SP97 installation mishap...(The horror!)

[PingSpike]

So I'm putting my SP-97 on yesterday...and I'm screwing those mounting standoff screws (The ones the spring loaded screws go into) into the backplate under the motherboard. Well, after finger tightening them I got out the needle nose pliers to finish, like it says in the instructions. I'm going around in a criss cross and its boring and I guess my mind started to wander for a moment because I wasn't paying that close of attention... and as I twisted around the screw, I had the pliers down to close to the motherboard, as I completed my half turn the tip of pliers broke off one of those little rectangle thingies that are all over the motherboard around the processor. I don't know what they're called, here's a pic to illustrate. The one I broke off it obscured by the standoff in the picture, there's an arrow pointing to it. (Its just to the right of "42". There's a circle around a similar one.

http://pics.bbzzdd.com/users/pingspike/ohcrap.JPG

My heart sank, not knowing what that thing does I could only assume my motherboard was ruined. My fiance suggested I try it anyway. I refused to without at least trying to fix the problem first.

I was somewhat lucky in that the tiny, tiny piece that I broke off did not go flying. I still had it. And I actually knew where it broke off from. Using a pin and a pair of tweezers I spent like 15 minutes getting it back into place...only to have it stick to the pin when I moved it away thus ruining all my work. (Do these things have tiny magnets on them or something?) At one point, I pressed down to try and hold it into place, and the piece went flying off towards the capacitors. I swore profusely as I searched across the face of the motherboard for it. Since there are hundreds just like it, I was in fact searching for a needle in a stack of needles. Argh! I found it.

I held the piece into place as best I could (some what crooked, but by this point I knew from experience trying to make it better would only make it worse) Then I shot several small dabs of hot glue onto it...which left it totally covered in a blob.

I hitched up my old CPU (I was doing an upgrade) quick and dirty with another heat sink. I put cheap ram in just in case. I only put the old gf2mx I had into the video slot and left the board sitting on top of an antistatic bag and some stuff. Plugged it into the psu. Plugged a monitor in and it started up. It posted.

After that I installed the mobile and the rest of the SP97 and tried again. It would not post...crap. I cleared the bios and it posted. Sweetness!

Anyway, I assembled the rest of the PC and it seems to be ok now. I ran out of time so the mobile 2200+ barton is only running at 1600mhz 1.5v right now. (23degrees system temp, 27degrees idle temp, no load tested yet) I'll have to play with it tonight as I ran out of time.

I have no idea what that thing did...for all I know it would have worked fine if I hadn't bothered to fix it. Who the hell knows right?

 

[Peter]

Get those standoffs out there quick. Looking at the photo, some of them seem to make contact with electrical components or even blank solder points. They're not supposed to be there anyway - and if a heatsink actually uses these mounting holes, then you have non-conductive PLASTIC stubs going through there.

The little component you popped off might have been a resistor (bad) or a capacitor (not so bad but possibly affecting stability).

 

[PingSpike]

There are actually plastic washers in between the standoffs and the motherboard, so that much should be fine. That isn't my pic. (I only edited it for this thread, it IS my motherboard though.) There should be plastic washers in that pic as well, they are clear and fairly thin so they are probably impossible to see.

I still have no idea what that thing was...was hot glueing it back in place a good idea?

 

[Peter]

No, of course you need to SOLDER it back on. Unless you've ripped its contacts and/or traces leading to them off along with it. These things can be repaired, but that'll require finer motor skills.

 

[PingSpike]

Well I lack a sodering iron...and even if I did have one, I have a feeling I would likely do more harm than good using it. I'm not sure why it would have to be sodered though, I placed it back over the connections it lost before hot gluing it...I don't think there's any glue in between or anything. (Its not like I dabbed some glue on it and just stuck it back in place, I remade the connections as best I could and then put glue on to hold it in place. Again, I have no idea if that would work.)

Regardless, I'll run some stress testing tonight to see what I can see. For all I know it was a redundant piece.

 

[Peter]

Why do you think the manufacturer used solder in the first place? And what makes you think desktop mainboards contain even $0.01 worth of redundant components?

Now do yourself a favor and get someone on the case locally who has a clue and the skills to go with it.

 

[PingSpike]

Originally posted by: Peter
Why do you think the manufacturer used solder in the first place? And what makes you think desktop mainboards contain even $0.01 worth of redundant components?

Now do yourself a favor and get someone on the case locally who has a clue and the skills to go with it.

You're sort of an asshole. I would imagine manufacturers use solder because it wouldn't make since to put an entire motherboard together with hot glue. But you didn't even begin to explain why you didn't think the contacts wouldn't work. You don't have to solder two wires together to make them connect, they need only touch each other. Now I'm no EE like you, but thats just how I understand it.

And if $0.01 of redundant components stopped a handful of motherboards from being RMA'd, I would imagine that would more than pay for itself from the manufactorers end. So I do not see how that is some sort of unimaginable circumstance, that a manufactorer would actually waste a quarter of a cent. The assumption is most likely wrong, I know that, but its not unimaginable.

But hey, I'm just some guy on a computer forum who asked a question about a mistake I made, in hopes that another user might have some insight on it. I thought thats what this was about? I didn't post in off topic by accident did I? If you don't have anything constructive to say, its a lot easier to just NOT post anything. Maybe I should take your advice and pay some one $50/hr to solder a broken piece on to a $50 motherboard. But some how, throwing it in the trash and buying a new one would seem like a more sound choice. But don't ask me, I don't have a clue. Or the skills to go with it.