Computer repair and video upgrade

Got a couple of things I'm hoping some of you may be able to offer advice and/or opinions about.

My motherboard went south a few days ago (under warranty - YAY!) and Asus is sending me a new one shortly. Of course this means removing the cpu from the old mobo and reinstalling it.

For you system builders out there, what is your recommendation for thermal paste? I've used ARCTIC COOLING MX-2 Thermal Compound in the past, but I need to buy new as I have none left. Also, would this be good to get for cleaning the old stuff off: Arctic Silver ACN-60ML (2-PC-SET) Thermal material Remover & Surface Purifier - OEM ?

Also, since I was looking at picking up a GeForce GTX 460 soon, I figure that I might as well do it now while I have the system all apart. EVGA makes a "superclocked" version and a standard version, and I was also looking at the ZOTAC, which is a little better, pricewise (I've had a ZOTAC GeForce 9800GTX for the last two years and I like it so far, but I'm looking for a little more performance). My question really is about the superclocked vs non - is it going to give me much of a noticeable performance increase, and if so, what kind of increase in performance would I notice?

Thanks in advance for any advice you might have.

Storm

For thermal compound, I'm partial to Arctic Silver products myself. They have several products to choose from, with Arctic Silver 5 being the thinnest (viscosity-wise), Ceramique the thickest, and Alumina in-between. Which one you use depends on the nature and finish of the CPU and heatsink; generally, thinner products work best if the CPU and heatsink are very flat with no gaps (polished and/or lapped) while the thicker ones can help fill gaps if you aren't able or willing to lap your heatsinks. But as long as you use a good brand of compound together with a decent heatsink, the viscosity shouldn't matter much. (We're talking a difference of a couple degrees here.)

As for cleaning off old thermal compound, that Arctic Silver stuff will work, but in most cases you can do the job just as well (and cheaper) with 90% isopropyl alcohol and lint-free cloths.

With regard to the choice of video card, all else being equal, you can expect the superclocked eVGA to be about 10-13% faster than the standard-clocked model. But that's just a rough calculation based on MHz numbers. Whether you will notice a 13% increase is up to you!

Bear in mind that these Geforce GTX 460's are proving to be highly overclockable by end users. I myself have this Gigabyte model, which is also factory overclocked (though not as much as the eVGA one.) But I find I can overclock it easily to 800MHz core/4000MHz memory, and I haven't even really tried to push it to the limit. Nearly 20% faster than the reference models (675MHz), and it does make motion a bit smoother, but that's really subjective.

In the end, any of the GTX 460s will do you just fine. If you can afford a factory-overclocked one, go for it (that Gigabyte is only $10 more than the stock-speed Zotac you linked to); if not, the standard models will still be plenty fast with a good chance you can overclock them. Which one you pick may depend more on non-performance related criteria than anything else (e.g. bundled accessories, extra features, warranty).

Another vote for Arctic Silver paste here; I've been using it for 10 years and have been very satisfied. One tube of it should last you a loooong time; I've put together probably 10 machines and still have about half of it left.

From the articles I've seen though the difference between top quality thermal paste and the cheap stuff doesn't amount to much. On the other hand we're talking the difference between $5 paste and $10 paste so it isn't a big deal.

Can't really help with the video card other than to concur that if you're planning an upgrade the time to do it is when you have the case on the table in pieces. I'm (hopefully) not looking at upgrading for a year or more unless something goes wrong; my quad core Intel from a couple years ago and a GTX 275 should do me for awhile yet.

I am surprised by the Asus MB failing on you though... I've had probably 6-7 of them over the years and all are either still working strong or were retired in working condition.

Thanks for the opinions! Very helpful.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Call Me Awesome Another vote for Arctic Silver paste here; I've been using it for 10 years I am surprised by the Asus MB failing on you though... I've had probably 6-7 of them over the years and all are either still working strong or were retired in working condition.

I was surprised, too, as I've used Asus products in the past and been happy with them. When I did talk to tech support, though, I got the impression that this model might have had some problems - they never even asked me what I did to troubleshoot it, just started the warranty return process. I'm used to being asked to jump through troubleshooting hoops to prove a particular product/part is defective.

Ah well, once I actually got to talk to someone (their US tech support is in the US), the process seemed to go smoothly - however, I faxed the necessary form to them around noon eastern time yesterday and they have not put a hold on my credit card as yet. So I hope they got the form... I will have to call and get an update on my case

Storm

I vote for eVga. They build durable, highly capable cards, and have a very good reputation. They're also easy to deal with.

Article today at Tom's Hardware showing the eVGA GTX 460 1GB Superclock delivering about 10% better performance than a stock speed GTX 460.