Considering the cost of good thermal paste and the tediousness of properly removing/re-applying it, I wanted to get this right the first time when I build my new server. The heat sink I used came with thermal paste pre-applied, but since the motherboard was dead-on-arrival, I needed to re-apply it when putting the CPU in the replacement motherboard.

Searching the internet led to this test of thermal paste application methods by Puget Systems. Their conclusion was that a simple X-shaped application to the CPU gives the best performance (fewest air-bubbles, lowest temperature). This turns out to be very similar to Cisco’s recommendation for thermal paste.