A coworker is building a PC for his girlfriend and offered to buy my old MSI Armor GTX 1070 Ti. The card still works, and I plan to open it up for a basic cleaning after running a few benchmarks. Since it has been used for about six years and stored for another two, should I replace the thermal paste while I have it apart, or is it better to leave it alone if the temperatures look normal?
3 Answers
Be careful with the thermal pads. They can tear or crumble when the heatsink comes off, and replacing all the different thicknesses can cost more than expected. If you do repaste it, measure or photograph the pad locations first and have suitable replacements ready.
The MSI Armor cooler is not especially strong, so replacing the paste is reasonable on this model. It is fairly straightforward to take apart, and fresh paste could help keep temperatures and fan noise under control, especially if the benchmarks show it running hot.
If the temperatures and fan behavior are normal, there is no urgent reason to repaste it. Opening a working card always carries a small risk, so cleaning the fans and heatsink without disassembling the cooler may be enough.
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