Introduction
We all know GeIL as a popular memory modules (RAM) manufacturer. GeIL sent us a small amount of their copper thermal compound. This tiny niche market is being dominated by Arctic Silver. Many large manufacturers fail to create high quality thermal compounds that can deal with the latest Arctic Silver products. Today, we are putting the GeIL copper thermal compound face to face against one of the best thermal compound solutions in the market. You’re right; it’s the Arctic Silver 5. We are going to find out about it pretty soon.

Features/Specifications
* Copper and Silver based thermal compound
* 1 grams tube
* 7.5W/m-k Thermal conductivity
* 0.06 C-in2/W Thermal Resistance
* 5% Silver and 5% Copper included

Technical Details from GeIL’s website
As heat generated from the CPU is transferred across a thermal compound onto a metal heat sink, it creates a "thermal current" flowing from the CPU to the heat sink and gets dissipated by the cooling fan. This thermal current indicates how fast the heat sink is receiving the thermal energy and is limited to the slowest thermal conductive material. When this thermal current is ultimately limited by the copper heat sink, using a copper thermal compound will optimize the heat flow.

Theoretically, the best result would be received by the best conductive compound. But when heat is transferred between different materials, this change of material creates a "thermal resistance" during heat transfer that hinders the heat flow (or slows down thermal current). This is the reason why a copper "coated" heat sink or an "insert" on an aluminum heat sinks base doesnt work as well as an all-copper heat sink. (Aluminum dissipates heat better than copper. In theory, a copper coated aluminum heat sink should be able to absorb heat just as fast as an all-copper heat sink and at the same time, dissipates faster. Thus it’s creating a faster thermal current. But in real life, after many tries by different well-known manufactures, the all-copper material proves to be the best cooling solution.) By using this patented copper thermal compound, thermal conductivity is optimized between the CPU and copper heat sink.

For those who are looking to replace their heat sinks with a copper coated or copper inserted heat sink, this compound will simply produce the same effect, making a difference of up to 5 degrees when used on traditional heat sinks.