Cleaning CPU fan/heatsink

[Barriehie]

I decided to clean the fans and the heatsink assembly today since it's been awhile. I carefully removed the all the fans and after a bit of 'tweaking' got the heatsink off; with the CPU still attached! That's not supposed to happen I think since the ZIF socket was still in the locked position. Anyhow, I cleaned everything off and put humpty dumpty back together and upon turning the machine on my monitor is just blinking, blinking like nothing is working!!!

...PANIC...

I went over everything several times and finally ended up hauling to Fry's and got back hours later with a new MB and CPU. Swapped everything out and guess what, still blinking!!!! Called Fry's and they had some refurbished machines so out I go again. Got to Las Vegas Blvd. and saw the traffic, hell no! I 'll do this tomorrow. Got back home, now it's been like 6 hours since my freak out, and put everything back together just like it was when I bought this machine 3 years ago and pushed the power button. An angel must've been watching because I got my familiar Grub Loading screen and all is now well, or it will be after I return the $242 MB and CPU to Fry's. Don't think I'll be cleaning this thing again for awhile...

Barrie

[Exodist]

LOL we've all had moments like that.. hehe
I was installing a new hard drive 3 weeks back and some how I didnt notice I knocked the mother boards power connector loose.. LOL I was pissed / confused / and a little frustrated that my system wouldnt boot up. Finally I noticed the 24pin connector was loose.. /smack plug fix turn one.. lol

[stinger30au]

the cpu can stick to the fan some times when u remove it

just open up the zip leaver and press the cpu back in and close the ziff leaver


from experience do this 3 times

i have been caught so many times that after putting the cpu back in the pc wont start so now i do it 3 times and it works every time

[Barriehie]

the cpu can stick to the fan some times when u remove it

just open up the zip leaver and press the cpu back in and close the ziff leaver


from experience do this 3 times

i have been caught so many times that after putting the cpu back in the pc wont start so now i do it 3 times and it works every time

Yes, I'll try that sometime in 2010... :)

Barrie

[amingv]

Tips:
Don't remove the heatsink so often as the thermal compound may make it stick to the CPU, if you need to remove it twist it gently left and right so it comes out easily.
If you do remove it, it may be a good idea to clean off the old thermal compound and reapply it, since it may not have such a good effect after removing a couple times.

Clean the heatsink by blowing air through it (air can or vacuum cleaner on reverse).

Also, always double-check RAM is set firmly on it's slot. Trust me on this last one.

Although if the new motherboard and processor didn't work it must certainly have been an user-side error. Someone forgot to plug his video card?:)

[oldsoundguy]

pressurized air! (be careful, but easiest!)

[amingv]

pressurized air! (be careful, but easiest!)

True that, if there's too much dust it can impale breathing, too.

[Tipped OuT]

True that, if there's too much dust it can impale breathing, too.

Also, if you have the can tipped at an angle, liquid nitrogen will come out.

[Khakilang]

Actually there is some sort of gel that stick the heat sink to the CPU. So when you remove the heat sink it might force the CPU out from the socket. That may cause the CPU to fail. It happen to me also and caused me an expensive lesson. Next use a small flat screw driver and slowly remove the heat sink. Hope that won't be another next time.

[amingv]

Also, if you have the can tipped at an angle, liquid nitrogen will come out.

A good opportunity to overclock, I guess:).
It's all about being careful, though, I've done it lots of times without a drop of, as you say, nitrogen coming out.;)

[Tipped OuT]

A good opportunity to overclock, I guess:).
It's all about being careful, though, I've done it lots of times without a drop of, as you say, nitrogen coming out.;)

Well I'm not exactly sure what it is, but when I get it on my fingers, the liquid instantly freezes, like liquid nitrogen.

[JBAlaska]

Actually there is some sort of gel that stick the heat sink to the CPU. So when you remove the heat sink it might force the CPU out from the socket. That may cause the CPU to fail. It happen to me also and caused me an expensive lesson. Next use a small flat screw driver and slowly remove the heat sink. Hope that won't be another next time.

Thats thermal paste and you NEED a nice thin layer of it between your HS and CPU.

Arctic Silver is good, But in a real pinch you can make some from toothpaste and Vaseline..really Google it..but it only works for about 2 months than it gets hard..Hey I used to live on a island off the Alaskan coast, you gotta do what you gotta do LOL

[amingv]

Well I'm not exactly sure what it is, but when I get it on my fingers, the liquid instantly freezes, like liquid nitrogen.

Not quite like liquid nitrogen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPGr7bnohuM
(there was a video where they froze a flower and it broke like glass, but I couldn't find it)

I understand what you mean, though, I'm just nitpicking :).

