Silicone grease is a kind of thing that we must use when installing the radiator, different properties of the silicone grease of course will have an impact on the heat dissipation performance of the radiator, we did a large silicone grease horizontal review as early as 2007, and now 15 years have passed, what changes have the thermal grease? This time, we collected a total of 18 different brands of silicone greases at different price points to see the differences in thermal conductivity between them, as well as the subsequent stability tests such as aging, oil separation and evaporation.
18 silicone greases tested
The parameters of these silicone greases are given by manufacturers, but the parameters given by each company are not necessarily complete, and some even do not give thermal conductivity.
How do we measure silicone grease?
If you have seen our previous video of how the heat sink should be measured, you should know that even the same CPU has different temperature and power consumption performance between each other, and the same CPU on different motherboards, even if it is the same motherboard, there will be different temperature and power consumption performance.
So we began to use the specially built CPU heating simulator a few years ago to do the radiator test, and this grease cross review we are also using this kind of heat-based heating body test platform, but and we usually test the radiator with the platform is a little different, the results of earlier experiments, according to the conventional method of measurement, there will be two problems, one is that the gap between the silicone grease may be very small, the other is that you are difficult to ensure that every application is the same state, especially the thickness and thinness can not be as consistent as possible.
So we decided not to take the conventional route, increase the amount of silicone grease used, silicone grease test platform to an Intel LGA1200 CPU top cover flipped over, the test grease will fill the groove, too much silicone grease will be discharged from the side of the small hole, so that you can ensure that the amount of silicone grease used each time is fixed, and the thickness of these silicone greases will be more than ten times the normal use of the situation, which can amplify the performance gap between the silicone greases.
The platform uses Limin's AR-120 SE radiator, the heating element power will be controlled at 170W during the test, next to the thermometer a probe is installed in the TOP cover of the CPU above the heating element, the other is fixed in front of the fan, test the ambient temperature, the thermometer will automatically calculate the temperature difference between the two temperature probes, and we are looking at this temperature difference.
Thermal conductivity testing
When the test officially began, in addition to these 18 silicone greases, we also added toothpaste to compare, since usually all day long people say that toothpaste can replace silicone grease, we will actually try it.
This gold silicone grease and silver silicone grease performance and toothpaste have a comparison, and the performance of other silicone grease is quite far away, at least 12 degrees, the gap between other silicone greases is not so large, the best Yajun W15II and Limin TFX are 39.8 degrees, the back of the Limin TF7 is 40 degrees, the remaining Shingoe GK5, 7921, Owl NT-H2, Kyushu Wind God EX750, Wind Chaser PH-NDC, Overclocking Three GT-3, Cool Extreme CF14, Violent bear KE temperatures are in the range of 40 to 42, while ARCTIC MX-4, Honeywell PTM7950-S, Dow Corning TC-5888, Kingpin Cooling KPx, and high conductivity GD007 are in the range of 42 to 44.
We also used the CPU to actually verify our test data, using the power locked at 170W Core i7-12700K, the radiator is the Owl's D15, but only took three silicone greases to verify it, the test results and our test bench measured the temperature difference is close, basically confirmed that the test bench measured data is reliable.
If you're using the LGA 115X platform, the impact on grease performance should be smaller because the CPU surface area is much smaller.
summary
Finally, we combine the temperature difference of the test and the average price per gram of these silicone greases, the average price per gram here is calculated according to the capacity of the cheapest average price, and the temperature test results and the thermal conductivity given by some silicone greases are very different, so the thermal conductivity of some silicone greases should have a false standard phenomenon, which is of little significance for the reference of the purchase of silicone greases.
The pursuit of performance is definitely to see our test results within 40 degrees of the first echelon of products, Yajun W15II and Limin's TFX performance is the best, but the price of Limin TFX is very high, the average price of Yajun W15II is very low, our evaluation room is also used daily this silicone grease, but its biggest problem is that the viscosity is too high, very difficult to paint, TF7 and their gap is very small, so there is no need to add so much money on TFX, and its viscosity is the lowest of the three, it is easier to paint.
Shingoe 7921 so many years of classic product performance is still as good as ever, in the first echelon of products its average price per gram is also the lowest, its biggest problem is that Shingoe's silicone grease is basically store resale, you don't know if what you buy is genuine.
Kyushu Fengshen EX750 also performed well, the average price per gram was similar to W15II, and its viscosity was not high, and the application was relatively simple. Although the official NT-H2 of the owl does not indicate the thermal conductivity, the performance is really good, and the viscosity is not high and it is very good to apply, in addition to being expensive.
Finally, let's talk about the high conductivity GD007, although its performance is different from the first echelon of products, but the temperature difference of 4 degrees is actually acceptable, the most important thing is that it is quite cheap, the average price per gram is only 7 cents 7, the cost performance is quite high, ignoring the two cans of green plum, it is the lowest average price of silicone grease we tested, and some netizens call it "domestic light" is not unreasonable.
As for whether toothpaste can be used as silicone grease, its thermal conductivity is actually similar to cheap silicone grease, and there is no silicone grease temporary top gear on hand for a while, but the chemical stability of toothpaste is far less than that of silicone grease, and it will gradually dry into calcium carbonate and other substances over time, thermal conductivity will be greatly reduced, and it may also be corrosive, and it is not advisable to use toothpaste as silicone grease for a long time.
Well, this is the whole content of the first phase of this silicone grease cross-evaluation, this time mainly to show the thermal conductivity of these silicone greases, I believe that after reading it will be helpful to everyone to buy silicone grease, follow-up we will also investigate the characteristics of silicone grease, evaporation and aging, it is time to let the oven appear again, please pay attention to the second phase of our silicone grease cross-evaluation.