Broken Pin on FX

[Jah_Warrior]

Today I decided to re-apply the thermal paste on my FX-55, I'd been using an XP-120 heatsink with Arctic Silver Ceramique. Thing is, as I carefully unclipped the heatsink the pressure of the clips tipped the XP-120 with the chip firmly stuck to the bottom of the heatsink. This bent a number of pins and one of them actually broke off. according to the diagram on the AMD spec sheet (Link) I've broken the E 1 pin on page 26 which is one of the VLDT_A pins.

My question is this:- Do you think a repair is a realistic possibility being as it's at the edge of the chip? I do have a friend who works in micro electronics and may be able to solder a new pin on there.

Any advice appreciated.

[cupra]

if the broken pin is in the first row of the cpu you can solder it gentle baek, but if the broken pin is not on the first row , hell i dont think that you can fix it up

[Scout255]

conductive epoxy may be a good way to go. Good luck man, that really sucks.

[Alec]

maybe you could put the severed pin into its correct hole in the socket and put the chip back into the socket; hoping that the pin makes contact... if not thats some pretty bad luck!
Another thing you might wanna try is ask a local jeweler if he/she could possibly re-attatch the pin for you.

good luck man!
Alec

[Jah_Warrior]

Thanks fellas for the kind words.

I called my little brother and he says he has a worker at his place that can solder under the microscope who may be able to do something with the chip. If I remember rightly its the same girl that re-soldered a resistor I knocked off my old GF4 a few years ago and she did an immaculate job.

The only problem is that I can not find the old broken pin so I'll have to fabricate a new pin to put in there. Would a single strand of relatively heavy gauge copper do the trick? ie would it be strong enough?

One things for sure I won't be using that XP-120 anymore, I think I'll just have to find an SLK-948 or something... can't go wrong with bolt on heatsinks.

[saaya]

welcome to XtremeSystems

you might also ask a jewelery shop, they have all the tools and expirience to solder even smaller parts and they can solder it with an silver alloy wich is more conductive and stronger than normal solder i think

good luck man!

[frostedflakes]

I have heard of people doing what Alec suggested with great success. Even if you don't have the pin, you could stick a piece of copper wire in there and it should work just as well. Kind of ghetto, but effective for those without the means to have broken pins repaired.

And FYI, the clip-on/bolt-on issue has absolutely nothing to do with it. The fact is that with the IHS and a large-base heatsink, suction is created. I've especially noticed this with Arctic Silver Ceramique. Your best bet would be to find a paste that doesn't have this effect. With my dual P4 Xeon setup, the OEM heatsinks came with a paste that didn't create any suction at all. I believe I remember reading that it's from Shin-Estu, but I don't know the specific model.

Best of luck.

[Jah_Warrior]

Thanks for the welcome Saaya,

Got my chip back today, I had a new pin soldered on and it seems like a pretty much perfect job! I cant really show any pics, my camera's resolution is far too low to get a clear shot. Anyway I dont wanna chance it with the XP120 any more so ordered a Zalman 7700 and some more Shin-etsu to replace the XP120/ceramique. Hopefully it won't impact my temps too drastically.

Thanks for the input guys!

[drftkng]

Glad you were able to get it fixed. Just curious what route did you take to fix it. Did you get a jewler to do it, or did your friend at work? Also what did they use to make a new pin?

[Jah_Warrior]

I had my brother's friend solder it at work under the microscope. I pulled a pin from an old chip to replace the one on the FX. The pin was slightly heavier gauge but still slots neatly into the holes of the socket... luckily

[eva2000]

wow nice stuff saving the cpu

[drftkng]

I had my brother's friend solder it at work under the microscope. I pulled a pin from an old chip to replace the one on the FX. The pin was slightly heavier gauge but still slots neatly into the holes of the socket... luckily

Good idea on using a pin from an older CPU.

[ozzimark]

Anyway I dont wanna chance it with the XP120 any more so ordered a Zalman 7700 and some more Shin-etsu to replace the XP120/ceramique. Hopefully it won't impact my temps too drastically.

good luck with that 7700, it's really heavy though

and what will become of your xp-120? (send it to me?)