Does thermal paste (still in tube) go bad? Quick response appreciated!

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Silvertongue19

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Jul 18, 2013
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Hello everyone,

Installing my new cpu tonight and was just wondering if my thermal paste is still "good". I've had a tube of artic silver just sitting in the cabinet for about 3-4 years now. Is it still perfectly fine or would I be better off purchasing a new tube as I know it's cheap?

Thanks for your help!
 
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JackNaylorPE
Artic Silver takes about 200 hours of thermal cycling to cure (or about a year of normal usage). It should be OK if unopened but I'd grab a tube of Shin Etsu anyway....just so I could get my OC's in place w/o waiting for curing to finish
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Calculatron

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If the thermal compound has separated at all (there's a watery substance that comes out, along with the usual grey paste) or, if I remember right, it has a strange smell, then it is probably best to invest in some new thermal compound.

Otherwise, you're probably good. A lot of people have a rule of thumb of three years, but there are plenty of thermal compounds that will last over five, as long as it is properly stored.

Arctic Silver 5 is an oldy but goody. Cure time aside, it is also capacitive, so don't spill any of it onto any circuitry. Many people consider it obsolete, but it still gives good results.
 
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shagbark

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Calculatron said:
A lot of people have a rule of thumb of three years, but there are plenty of thermal compounds that will last over five, as long as it is properly stored.

Arctic Silver 5 is an oldy but goody. Cure time aside, it is also capacitive, so don't spill any of it onto any circuitry. Many people consider it obsolete, but it still gives good results.
Click to expand...
I have a tube of Arctic Silver 5 that I think is 15 years old. Should I throw it out?
 
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Jason H.

Jason H.

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shagbark said:
I have a tube of Arctic Silver 5 that I think is 15 years old. Should I throw it out?
Click to expand...

thermal paste is cheap. A good 10-15$ tube will last you the lifetime of the pc, depending how often you remove the heatsink for cleaning (I do mine about every 2 months because Im a smoker) So in my case a tube lasts me about 1 year. Which is probably about 1/5 of the life of the PC.

Most people only replace the paste about once every year or 2.

So yea throw that out and buy some new paste, because even if its not bad, which I doubt it is as paste only really gets bad under heat, the new paste they make now a days is a bit better.
 
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