fingeroil on cpu

[SlowEJ8]

I got a little bit of finger oil on the bottom of my cpu chip that touches the pins... what could i do? and is that bad?

 

[Rifter]

clean it with alcohol if you are worried about it.

 

[Diogenes2]

What CPU ?

 

[SlowEJ8]

intel i5 2500k

 

[SlowEJ8]

will it do any harm?, its a little on the side with the gold 'circles'. i didn't clean it, but the i can't really see it anymore either..

 

[Diogenes2]

If you can't see anything it's probably OK . The socket tension will probably overcome any contamination that is not visible..
Wiping with soft lint free cloth and alcohol will not hurt..
Just make sure there is no lint or dust left behind.

 

[VirtualLarry]

I would clean it with 90% Alchohol. Or just send the CPU to me, it's ruined.

 

[Idontcare]

I got a little bit of finger oil on the bottom of my cpu chip that touches the pins... what could i do? and is that bad?

There is absolutely no cause for concern.

The surface of the metallic pads you see on your CPU are actually already oxidized metal. This metal oxide skin layer is highly resistive (doesn't conduct electricity very well).

So the pins in the socket, combined with the tension mechanism of the socket, are already designed to slightly abrade the surface so that a metal-to-metal contact is made.

The metal in the pins is pushed through the metal-oxide film covering the pin, through the finger-oil on the pads, and through the metal oxide film on the pads and into the metal of the pads.

The only thing you could do to destroy the contact is to destroy the pads, which can happen if you put corrosive materials on them (oxygenated water and light, or nitric acid, etc).

Finger oil is non-conductive and non-corrosive, provided the oil isn't loaded up with other stuff from the environment.

If you are worried about it you can remove the finger oil with rubbing alcohol. Just make sure it is air dried before putting back into the socket.

edit: some reading material if you like:

http://www.advancedprobing.com/pdfs/contact-resistance-2.pdf

And checkout the pictures in the pages following this link for some closeups of an abraded pad (just for examples, not actual CPU pads).

 

[SlowEJ8]

Thanks! Also, if nothing is plugged in and ester is spilled into the motherboard or CPU, etc will there be any harm done if I dry it first then replug everything and turn on? Not saying I did, just wanted to know what would happen if something like thy did happen

 

[VirtualLarry]

The surface of the metallic pads you see on your CPU are actually already oxidized metal. This metal oxide skin layer is highly resistive (doesn't conduct electricity very well).

I thought those dots were gold-plated? In that case, they don't oxidize.

 

[MentalIlness]

Thanks! Also, if nothing is plugged in and ester is spilled into the motherboard or CPU, etc will there be any harm done if I dry it first then replug everything and turn on? Not saying I did, just wanted to know what would happen if something like thy did happen

Got some nervous hands do we ?

 

[Martimus]

Thanks! Also, if nothing is plugged in and ester is spilled into the motherboard or CPU, etc will there be any harm done if I dry it first then replug everything and turn on? Not saying I did, just wanted to know what would happen if something like thy did happen

Shorts can't happen without any electricity flowing, so as long as it is unplugged it is pretty safe. This is the reason that you pull the battery out of any phone that was dropped in the water and let it dry overnight before turning it back on the next day. It is also why trying to turn it on while it is still wet will kill it.

EDIT: I used to rinse off boards with isopropol alchohol, then rinse them off with tap water before drying them with a heat gun after soldering on components all the time. (I did this to clean the flux off the board.) As long as the board is completly dry when you apply power, it should be fine. The worst thing that could happen is if you get some water stuck in a capacitor that wasnt' sealed completely, but if that was the case then that cap wouldn't have been long for this world anyway.

 

[Hogan773]

Thanks! Also, if nothing is plugged in and ester is spilled into the motherboard or CPU, etc will there be any harm done if I dry it first then replug everything and turn on? Not saying I did, just wanted to know what would happen if something like thy did happen

What happens if I am eating Kentucky Fried Chicken while building my PC and I mistakenly drop a giant drumstick into the mobo and then while trying to pick it up again I end up jamming it into the CPU socket while closing down the pressure plate at the same time?

 

[Seero]

Thanks! Also, if nothing is plugged in and ester is spilled into the motherboard or CPU, etc will there be any harm done if I dry it first then replug everything and turn on? Not saying I did, just wanted to know what would happen if something like thy did happen

IF things can be DRIED COMPLETELY, IMMEDIATELY, and no electricity were going through during the soak, then in theory, no harm done. However, note that since the mobo isn't design to take such abuse, there are lots of parts which can oxidized when in contact with ionized water, and therefore it is strongly advised not to spilled sh!t on mobo.

Also, to make sure that there is no electricity going through the mobo, you will need to remove any batteries and discharge it completely. A static charge from your body can, in theory, damage the bios of the mobo and destroy it upon boot.

In short, don't spill sh!t on the mobo or CPU. Be careful and ware a pair of thin plastic gloves while doing so.

Food for Thought: How do you know those are oil and not something else which constructed the finger mark on the pins? How can you possibly see a fingerprint on a pin?

 

[Seero]

What happens if I am eating Kentucky Fried Chicken while building my PC and I mistakenly drop a giant drumstick into the mobo and then while trying to pick it up again I end up jamming it into the CPU socket while closing down the pressure plate at the same time?

You sue KFC for your lost.

