fixed my pc fan.. some ideas
tried both arctic silver 5 and arctic ceramique
which is better? depends
I think silver 5 is better for desktops while arctic ceramique is better for laptops
--- why?
here are several tests that I ran.
first.. too much thermal paste is gonna blow the machine.. no matter which one, it wont let you start the pc, fan runs crazy and errors out
it is not gonna help to reduce the heat of the cpu, on the contrary, could heat it up
so it only needs a very small amount, like a grain of rice; then spread the paste evenly on the surface..
-- how thin should the thermal paste layer be ?
as thin as possible. this is based on the tests. it should be very very thin but also covers the cpu surface using the small amout of paste.
the reason that we use thermal paste is that it helps to push out the air between medal connections, specifically, the cpu and the heatsink
it is like a Chiffon on the body :)
if there are two / multiple cpus, put the same amount of paste on each one and make them spread evenly on each one. the layer on each cpu should look the same
or it is gonna cause some other issues.. e.g. the fan is not gonna run smoothly as it should
so why ceramique is better than silver 5 on laptops ?
well, cause it is made of silver.. it is not working quite well on laptops. It is absorbing the heat too fast, and then pass it to the heatsink, so that the fan is not gonna stop running, even openning a small application or a few web pages.. the cpu is cooled down. but the fan is noisy..
for desktops. the fan is bigger and cheaper while runs better than a small fan on a laptop.. so for desktops.. use silver 5 might be a better choice
above are the thoughts after I fixed the laptop fan.. write it down so that it could be helpful next time :)