[Barriehie]

...muted...
Although if the new motherboard and processor didn't work it must certainly have been an user-side error. Someone forgot to plug his video card?:)

:) Perhaps, when I put it back together I changed the sockets that my cards were plugged in. I was thinking on the way back from Fry's the first trip I could have a bad video card and could've tested via knowing the keystrokes and HD activity sequence. Instead I used the onboard graphics adapter... duh!

Barrie

[Barriehie]

Don't think I'ld use toothpase for a thermal compound but here's a bit of plumbing for you... hope it doesn't leak! (http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=614271&page=4).

Barrie

[Dayofswords]

i was swapping a hard drive out and went to put the new one in, then i saw a small flash of light when i put on the power thing, i had forgot to unplug the dang thing


rookie mistake..
(hard drive was fine, no damage to it)

[Macintosh Sauce]

I got this compressed air called "Surface Dusting Air" from Amazon.com. Their website is at http://www.surface-clean.com/.

It is specifically made for cleaning dust from computer electronics. A couple of days ago I installed two new 2 TB WD HDs and a new ATI Radeon HD 4870 graphics card in my Mac Pro, I cleaned the fans, motherboard, RAM area, heatsinks, etc. There was a bit of dust but this spray cleaned everything very well. I highly recommend this product.

[Barriehie]

I got this compressed air called "Surface Dusting Air" from Amazon.com. Their website is at http://www.surface-clean.com/.

It is specifically made for cleaning dust from computer electronics. A couple of days ago I installed two new 2 TB WD HDs and a new ATI Radeon HD 4870 graphics card in my Mac Pro, I cleaned the fans, motherboard, RAM area, heatsinks, etc. There was a bit of dust but this spray cleaned everything very well. I highly recommend this product.

I've gone to the next level and since I'm an HVAC repair tech. by trade I've covered the air intakes with some good air filter material and put a new layer of thermal paste, -not toothpaste-, between the CPU and the heatsink. acpi -t returns 40* C. Same as it ever was!

Barrie

Edit: Now I'm thinking I can run:


acpi -t > ./cputempout
grep -e 40 ./cputempout 1>./grepoutput
...
some code to see if ./grepoutput == 0
make alarm
endif

[oldsoundguy]

Actually there is some sort of gel that stick the heat sink to the CPU. So when you remove the heat sink it might force the CPU out from the socket. That may cause the CPU to fail. It happen to me also and caused me an expensive lesson. Next use a small flat screw driver and slowly remove the heat sink. Hope that won't be another next time.


It is not gel .. it is a VERY important product known as "Thermal Paste" (the best being Arctic Silver) .. it is a heat conductive material that transfers the heat from the processor to the heat sink (and fan) assembly.

DO NOT REMOVE THE HEAT SINK FROM THE CPU!! Not unless you want to replace that thermal paste (first cleaning off ALL REMNANTS of the old material). Failure to do that is asking to turn your processor into a lump of carbon. .. and if you replace the paste .. it takes just a very small amount .. if it oozes out, you have way too much .. and NEVER block the small hole in the processor.

[joey-elijah]

Gawwwwwd i remember something timilar happened when i had bought a new CPu Heatsink.

The CPU was literally solidly attached to the heatsink and there was no leverage or gap anywhere. In the freezer it went for a little while but no comprendez.

No one should ever try this but i ended up using a hammer (!) and a needle (!) to pry them apart. Once i'd got a tiny bit of leverage - pop it came off. Even worse was that somewhere along the line i had bent one of the CPU pins so it wouldn't slot back in to it's 'place'. (gently bit of bending later and it did!)

[Barriehie]

Gawwwwwd i remember something timilar happened when i had bought a new CPu Heatsink.

The CPU was literally solidly attached to the heatsink and there was no leverage or gap anywhere. In the freezer it went for a little while but no comprendez.

No one should ever try this but i ended up using a hammer (!) and a needle (!) to pry them apart. Once i'd got a tiny bit of leverage - pop it came off. Even worse was that somewhere along the line i had bent one of the CPU pins so it wouldn't slot back in to it's 'place'. (gently bit of bending later and it did!)

Yeah I thought about my little screwdriver but when the image of a cracked CPU popped into mind... :(

Barrie

[CharlesA]

I've had the CPU pop out when I remove the heatsink on a few occassions. I suppose the thermal paste justs gets hard after a while (and it's cold, not warm. :P), so it just pops the CPU out of the ZIF socket.

I think I ended up having to use a hair drier to heat up the heat sink and prying the cpu off of it with my utility knife once or twice.

Also, I always clean both the CPU and heatsink with rubbing alcohol: apply to Q-tip and wipe the old grease off. :-)