Switching the cold paste on graphic card

Hey overclockers,

I sat and looked some reviews of graphics cards, and saw a review where they are, by changing the cooling paste on the graphics card (shown enough on HD3870) actually got the temperature down to 10-15 degrees!?
Are there some who have tried it here itself, and can tell whether it actually gives an effect?

And it is much harder than switching cold paste on a CPU?
It is not because my graphics card is too hot, but if it could run cooler, I think it will certainly worth it, then it could perhaps also overclock a little more.

And should in that case should use some specific cold paste? I have both a tube Arctiv Silver 5 and a noctua Nt-H1 available, can I just use them?

Thank you in advance.

Have not tried just to switch cold pasta, and yet retain the original radiator, so can not say how much it gives.

However, I have changed several graphic cards. In most cases the standard cooler been fitted with too much cold paste, and apparently just a white label - I think certainly we can do better, but I do not think we are talking 10-15 degrees, and more 5-10.

All in all, it is not difficult to switch a graphics card cooler than a CPU cooler - obviously depending on which graphics card you have.
The fastest card I have changed the radiator, the GeForce 7950GT in my PC now, and it has no active cooling of RAM. I do not know how difficult it is in a cooler which also covers RAM.

When you change the radiator on the graphics card, there was actually a number of advantages in relation to CPU:
- You can take the card out and work with it where there is plenty of room and plenty of light
- The radiator is flat and therefore easier to manage
- Radiator surges often settled from the back, so as not to have problems during cooling.

By contrast, there are also one or two major drawbacks:
- Graphics kernels do not have heat spreaders
- Some graphic cards also covers RAM

Application of cooling paste and feeding the radiator requires a lot more caution than on a CPU.

Overall, I think even that is a fairly easy task and seems so absolutely should just throw you out of it.

My graphics card cooler is installed with Arctic Silver 5.
You can usefully use one of the newer products that are not currently cheap, but essentially it's just a question of being prudent, then AS5 is great.

Yes. it is an easy task.
Like switching paste on a CPU.
It simply must be aware of that a framework could be Pigs heat, and therefore it would be beneficial to buy a cooler pack of GPU and RAM coolers. I bought a Thermal Right cooler for my 9600GT.

It went from ~ 90 * at idle to ~ 30 * and now run the max 45 * on load so it could not be better. I then put a nice little quiet fan on.

Thank you for the good answer :)
It sounds not as if it is such a difficult task again, but as I had not really liked to switch cooler just paste, but there are some after-market coolers for a GTX 260 yet?

It is that I just worry about at most aftermarket coolers is that they are usually leading heat directly into the box, while the GTX 260 cooler throw it out of the back and I could imagine it is very very hot for such a card.

What is it is difficult to cover the ram, cooler on a GTX 260 course covers any case also ram, I believe I have seen pictures where there actually was just a long thick cushion of any cooling something all the way across to the ram block energy. But it is surely just a small dollop on each block of RAM, and then have it spread well and looked at the cooler again.

I know, any case, that my noctua NT-H1 is not conductive, so I could use just as well. And as they do not have heat spreaders what makes it such exactly, so what should I be giving extra attention?

When no heatspreaders on it, I will say that you can see the exposed core.
Just like the old AMD CPUs, which was not on the heatspreader. We therefore need to be a little cautious when cooler spans firmly on the graphics card.

Unless you feel cooler noise on your graphics card, I can not see any reason to change it? As far as I remember, the cooler on GTX260 is as quite good, is not it?

And RAM, so I wrote it just because you should be aware that this is one of the things that makes it harder. For a CPU, only one plane and four holes, so it's easy to make that part well. In a graphics card, you suddenly find many surfaces and gaps so be careful.

Do as I say never mount a cooler covering RAM, so do not know exactly how things work.

If you have something non-conductive cold paste, it is just super ...!

And yes, heatspreader is that on the metal plate / cap that covers the core of modern CPUs. In a graphics card is not such, and that means you have less room to spread cold paste, but probably more significant that there is a smaller and more delicate surfaces to face pressure from the cooler.

In other words, everything is just done with a little more caution on a graphics card in relation to a CPU.

I hope makes it sound more difficult than it is - just think you should have all angles of the case before you throw out of it ... ;)
In essence, it is very close to being as easy as with a CPU cooler.

Unless you feel cooler noise on your graphics card, I can not see any reason to change it? As far as I remember, the cooler on GTX260 is as quite good, is not it?

And RAM, so I wrote it just because you should be aware that this is one of the things that makes it harder. For a CPU, only one plane and four holes, so it's easy to make that part well. In a graphics card, you suddenly find many surfaces and gaps so be careful.

Do as I say never mount a cooler covering RAM, so do not know exactly how things work.

If you have something non-conductive cold paste, it is just super ...!

And yes, heatspreader is that on the metal plate / cap that covers the core of modern CPUs. In a graphics card is not such, and that means you have less room to spread cold paste, but probably more significant that there is a smaller and more delicate surfaces to face pressure from the cooler.

In other words, everything is just done with a little more caution on a graphics card in relation to a CPU.

I hope makes it sound more difficult than it is - just think you should have all angles of the case before you throw out of it ... ;)
In essence, it is very close to being as easy as with a CPU cooler.