I have bought two 9305-24is and...

[Falloutboy]

I was measuring up to put a bigger heat sink on the card which I was going to have custom made but I noticed that the thermal pad which I would expect to be a bit flexible and rubbery is very dry and chalky almost like it has expired with age...

Can this happen?

Should I replace it specifically with a pad of the same type or will TIM like Arctic Silver 5 suffice, regardless of this can anyone tell me what the appropriate pad make and model is?

 

[nexox]

Old thermal pads do often wear out, I like to replace them with more pads because it's hard to get that type of heatsink installed without tilting it and a pad won't squish out. I would just grab a generic pad off amazon or wherever that's about 1mm thick and at least 6 W/mK, cut it to size with scissors.

 

[nabsltd]

These seem to be fairly decent...I haven't found them too bad to work with, but who knows if the thermal rating is accurate. But, they are cheap:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BQJGY7H4

 

[nexox]

I have used Gelid several times: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B08PL2H3Z6

Also don't know if the specs are accurate but it keeps my Xeons at least as cool as the stuff that comes on Supermicro heatsinks.