Thermal GrizzlyThermal Grizzly - PhaseSheet PTM (50x40mm)- High Performance Thermal pad with Phase Change Material | Durable, not electrically Conductive | for CPU, GPU & Electronics Cooling

If you're reading through reviews on this stuff, chances are you're looking to find out how it differs from standard thermal paste, and whether it's worth your time. Hopefully I can help you with that.Thermal Grizzly's Phase Change pads have many advantages over paste. Since I like to start reviews with the good, let's look at a few.Thermal paste dries out, and when it dries it loses its ability to conduct heat. It's a good practice to repaste every couple of years because of this. If you're the type of computer user who upgrades often, this probably won't apply to you since you're either getting rid of your old system before that paste dries, or you're constantly re-applying it anyway as you change cooling solutions or upgrade CPUs. On the other hand, if you like to run your systems as long as possible, these pads are for you--they DON'T dry out. Pretty nice stuff if you're going to be using them in a server or a system that won't see much in the way of regular maintenance.These pads also don't suffer from "pump out." Since your CPU and heat sink are usually made of different materials, they expand and contract at different rates. Over time, more and more paste gets pushed out until you've got areas with poor coverage. Phase change pads are solid at room temperature, and they turn into a sort of paste under high heat: your pads are expanding and contracting right along with your heatsink and CPU rather than being pushed out.I've repaired enough computers in my time to know that most of you don't apply thermal paste properly to begin with. Most folks fall into the "more is better" mindset and make a proper mess, like they're making a peanut butter sandwich. Others use far too little and have a lot of area uncovered. These pads take all the guesswork out of that by completely covering the die with a uniform layer.Also, if you're careful while removing your heat sink, you might be able to reuse the pad. It's solid at room temperature, remember, and it never dries out.If all that sounds good to you, here's how you use it.First, store the pad in the refrigerator until you're ready for it. It's solid enough at room temperature, but it'll rip less easily if it's cold. While the pad is chilling, remove your heatsink and clean off all that old paste. (Told you you use too much of it.) 99% rubbing alcohol works great for this. Take your pad out of the fridge, and line it up to your CPU surface. Use a Sharpie marker to mark off the length and width, then cut the pad to size.Now for the fun part: peel one side of plastic off the pad. Lay the exposed pad on your CPU, then press it down. Use your fingers to roll any air bubbles out of it. Then CAREFULLY... SLOWLY... peel the top plastic off. The pad is going to want to stick to the plastic more than it's going to want to stick to your CPU, so be patient with this. Once done, carefully install your heatsink (try not to slide it around, which might wrinkle the pad).Time to test temps, right? Well, no... not exactly. The pad needs a few hot/cold cycles in order to work its way into all the microscopic nooks and crannies. The general recommendation is to run a stress test for ten minutes, then power down the system to let things completely cool. Ten cycles like this is what most people recommend, but I've found four or five is enough. This is where Youtube reviewers tend to mess up, by the way: they'll slap on a pad, immediately run a stress test, then conclude the pads aren't as good as paste. Nothing could be further from the truth. Once cycled, you very likely will be getting lower temps than you would have gotten with tried-and-true paste.And you'll never have to apply it to that system again. That's my way of addressing the main disadvantage of the pads, which is that you could buy a tube of paste for what you're paying here. On the other hand, you're going to be applying that paste over and over again--and probably using too much of it anyway. (Don't worry, that's the last time I'll berate you for this.)The other downside is how meticulous you have to be about applying it. Just slow down and take your time. If the pad does rip, do your best to fix it and you should be fine.Highly recommended!

This stuff works great, I bought this for my laptop because the Arctic MX-6 paste I have been using rapidly degrades in performance. The initial performance is amazing, but it takes only about a month for it to cool like some old dried out paste that was five years old or something. This product keeps my laptop almost as cool while gaming, but is expected to maintain that performance for a very long time. I had no issues at all installing it for the first time, I suggest reading and following the instructions that are provided for best results. The only thing I wish I had done differently was to have a micrometer to measure the CPU and GPU die size instead of just eyeballing it, and to have a sharper set of scissors to cut the pad down.

Works as advertised. Just follow the directions as indicated and you should have no issues applying it on the 1st try to your CPU. Cut it to match your CPU size and don't pull the 2nd film from the Red tab. Remove 2nd film from a section you made a cut from that extrudes slightly from the CPU border. Don't use your fingers to apply it. Use a plastic flat item to move it carefully and flatten any bubbles. It made a huge difference on my CPU Temps (Ryzen 7 5800X). With thermal paste, at times and during heavy loads my CPU would reach 90C. With This product, never again it goes that high and in loads stays around 80C. This is just 2nd day after running my PC. It should improve more as it settles and molds to my CPU and Cooler. Cooler: Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 EVO CPU Cooler,7×6mm Heat Pipes CPU Air Cooler,Dual PWM Fan Computer Cooling,2150RPM Speed. Roman knocked this one out the park. Great product! Recommended.

They seem to work well. Easy to use when you put it in the freezer for a bit. Just make sure you take off the plastic! It takes a few days to break in but you should see a 5-10 degree difference in temperatures. I did atleast.

I wanted to try out pads because they sound like a great idea. Just put the pad over the CPU and the heatsink on top - none of the messiness with paste. Unfortunately, these don't really feel anything that a normal person might call a "pad". Instead, they're more like a congealed square of paste, and they tear as easily as you might imagine. I read and followed the instructions and still tore the pad while trying to remove the plastic cover attached to it.It's possible other thermal pads are a lot closer to what I was envisioning, but not these ones.