Heres a more in depth analysis of all the TIM methods with how much air bubbles per method on clear plates etc....
 
https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/articles/Thermal-Paste-Application-Techniques-170/  
 
http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/what-is-the-best-way-to-apply-thermal-grease-part-1/11/ 

Nice post. Definitely don't overthink it. In the 20 years I have been overclocking, pea size blob in the center and usually let the pressure/contact of the cooler spread it out always worked the best for me. On LN2, the tim application is very critical actually. Get it wrong with a bad uneven spread and you get cracks and huge temp deltas and poor Ln2 overclocking. Sometimes I will flatten it out with grease spoon to a small centered square prior to mounting the pot and sometimes I will just cover the whole IHS with thin layer but that's wasteful and unnecessary IMO.

While the pea size blob and line method cover the important heat generating areas, the ideal application would have an even spread across the entire surface... I've been using the spread method for years to achieve this...  You just have to make sure it's thin, and you don't just drop the heat sink straight down to capture the air bubbles... You set it slowly down at an angle and slowly press it on so any air is removed (Hope that makes sense).. And then once it's seated before tightening, you twist it a little bit back and forth to make sure you got a good spread....   This has absolutely been the best method for me... Then you know you have the perfect amount...  Each to their own I guess...  Every single time I've seem someone trying to disprove the spread method, they aren't doing it correctly so of course it isn't going to be as good.....

Problem is some thick pastes simply don't want to spread at all (Thermaright TFX I'm looking at you), and will stick to the applicator instead of the IHS.  For those, the diagonal intersecting X pattern from corner to corner is best so you don't waste paste that won't spread.  The 5 dots method is interesting also, may give identical results to the X method, possibly with a bit less paste used.

CraptacularOne

neat stuff, ive always just done a manual spread.  Really the difference between pea sized and manual if any is so small when it comes to actual temperatures it doesnt make a difference.

Thanks for all the work. I like to see informative post about things like this.

Those tests are amazing. I wish I'd thought of it. You just have to trust in the pea though.

the more important thing is to make sure that you have coverage over the actual chips under the ihs.