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

[Ben Scott]

On Thu, Jul 7, 2016 at 11:31 PM, Joshua Judson Rosen
<rozzin at hackerposse.com> wrote:
> Yeah--it's *stuck*. Maybe if I still had it locked in the socket,
> and/or if I'd been running it beforehand and still had it hot...,
> though the whole idea of holding the CPU by the pins, using the motherboard
> to apply leverage... actually kind-of freaks me out....

  As it should.  The electrical contacts[1] are not structural, and
can easily be damaged.  The mechanism which holds the chip package in
place is also not designed to withstand significant mechanical
load[3].  I've seen what misapplied force does to a microchip package,
and it's not pretty.

  I strongly recommend first removing the package from the motherboard
socket, and then removing the heatsink from the heat-spreader[4], as
you ended up doing.

-- Ben

[1] Many recent designs actually put the pins (crushable pointy bits)
in the socket, and use flat pads on the chip package.  Since the chip
is usually more likely to be placed flat on a surface, and the
motherboard is often less expensive than the chip, I think this is a
good idea.

[2] This footnote intentionally left blank.

[3] It's called "Zero Insertion Force" for a reason.

[4] The piece of flat metal, that serves to interface the chip carrier
with the heat-sink.