A word of warning to anyone who wants to unlock their Athlon XP

I know this has been said before, but I'd just like to reiterate it for the benefit of anyone who hasnt come across it.

The packaging of the Athlon XP is quite soft and if you use a sharp knife to scrape away excess filler or conductive paint from around the L1 bridges, you run the risk of scraping right through the surface and exposing the copper beneath.

I know because I did it (before i found the warnings from others - that will teach me to do my research properly !), but fortunately I was lucky and my chip still works at its original speed. I was trying to remove some excess conductive paint with a craft knife and didnt want to use acetone as that would have removed the nail varnish I was using as a filler as well.

My chip is still locked and i dont know if I can unlock it now because the scratches are almost touching the L1 contacts and masking them off is going to be very difficult :-(

I also had lots of fun (not) with both the filler and conductive paint sticking to the masking tape when applying to the bridges individually - the bridge i had just done would pull away when the making tape for the next bridge was removed.

Another piece of advice I have is that if you are using nail varnish as a filler for the pits, use a coloured one as its a lot easier to see !


Nick

Thanks ! I knew they were able to bend, but to scratch that easy?


The info is appreciated.
No matter HOW many times we hear info, we all get BRAIN CRAMPS, and forget sometimes.

Heh

I have been painting and cleaning and isolating my XP now for about 30 times or so. After 28 times I realized that the mobo's mistyped the jumper saying "Athlon/Palomino" that would allow it to read the correct FID

Now my XP is so much scratched and covered with ink, the 0.7 gallons I have used in time (seriously! Ok, nearly that much) to clean up its surface again and again have not hampered its fiberglass cover although. But I have used
-Razor Blades
-Kitchen knifes
-Scissors
-A couple of other Razor blades
-80% of my expensive conductive ink
-two tubes of super glue
-two rolls of scotch tape

And its now working like a charm. But of course I had to be careful when connecting the bridges. There are so many scratches and places with bare copper on it now, Its really hard to connect the bridges w/o shorting them to those scratches...

Thanks Dabljuh - reading your comment gave me the boost I needed to have another go and I have now successfully unlocked it

Regards

Nick