Me again and merry ho ho
So I got the foam, not sure if it was the same as what Wilhelm was using, but lets put it to you this way, it does not hold pressure when heated up and cooled when the system is over 130 deg f. It tends to just lay flat after abuse of a metal plate being layed on it after heating. So I had a system given to me, again, with the nasty E74 error. I had already prepared the metal case in the same manner as in Wilhelms updated tut, but this is where I did something different. I don't understand why Wilhelm said to sand the standoff down to 3mm, when he already said the outside rim where the motherboard sits is 3.75 mm, so that is up to you. I have a rounded end pry bar that I hammer on the top of the standoff to get it just slightly below 3.75mm. Now flatten the tips of the x-clamp out, or as I did clip off the tips and then flatten them. It's a lot easier to do it that way, BUT LEAVE THE BLACK TABS ON THEM. No need for foam here people. The BGA chips are not that large where you need a lot of upwards pressure. I also do not flatten them out completely, just the outside tabs and leaving the factory bends on them. Now put the clamps on first, then three washers, the system board, two washers and bolt it all down. The metal case has enough of a 'cut-out' design in the case to allow the springs to actually go below further than the base of the washers and clamps. How did it work out. Bam, no overheating or nothing it fired right up. The three washers and the clamps make the total thickness @3.75mm. I used digital calipers just to verify Wilhelm and my own cases and the thoughts and measurements are correct.
I have invited Wilhelm by PM to watch this as it progresses, and gave him a couple of other thoughts on the fix. Hopefully you are watching and thanks for the great pictures and tutorials for all to follow.
Delta
robbieboy 360-HQ Freak
Joined: May 15, 2006 Posts: 911
XP: 886
Posted: Sat Dec 27, 2008 9:59 pm Post subject:
deltaarmstrong2000
that way sounds much better to me.....
that was the two things i did'ent like about that way of fixing it.
1. the heat build up under the chip with the foam there....
2. and that the foam would go off melt and go hard....
one thing though why did you not overheat the system when done...?
even with most x-clamp fixes it will start up straight away but you still need to overheat the system to make it last.....?
thanks for all the info mate.. _________________________________________________________
In one of my earlier posts, I took notice with my temp gun and found it did not reach 230deg f. So, even though we soften the solder it does not actually re-flow itself properly. Now it might actually do that but making it a cold solder joint again. By all means, heat the cpu/gpu one at a time as I stated by blocking the airflow from each heatsink with a tape/cd case lid, wait for the fans to spin up to it's max for a few minutes then shut off the machine. Wait an hour and do the other one in the same manner.
I was more or less just stating that it fired up right away by doing the one step of leaving the clamps with the black pad left on, when my other attempts had been short lived and I had to overheat to get it to work again by using the same method as posted in the linked tutorial.
Ya, that foam pad I had another problem with. The area it would cover a lot of SMT caps and resistors on the bottom side of the board. I don't know how well they might hold up over the long run of heating and cooling and no airflow with that much radiant heat coming from above.
All depends. If the chips are glued down from the factory like on most systems with the hdmi port, no. If not glued then yes. I think the glue might work against us in a sense that we would not be able to put enough pressure down on the whole chip. Some glue gets under the BGA chip itself so it almost holds it up. But that choice is totally up to you. No harm done if you do.
Did the x-clamp fix the way delta did it, no foam and no credit cards. It wouldn't work at so I had to tighten the screws all the way down and bake the GPU. Now its working so I'll see how long it lasts. _________________________________________________________
Hey, don't feel bad. I had to loosen the bolts for mine to work. Weird eh. I also put a couple of brass washers on the ram chips under the gpu heatsink. Don't think it made any difference. I'm fighting the e74 error and it seems to be the worst one to fix. All my other 3 rings have held up no problem.
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