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Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut vs. Kryonaut Extreme Review – Final showdown of two equal pastes, urban legends and clever marketing

4. October 2024 06:00

Today I have to do it once and I hope Thermal Grizzly will forgive me (well, we’ve already talked about it). But after being asked over and over again how the normal Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut differs from the Kryonaut Extreme and some readers and colleagues even swearing me stone and bone that the Extreme is so much better because the price is also an indicator, I have to write something about it and make it clear. Because perceiving something subjectively (of course also via the price and social media legends) and being able to compare something exactly in the laboratory are still two different things. It’s just stupid when both have the same shoe size and the same manufacturer on the label. But I don’t want to spoil everything, I just knew how it would turn out before the test. But today it’s not about subjective feelings, but about real facts.

Speaking of size: Thermal Grizzly has done a really clever job of preventing direct price comparisons to a certain extent, as there are no uniform and identical container sizes for the two pastes, so you can also make a direct price comparison per gram. The larger the container, the cheaper the price per gram. But there are also reasons why the Extreme is slightly more expensive than the “normal” Kryonaut, but this has nothing to do with the actual performance. Of course, I spoke to Roman Hartung about this several times and in the end we agreed that the price difference (in addition to clever marketing and great packaging) is actually purely technical. Whether both prices are justified is ultimately a matter for everyone to decide for themselves, it’s not for me to judge.

Measuring the bulk thermal conductivity

The fact is that both pastes are the same and yet different. And that has nothing to do with the color, which is just a gimmick anyway. But today’s test is a good example of how a good matrix, i.e. the binder used and the manufacturing process, can determine the actual performance of the pastes. No one has ever been able to prove this so precisely in this form, so in a way it is also a kind of premiere.

Let us first compare the two measurement protocols. We can see that the values determined for the so-called bulk thermal conductivity in W/m-K, i.e. that of the pure paste without the contact resistances to the surrounding surfaces such as the die or IHS and the radiator base, are approximately the same at 3.2 W/m-K, if we round to the first decimal place. The normal user would now conclude that the pastes would also perform approximately the same, as they also contain identical heat-conducting particles in almost the same quantity. So much for the theory with a definite YES.

The real difference lies in the effective thermal resistance and also the effective thermal conductivity, as I measure it, and of course the heat flow in practice from A to B across all layers and bodies. This comes much closer to reality and shows differences that you would otherwise not see. The best example of this is the so-called interface resistance, i.e. the heat transfer resistance at the contact surfaces. However, I won’t repeat this again now, as there are the measurement basics linked below. But we can already see that the Kryonaut Extreme has a slightly lower value here. What does it do and mean? We’ll see later…

Now let’s move on briefly to the test setup, which I will no longer include as text and images in the articles in future, but for which I have written special articles on the basics, including a presentation of the equipment and the measurement methods, to save me and you a little redundancy. If you would like to read up or refresh your knowledge, please use the following links to the two measurement setups for ASTM D5470-17 with the TIMA5 nanotest and LIBS including microscopy with the Keyence VX-7100 and EA-300:

Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut Extreme Wärmeleitpaste, 2g (TG-KE-002-R)

	Lagernd, Lieferung 1-2 WerktageStand: 05.10.24 01:16	18,89 €*Stand: 05.10.24 01:22
	Alsdorf: bei Vorbestellung in ca. 24h - 48h lagerndVersandlager: lagerndStand: 04.10.24 22:45	18,90 €*Stand: 04.10.24 23:46
	lagernd: 10+	19,89 €*Stand: 05.10.24 01:21