apply thermal paste to avoid the arguments in the comments. According to testing though, it really doesn't seem to matter all that much as long as you are using enough.