Testing

Methodology

We’ll be using both the ZEROtherm Nirvana NV120 Premium heatsink and the AMD stock HSF. The reasoning behind this is that we discovered that the clip system on the ZEROtherm cooler would prevent one side of the interface pad from making perfect contact with the core, reducing the effectiveness of the paste. The stock cooler however always makes perfect contact with the core although its cooling ability is lower than the Nirvana. The Nirvana NV120 was run without the fan speed limiter meaning it was running at full throttle hence the disparity between the earlier results for that cooler.

The temperatures are taken from the built in diode on the AM2 6000+ Dual Core processor. Idle results are recorded from letting the computer idle for 30 minutes directly after cold boot and taking the average temperature. Load results are recorded by running OCCT for 30 minutes and taking the average temperature.

Ambient temperature is 19C.

Results

The results are very close, close enough that it could have been reading error etc. causing the temperature to change by a small fraction. As a result, each test was repeated three times, which means the coolers were cleaned and the CPU IHS each time for a reapplication to remove the chance that a single application of paste could sway the results. After cleaning 18 times, and using nearly all of our kitchen roll in the process, we got these results.

When the ZEROtherm cooler was in use, the Tuniq TX-2 is a clear 3 degrees ahead of the Artic Silver 5 result. The Arctic Silver 5 wasn’t allowed it usual drying time to make sure that the tests were fair and accurate (each paste allowed the same standing time, and applied in the same way). Allowing the Arctic Silver 5 to set resulted in inconsistent results (i.e. non-repeatable) and the maximum difference was around 1-2 degrees. The Noctua heatpaste is only a degree behind the pace that the Tuniq compound sets.

When the AMD stock cooler was strapped on, the Tuniq TX-2 paste manages to keep up with the temperature that Arctic Silver 5 sets, although not quite as good as the Noctua compound.

As with our Noctua NT-H1 review, these results are quite inconclusive as to which is the greatest product to smear on your CPU, but both the Noctua NT-H1 and Tuniq TX-2 seem to pull ahead when the cooler on top is more capable at removing core heat. If you are running a quad core overclocked chip, you are probably going to see the differences rise between the pastes with these two products pulling further ahead of the old dog Arctic Silver.

We ran another test with the unusually hot P4 Northwood 3.2Ghz overclocked to 3.5Ghz @ 1.7 Vcore, and the results were even stranger still, with the Tuniq MX-2 managing to beat the others by one degree at load, while all three received the same result for idle temperatures.

As a side point, this paste was the easiest to clear off your core once finished. While doing the testing this was a major plus for me as the experience of cleaning a CPU and heatsink 18 times begins to wear a little thin. For most however this won’t play a part in the purchase as cleaning a heatsink/CPU is a rare occurrence unless you are changing cooler every week.