I go with the 'Spread it out with a xxxx' method.

Reason is that you want the thinnest possible layer in the junction. Only enough to fill the microscopic imperfections in the heatsink and chip cover. They look smooth, but if you get them under a powerfull microscope they look like the Himalayan mountains. If you seat them together with no compund 90% of the surface doesn't actually touch, and has an air gap. Lousy for heat transfer.

Thermal compound is a much better heat conductor than air, but it's not as good as solid copper or aluminuium. So any extra in the joint above what is needed to fill in the air gaps is actually making the thermal junction less efficient.

The 'line' or 'grain of rice' may be simpler to apply, and 'good enough', especially if the compund has good flow and spreads out well. But getting that nice thin layer spread out first should give better results.

Of course most of my machines are old salvaged junkers and not overclocked beasts, but stripping them down and replacing the factory 'chewing gum' with a nice thin layer of generic silver paste seems to help them a lot.

Ian

I go with the 'Spread it out with a xxxx' method.

Reason is that you want the thinnest possible layer in the junction. Only enough to fill the microscopic imperfections in the heatsink and chip cover. They look smooth, but if you get them under a powerfull microscope they look like the Himalayan mountains. If you seat them together with no compund 90% of the surface doesn't actually touch, and has an air gap. Lousy for heat transfer.

Thermal compound is a much better heat conductor than air, but it's not as good as solid copper or aluminuium. So any extra in the joint above what is needed to fill in the air gaps is actually making the thermal junction less efficient.

The 'line' or 'grain of rice' may be simpler to apply, and 'good enough', especially if the compund has good flow and spreads out well. But getting that nice thin layer spread out first should give better results.

Of course most of my machines are old salvaged junkers and not overclocked beasts, but stripping them down and replacing the factory 'chewing gum' with a nice thin layer of generic silver paste seems to help them a lot.

Ian

The flow characteristics of MX-2 respond well to the simple technique......but would probably would equally well or better with the straightedge spread technique.

I tried licking it smooth with my tongue once......but that only left a bad taste in my mouth.......so much for that technique.

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"Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster

`
Hei Luke - and Ianab too ;-)
I`m just sneaking in here to read
about this - waiting for the big
event to come.. Maybe it will be
up and running for Christmas..? :-)

Good Luck with it!

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Hi Moon...!
Probably not by Christmas, I am still waiting on a few components, see here:

So perhaps sometime round the 27-29th I will have time to get it built! However, it will still be hard to get to my 31st deadline. Oops... just remembered I need to buy a cat5 cable.

Anyway, it was Saturday yesterday, so I finally had time to set up the desk. It took about 2 hours. And here it is in the crunching den (spare unused room)...
.
Usually, the curtains are closed...
And, the actual desk was too big for what could fit, so I had too saw off 5mm to the bottom legs, and 6mm of the side to fit under the other desk.

- Luke.

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- Luke.

Well, this question has been nagging me the past few days... will the graphics card fit in the case. So as of about 5 minutes ago I decided to answer it.

And the answer is...

YES! But barely... there is probably about 3-4mm of gap between the PCI slots and the HDD bay.

Very close call.

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- Luke.

Well, this question has been nagging me the past few days... will the graphics card fit in the case. So as of about 5 minutes ago I decided to answer it.

And the answer is....

Very close call.

My goodness what a small case. How are you going to get air flow? I had to remodel two of my counters to put larger cases in as I couldn't keep the small boxes cool and they just had celerons in them.

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Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

Lucky! I bought a GTS 250 and it didn't fit :-(

HDD is in the way - can't move it...

Lucky! I bought a GTS 250 and it didn't fit :-(

HDD is in the way - can't move it...

I had to get a bay insert for one of my machines that had 4 HD's in it. Then it fit under the CD and had an extra fan.

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Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

I wouldn't call it small... it's the NZXT Lexa Blackline Mid-Tower ATX case.
You can't compare it to the Antec 1200, but it certainly isn't a microATX case. It only looks smaller because the HDD bay is rotated 90 degrees, so the HDD's face the side (downside is I may have to buy 90 degree SATA connectors) which means the bay wall blocks the larger graphics cards

@Niko: You might be able to rotate the HDD bay with a few tools and some time. There are guides out there to rotate the bay of my case...

- Luke.

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- Luke.

No problem getting GTX295's in this case.


Dave

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I wouldn't call it small... it's the NZXT Lexa Blackline Mid-Tower ATX case.
You can't compare it to the Antec 1200, but it certainly isn't a microATX case. It only looks smaller because the HDD bay is rotated 90 degrees, so the HDD's face the side (downside is I may have to buy 90 degree SATA connectors).

@Niko: You might be able to rotate the HDD bay with a few tools and some time. There are guides out there to rotate the bay of my case...

- Luke.

Oh OK just looks it in the picture. I have a huge case leftover from my Water/Peltier days so most look small. LOL

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Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

No problem getting GTX295's in this case.


Dave

Woah! Nice setup you've got there Dave... whats the case you have there? It's not instantly recognizable...
I've got red LED fans pre-installed in the NZXT and I bought 1 red cold cathode and a blue cold cathode. I don't want to mix the colors too much.

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- Luke.

It's an nVidia Special Edition


This is it beside an ordinary sized case.

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Heres mine from another thread before I added second Video card.


my cruncher

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Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

It's an nVidia Special Edition


This is it beside an ordinary sized case.

Where can I buy? Or... do they not sell it anymore?

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- Luke.

A big case, Hmm, Good: The HAF 932 does pretty good as It will take a 13" long card, Bad: Dust Magnet as there are no filters, Filters have to be added, I'm adding DEMCifilters as they stick on the outside magnetically and custom sizes can be made, there are some that are already made the 932 of course and their Here.

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The T1 Trust, PRR T1 Class 4-4-4-4 #5550, 1 of America's First HST's

Dont't honestly know if it is still available.
I will put more pics of the build if I can work out how to upload them.

Dave

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@Niko: You might be able to rotate the HDD bay with a few tools and some time. There are guides out there to rotate the bay of my case...

- Luke.

Thanks Luke - both HDDs in my case were parallel to the mother board so it takes only a low profile GPU. The CD bays are full.

I picked up a NZXT Guardian 921 Mid-Tower ATX Case w/ Xion 630w PSU bundle.

Going to transfer the components from my Dell over the holidays.

A big case, Hmm, Good: The HAF 932 does pretty good as It will take a 13" long card, Bad: Dust Magnet as there are no filters, Filters have to be added, I'm adding DEMCifilters as they stick on the outside magnetically and custom sizes can be made, there are some that are already made the 932 of course and their Here.

Heck with the filters I got a compressor, no cat hair can stand up to that. I also use "Ideal" Electronic Switch and Contact cleaner every few months and even with no smoking in the house it doesn't drip pretty. Dries pretty much instantly.

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Official Abuser of Boinc Buttons...
And no good credit hound!

I think that this link should go to my i7 Build album.

http://s614.photobucket.com/albums/tt229/FiveHamlet/i7%20Build/

EDIT Added a couple more pics.

Dave

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