No it will not make a 20C difference.
There’s something else here that’s messing with your temperatures.
There is one thing, the first time I replaced it, I also loosend the fan and took it out to inspect it, to hear if it clicked or anything like that. Then I reattached it and when I booted the computer, the fan made a weird noise. It kinda…“lagged”, like it bumped into something. But then after a minute it sounded like normal again. It seems to spin just fine now though.
This guy here seems to have had the exact same problem as I: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/19796-awful-temps-after-thermal-paste-replacement/
yea that’s definitely gray, still as i read more about it look like ‘ok’ paste. Though i wouldn’t want it on my GPU.
i saw this img, and it looked white…
ontopic, make a picture of your cooling (did you clean it off?) and core chip. – i want to see how paste spread itself out.
white balance making it look grey
Of course I have cleaned it each time I’d apply new compound.
This is with (to) much compound put in an X: Imgur: The magic of the Internet
This is after I spread it out with the tip of the syringe: Imgur: The magic of the Internet
Dammit, I can’t afford a new card now but I can’t stand this fan noise. 
Right now I’m testing with a very thin layer of compound, gives me about 67 in idle.
damn i duno,
looks ok,
maybe sand the headsink side a little? make it smooth as possible
Yes I could, but it would still just give 1-2 degrees tops. 
And sure I could buy the MX 4 tomorrow, it should still not make that a big difference.
Maybe I’ve got a faulty batch of compound?
Arctic MX-2 has shit thermal conductivity. 5.6W/(mK), you can get silicon polymer silpads with twice that thermal conductivity for about 60 dollars in a sheet. 150mm x 150mm with a 0.5mm, 1mm, 1.5mm, or 2mm thickness. Then cut the size you need. If you want a cheap paste that will work better than that crap ceramic junk Arctic MX-2, get a diamond dust based paste. Most of them are up around 8-9W/(mK) thermal conductivity.
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my fav is fujipoly, the extreme pads are up to 17w/mk
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Those are somewhat prohibitively expensive to most people though, although they are great for VRM components.
fujipoly has nice thermal properties but fell like rubber and cant be squashed , the pinky one, others with lesser conductivity are still great. Here are some test on some pastes
tables are for day one. day 3 and day 7. according to this mx -2 should drop temps by few degrees after a week. Test were done 2.5 years ago so should be valid unless manufacturer changed formula .
Tom’s thermal paste test Results: Air-Cooled GPU; Medium Mounting Pressure - Thermal Paste Comparison, Part Two: 39 Products Get Tested | Tom's Hardware
MX-2 is fine.
Did you replace the thermal pads as well?
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I would try a better thermal compound, in my experience direct die situations like a GPU can accentuate the lesser performance of lower quality compounds like MX-2. Combine that with some mounting and compound application issues + lack of burn in time ( although you could argue that its effect would be minimal) and i would say that would account for most of the temp difference
I.was also going to say wait for the bedding in. It usually drops a fee more degrees.
I take anything I read from Tom’s with a huge grain of salt. Those graphs make it look like they are advertising Coolabratory products, the scaling on the graphs makes no fucking sense other than to catch your eye and make you say, “Yeah, that one’s the best!”, even though it is only 2-3*C colder than the next best thing.
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when replacing the thermal compound on a gpu i have found that using a single drop on the middle of the core works best if you can replace the cooler with out having it slide around. if the cooler slides around then it is best to put a thin layer using a single drop as a starting point then using a credit card spread it out. repeat the process on the cooler as well and you should be good to go.
Okay, so according to the most replies here, I should try another(better) paste. As I want to fix this before the weekend, I’l have to go to the store and buy some. They don’t have many compounds to choose from, just these: http://www.inet.se/kategori/144/kylpasta
And acording the test at tomshardware, I will probably go with Arctic Silver 5 or MX4.
MX 4 should have 8.5 W/(m*K), so I think I will try that.
So I bought some MX4 at the local store and went home. I took the card apart and removed the old paste and then I cleaned both the card and the cooler with my compressor. Then I lubed the fan and put on some MX4 in a line.
Still got the same temps as before.
I did a little test; I set the fan speed to 100%, this got the temp down to about 50 degrees, Then I launched furmark and almost instantly temps went up to 90 degrees.
So it could still be something wrong with the heat transfer,
Somebody want a 6950?
no thanks, if u want i can sell you 290x gigabyte for $200
other way around it,
- buy sand paper (one with small grains - for glass etc) sand it down.
- get thermal camera / you can get cheap ones – there’s possibility you damaged thermal sensor on your gpu by screwing it too hard.