Motherboardectomy: how to un-bond the CPU's heatsink?

[Joshua Judson Rosen]

On 07/07/2016 10:44 PM, Matt Minuti wrote:
> Apply low, gentle heat? The viscosity of most thermal paste/pads
> changes a lot with temperature. I'd take a hairdryer on low and heat
> up the heatsink, slowly, occasionally attempting to twist the cpu off
> by spinning it about the axis perpendicular to the base of the
> heatsink. Right-hand rule of chip removal, I guess?

That worked fantastically well! I don't have enough hair
to warrant owning a hairdryer at this point, but my wife
had such a machine. I just put it on "low [speed]" and
blew hot air in through the fan on the other side of the
giant copper heatsink. Melted the thermal g[l]oo tout de suite.

And now I'm thinking about upgrading the pots and pans in
my kitchen from aluminum and cast iron to copper....

-- 
"Don't be afraid to ask (λf.((λx.xx) (λr.f(rr))))."

> On Thu, Jul 7, 2016 at 10:03 PM, Joshua Judson Rosen <rozzin at hackerposse.com <mailto:rozzin at hackerposse.com>> wrote:
> 
>     Bought a nice CPU a while back, with a cheap motherboard to put it onto
>     until I found something better (in retrospect, that was probably silly...).
> 
>     Finally found a better motherboard, and am now reminde that
>     (a) now I need to get the heatsink off of the CPU in order
>     to transfer the CPU between the ZIF sockets (since the socket lever
>     is covered by the heatsink), and (b) baked thermal paste is
>     a remarkably good adhesive.
> 
>     Somewhat surprisingly..., the CPU is out of the original socket
>     at this point--it popped out while I was fiddling with the heatsink.
>     I'm going on the assumption that nothing got broken in the process,
>     for the time being....
> 
>     Any suggestions on what the right course of action is, here?
> 
>     Wikihow advises to soak the CPU+heatsink assembly in isopropanol
>     and then slicing them apart with dental floss.....