Have you ever cracked a core?

[Ascario]

Wow, the poll seems to show some good results, most of the voters (myself included ) didn't have their core crushed! Well, not yet anyway.
Well i myself have been carefull from day one, thanks to reading THG at the time (over 3 years ago now). Placing the HSF on the cpu is the most delicate process of building a pc, so i always take my time no matter how many times i've done it before.

However, i believe much more people actually simply fried their cpu than crush it. I bet if you asked about burned cores in a poll, the results would be very different!

[LORD-eX-Bu]

Hey, I am about to buy a new Air cooling thang, eh, I am gonna buy a Thermaltake Volcano 7+ for P4 Socket 478. I have a 2.4 Ghz Pentium 4b Northwood, is that a good HSF for it? or is there any better?

[thcdru2k]

i heard the coolermaster are better

[PCarr78]

I almost did.

A friend came over with his comp parts so i could build for him.

Anyway, we got to the point of installing ths stock hsf on his Palomino 1800+

I had only limited experience with flip-chip cpus... My indestructible Pentium III. ( I am SO negligent when installing hsfs on it, surprised it hasn't cracked!)

Anyway, i had read all about horror stories, so i explained what we were gonna do. We figured a way to use both of us to install it. One tries to hold it properly and steady while the other tries to fit the clamp in. I was holding, he was pushing.

It was going well. The clamp was about 1/4 into the socket nub when suddenly:

SNAP!

The screwdriver slid right off and the clip snapped into place. Our hearts sank. We had no idea whether we had killed the cpu or not. anyway, we kept putting stuff together hoping the cpu was ok.

We shut the case, plgged in KB/mouse/monitor, and crossed our fingers


We slowly pushed the power button on the case, and then....



NOTHING!


NOOOOOOOOOOOO! We thought.

Then i saw the ATX cable sitting in my lap.

[LORD-eX-Bu]

lol, dang thats scary. Wow, eh, I am getting a pretty big HSF for my Pentium 4, but I have read from many places that the Pentium 4, even the new little ones, haha, are really tough. The surface area is larger than that of a Athlon and they look more solid. All I am gonna do is apply the arctic silver 3 to the cpu and to the copper part of the volcano and maybe have my dad help me or something and hopefully I'll be fine. I didn't pay $192 to break my core, haha.

[thcdru2k]

i came close twice i guess? i didn't know your suppose to use a screwdriver to clamp tight on the fans to cpu. so i used my hands to clamp on a volcano 3 to a amd tbird 1ghz and a volcano 7 to an athlon xp 1.4 ghz. i remember using quite a bit of force lol.

[LORD-eX-Bu]

eh, what is a cpu shim? I Know my volcano is coming with one, errr, only if I knew what it was, I probably do, but I just don't know it by that name, what is it?

[TheOneKEA]

It's a thin strip of metal that lays on top of the CPU and increases the resting surface area of the processor. Since AMD doesn't do heatspreaders or P4-style HSF hookups, having a shim is a good idea, especially for the Thoroughbred processors cuz of their small cores.

CPU Shim

[LORD-eX-Bu]

Hey thanks for your help, I also ordered some Arctic Silver III and I am thinking about ordering a Thermaltake Crystal Orb for my northbridge. I heard that it tends to get pretty freakin' hot for SIS 648. And all it comes with is a heatsink, so I will be taking that out and putting a crystal orb in. The only thing is, what do I do with that pretty green heatsink that says "AGP 8x" on it?

[koslov]

I've never personally cracked a core, but I've seen more than a few that have been cracked. Usually I end up troubleshooting these systems (after my noobish friends attempt to build them), working on them for sometimes hours before I finally yank the HSF off and discover a chipped corner or crack. Nowadays, it's one of the first things I do when I get a comp that doesn't POST.

I have 3 dead soldiers, all 1400 Tbirds, sitting right in front of me, from people who improperly installed them or used the wrong HSF. Can't tell you the number of times I've seen a TT Golden Orb crush a Socket A CPU. Ok, I can. 3.

I personally don't use shims; they can actually inhibit contact between CPU and HS. This happens when they are not perfectly flat and the exact height of the die. As long the foam pads are intact, I don't worry.

[pelly]

Does anyone use a CPU shim?
If so, which brand/model do you use?

I've used some from Cooler-guys before with luck...but I've really been looking at the ones from Tweakmonster for my newxt CPU...Head over and check it out...there's no inner material to short the bridges.....

[Kruno]

Guys I accidentally voted no. Take one away from "no" and palce it into "yes". I destroyed a Pentium 2 cpu to get the permament heatsink I placed on. Got it off with pliers and destroyed the cpu. No other way to get the heatsink off