MANUFACTURER: Coollaboratory
SUPPLIER: The Mad Penguin (or order via maxxdistri)
Welcome to my review of Coollaboratory's Liquid Metal Pad. This TIM (Thermal Interface Material) is the successor to Liquid Metal Pro, by the same manufacturer. Instead of applying a liquid directly onto your CPU/GPU you can now place a thin sheet of 'dried' metal between the processor and cooler and, hey presto, great contact with minimal fuss. Or is it?
In the package
My supplied product consisted of the basic plastic packaging with one Liquid Metal Pad and a manual. Note that this is simply a review set: there are other packs available containing 3 LMPs, an isopropyl alcohol packet and a scrubbing pad. The pad itself is a wafer-thin sheet of metal, similar to tinfoil, taped securely to the front of the packaging.
Before we go any further, I have to comment on the manual. Quite simply, it's rubbish. It reads like a partially brain-damaged chimpanzee did the translation from the original German into English, and thus a lot of the instructions are not exactly clear. I highly recommend reading around on the 'net a bit before installing the LMP, but I'll explain my setup procedure as best I can.
The pad measures 30mm x 30mm, the exact size for most mainstream AMD and Intel CPUs. You can also trim it down if you want to slap it on a GPU or a smaller CPU.
Test setup
The CPU I'm using to test the LMP is an Opteron 170, overclocked from 2GHz on both cores to 2.7GHz, voltage set at 1.45v. It's being cooled by a Vapochill Micro Silent cooler, with fan speeds set at an average 2000rpm. (Note that any further speed increase on the fan removes very little extra heat while still providing a fair noise increase, thus it will remain static for all the tests.) I'm also using the stock AMD-supplied thermal grease for comparison.
I'm using Prime95 as well as Toast to jack up the CPU temps, and I'll be monitoring using Core Temp and Everest to keep an eye on both cores as they change. I'll also be doing a run through Crysis to provide some real-world practicality to the tests. Idle temps have also been compared in BIOS to ensure they're accurate.
Right, on to the product!
Installation
This part was really easy. All you need to do is remove any old thermal grease and slap the LMP directly on top of the processor. Then, place the cooler on top, wire it up and you're good to go.
Ah, but wait: the pad is still in solid form. After consulting the manual, I discovered that a temperature of 58 degrees is needed for the pad to melt. WTF! It's a good thing I checked too as that part isn't even mentioned in the 'Installation' section. Whew.
So, I booted into BIOS first to make sure nothing was catching fire yet. Idle temp was still safe so I jacked up the voltage a bit to speed the melting process and proceeded into Windows. Prime95 was run on both cores until the temp hit 63 degrees (I like to be thorough), and was left for a few minutes to ensure proper melting. The machine was then shut down and left to chill for a couple hours.
Upon reboot I set the voltage back to normal. I then measured idle temps, then ran Prime95 (both cores for 30 minutes) and Crysis (3 benchmarking runs on max detail), recording the results for each. I averaged the temperatures between both cores as they're always within a degree or two of one another (i.e. if one core read 43 and the other 45, the average is 44) and recorded all the results. Also note that case temp was maintained at around 26 degrees for all tests.
So how did the Liquid Metal Pad perform? Here are the final temps:
As you can see, temperatures were lower all across the board. Prime95 temps were especially high with the old paste, but bear in mind it's designed to create maximum heat so shouldn't really be taken into too much consideration for your average rig.
Conclusion
Overall I'd be happy to recommend the Coollaboratory Liquid Metal Pad as an effective cooling solution. The fact that you have to run it so hot to get it to melt is a slight disadvantage though, and I can see it being a problem for watercooling users. However, the manufacturer does mention that a heat gun or hairdryer can also be used if the pad doesn't melt properly under normal circumstances (though I wouldn't be too crazy about that option).
The only other disadvantage is that each pad can only be used once: once it's on, it's on, end of story. I'd also like to see how easy it is to clean too, but I plan on testing the temps a couple more times over the next week or two to see if the metal 'cures' at all and further affects the temps.
Summary:
PROS
* Easy to install
* Excellent cooling capability
* Sounds really cool when you tell your friends about it
CONS
* More costly than other high-end solutions e.g. Arctic Silver
* Not a good idea for watercooled setups
* Removal is said to be quite a pain
Overall I give the Coollaboratory Liquid Metal Pad a rating of 85%. Check back over the next week or so as I update the test results.
Sweet.
