Just when I started tuning my guitar today & before I could get any tunes up on my favorite Good Charlotte song, my e string of my guitar broke.. argh!!

Dang I don’t have a spare anywhere, shouldda go easy on it. considering its the thinest string… but I think its time for a string change anyway. And there it was standing broken & unable to play a song.. though I could always do alway with the highs.. but arghh! disaster!

Then hope came, my parents planned dinner out so maybe I can drop by somewhere.. where I can get replacement strings fast.. & hey there I was next at parklane shopping mall, opposite peace centre.. the mini music heaven… got my strings changed at my favorite Parklane music novelty store at the basement. The old uncle there is always very kind, never fail to have to good chat & usually gives good discounts for stuffs there, you should check out his music store, I reco that with quite a selection of accessories guitars & amps.

However, I had never changed strings at that store before. Furthermore my guitar spots a Floyd Rose Tremolo system so I would like to heck the hassles of changing strings myself. So I asked whether he provides the service, “sure, no problem, that would be $2 per string, $10 for all 6″ he replies… ok reasonable.. but next I was kinda “dumbfounded” when he took out his modified power drill attached to a de-tuner winder attachment to unwind the strings & put on the new ones, quite hardcore but otherwise, very impressive, & I thought we peeps were limited to those “relatively good” manual tuner winders… but a drill attachment? whoa! But it gets the job done very professionally & in record time too, plus tuning… well at least now I know a good place for strings replacement service!

Had dinner at rex resturant, opposite the sunshine plaza, they didn’t have much food left as its near closing, so we only had chicken rice with veg, still hungry we left for paradigm center back across the road where I had a foot long subway meal while mum & dad had their complete dinner at the center’s foodcourt. Tuned the guitar the moment I got home, & just in time for my ATW, camp mate, wong to meet on mirc (though I was 1/2hr late) to transfer the AHM photos he took on his camera. