So why doesn’t everyone use it?
There is a certain amount of fear in the community of Indigo Xtreme. I’ve heard plenty of people state that they were scared of using it despite being prolific water coolers. I’ve also heard people complain about the price. While it is more expensive than most thermal interface materials it’s not that expensive when compared to a CPU or a waterblock.
The “fear” really comes from the “reflow” procedure. Unlike most TIMs which are simply deposited on the top of the CPU and spread either by the block or by hand, Indigo Xtreme needs to be melted. It’s melted using the heat from the CPU and the high temperatures endured during the short procedure are usually the cause of the “fear”. Reflow usually requires the CPU to “throttle” at it’s maximum temperature. Nearly all CPUs have built in thermal protection that lowers the cpu clock cycle (and thus power) when it hit’s the temperature limiter. During reflow the CPU is set to stock voltages and frequencies and so the chip is extremely unlikely to be damaged because of a few minutes at high temperatures. I have made a video that will run through the reflow procedure down below.
Follow the instructions!
The procedure is more difficult to follow than most regular TIMs because of the reflow and a poor result is usually because of
– a non horizontal motherboard (TIM leaks out the side)
– the TIM was cooled too rapidly resulting in a multiphase alloy rather than a single phase
– panic because reflow is unexpectedly slow
– not using speed fan to plot the temperatures to accurately see when reflow starts and stops
Make sure to read the instructions carefully, watch my video and check on the Indigo Xtreme website in case changes have been made to the instructions!
In addition I’ve also compiled a table that shows how much mounting pressure gave a successful mount for me on the waterblocks I reviewed in combination with a 3930K on a Rampage IV Extreme motherboard (Lottes socket):
How to Video
By the thermal profile the metal is probably Cerrosafe
Hello John, nice to meet you I about to start up my system and I want to use the Indigo Extreme, and after watching your video I’m with some doubts about the reflow method to my rig, I have a full water cooled system with 2 VGAs ( radeon R9 280x) , CPU ( Delided 477k with CLU ), MotherBoard (Maximus VI Extreme) and aquaero 6xt to be cooled by the Water Cooling system so my doubt if I startup my system with the pump off this will not cause some problem to the components by overheating them ? and another doubt my case its a Cosmos II so it works vertically for the first turn on to reflow the Indigo Extreme it needs to be horizontally?
I hope you can help me, thanks and congrats for the very nice site you have.
[…] 30 minutes) video dedicated to how to make it work, also showing ~3 degree difference to MX-4 – Indigo Extreme Review & Guide – ExtremeRigs.net Serverely dissapointed with Indigo Xtreme TIM (read the principle, not about the specific heatsink […]
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