 

[Idontcare]

Thanks! Also, if nothing is plugged in and ester is spilled into the motherboard or CPU, etc will there be any harm done if I dry it first then replug everything and turn on? Not saying I did, just wanted to know what would happen if something like thy did happen

Ester? I'd be a little concerned with it penetrating any organic components on the motherboard to be sure. Polymeric swelling and all that.

But yes, as you suggest, if the ester is given time to evaporate then the effects will most likely be reversible.

One concern to have is that the ester will dissolve surface debris (or already contain dissolved contaminants) and those contaminants will re-deposit from the ester as the ester evaporates and then the as-deposited contaminants could create electrical shorts or parasitic capacitance structures which would inhibit the board from functioning properly.

This is one of the reasons using distilled & deionized water (which is not electrically conductive) is still a problem for immersion systems, the water eventually becomes conductive as it dissolves contaminants from the environment.

Shorts can't happen without any electricity flowing, so as long as it is unplugged it is pretty safe. This is the reason that you pull the battery out of any phone that was dropped in the water and let it dry overnight before turning it back on the next day. It is also why trying to turn it on while it is still wet will kill it.

Unfortunately nature can still conspire against you if you have dissimilar metals exposed to the water as this creates a wet-cell battery that is effectively shorted out and you will have corrosion occur even in the absence of an external voltage source. (aka Galvanic corrosion, oxidation at the anode)

Adding an external voltage only makes it worse, but the absence of an external voltage source unfortunately does not ensure there won't be irreversible corrosion.

One thing that really drives corrosion in these situations is light...photo-induced corrosion (aka Photoelectrochemical corrosion)...so in addition to ensuring the battery is removed from that cellphone you can really do yourself and your phone a favor by keeping it in the dark while it is drying out as well.

 

[bryanW1995]

you would have some deep-fried chicken. and a heart attack.

what happens if I spill ether on my motherboard?

 

[Martimus]

Unfortunately nature can still conspire against you if you have dissimilar metals exposed to the water as this creates a wet-cell battery that is effectively shorted out and you will have corrosion occur even in the absence of an external voltage source. (aka Galvanic corrosion, oxidation at the anode)

Adding an external voltage only makes it worse, but the absence of an external voltage source unfortunately does not ensure there won't be irreversible corrosion.

One thing that really drives corrosion in these situations is light...photo-induced corrosion (aka Photoelectrochemical corrosion)...so in addition to ensuring the battery is removed from that cellphone you can really do yourself and your phone a favor by keeping it in the dark while it is drying out as well.

Corrosion isn't really your enemy on exposed metals, since they are soldered together and corrosion will only form on the outside of the metal, not the contact points. Plus it gives you an extra layer of protection against shorts from foreign particles in your circuit. I only worry about corrosion when I am creating a new contact point, not with existing ones.

One thing I found with cell phones is that LCD displays don't react well to water even without any external voltage applied. However, I have seen maybe a half dozen cell phones survive a trip into a bowl of water when we removed the battery immediately. (This was caused by a young girl who liked putting things in the toilet.)

All this recent talk about fixing electrical components reminds me that I actually will have the means to finally build my own workbench for electronic work. I had always used a work lab in the past when I needed to fix electrical components, and of course I have a large amount of experience fixing and building electrical components from just doing my job. Other than a new computer, this will be my goal for this year (plus I am taking my daughter to Disney World).

 

[pm]

Can organic land grid array (OLGA) packages suffer water damage? I was thinking that it might absorb water and swell...?

 

[BoomerD]

As long as we're playing the "Wacky What-if's,"
What if a Bulldozer runs over my Sandy Bridge? Will it hold the weight, or will it collapse under the load?

 

[nyker96]

I got a little bit of finger oil on the bottom of my cpu chip that touches the pins... what could i do? and is that bad?

oh nOOOOO! your $million investment is screwed! You computer chip will fry ... then burn down your house ... then OMG!

You are like my super-clean Uncle, once he phoned me up and started talking about how he repeated cleaned the bathroom faucet daily because he can see finger prints on it! My god I'm worried about his mental state more than his faucet at that point. But I didn't tell him that of course.

 

[Dizon]

I dunno about washing things with water even after letting it dry. Depending on your water or whether it is de ionized, it may leave minerals that can conduct electricity.

 

[pm]

As long as we're playing the "Wacky What-if's,"
What if a Bulldozer runs over my Sandy Bridge? Will it hold the weight, or will it collapse under the load?

Depends on the weight of the bulldozer.

Asking what happens if water leaks on a CPU or PCB isn't all that wacky. A lot of us on here have water cooling on their CPUs, and some of us (like, me) are thinking about it. And actually, asking what happens if food falls onto a CPU or PCB is more wacky, but I watched someone spill a coke inside their computer one time.

 

[aigomorla]

dude the IHS is not a glass bulb where the finger print will heat up the glass and end up rupturing the bulb.

lulz..

And the thermal paste you should be using is more dense the oil in your finger so it should push aside the finger oil while its filling in the micro gaps.

So dont freak out if your cpu has finger prints all over it.

 

[Ben90]

lulz..

And the thermal paste you should be using is more dense the oil in your finger so it should push aside the finger oil while its filling in the micro gaps.

Hmm, I didn't know they made thermal paste to go in between the CPU socket and processor. That must be some KrAzY KoOl stuff.

Also, density has nearly nothing to do with something sticking to something else. Put a piece of paper in between your thermal compound and the IHS and screw down the heatsink. Despite having less density, the paper didn't move did it?

lulz..