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Does it matter if it is silver or white? I was planning on buying the silver stuff....

No, I'm quite sure it really doesn't matter. I remember when I was really into new hardware a few years ago reading a short review of thermal paste. They tested temperatures of a CPU using a large variety of different pastes, from the free sachet you get with a heatsink to the fanciest Arctic Silver. The conclusion was, they are all the same - no temperature difference. I wish I could still find the review.

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I liked the HSF that came with my Athlon 2100, which just had a peel-off backing over some thermal paste and I didn't have to do anything more.

Yeah it is convenient, but the same review mentioned that the 'pads' on the bottom of heatsinks are not always great. For one application they are fine, but if you take the heatsink off the CPU and put it back on you are better off carefully removing the pad, cleaning the surface and using a tiny bit of liquid paste.
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Hussein