alt Hacker NewsThis video seems to be about LM on untreated copper (which I thought wasn't really advised).
Now, I personally have had two builds with LM. One with LM as the material for a CPU re-lid, and another for a direct-die application. Neither touched aluminum or untreated copper.
The re-lidded CPU is still going strong, no issues. But with the direct die application, I found the performance to significantly degrade after two years. Apparently there's a pump-out effect.
I ended up switching to PTM. Same temps as LM, but zero degradation so far.
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I never really understood why you would risk using liquid metal versus something like Honeywell's PTM with the effect size in temperature difference indistinguishable from statistical noise. The only drawback I've seen for the PTMs is that the paste is extremely sticky to the point that I've ripped pins off an old 3600 when I tried to remount the cooler without warming it up first.
> LM on untreated copper (which I thought wasn't really advised).
I think the supposed issue is nickel (the most common waterblock coating) has a much lower thermal conductivity so you might lose a degree or two under load vs a bare copper block.
Which kind of makes sense: people who know what they're doing use liquid metal to squeeze out that last couple degrees vs PTM/graphene so going bare copper and dealing the the buildup problems maybe makes sense for them too.
He mentions in this video that liquid metal really should just be for the extreme overclockers who don't mind changing it out and resurfacing their waterblocks regularly which is good advice. The fact liquid metal is even semi-mainstream and comes standard on any consumer hardware is kind of stupid.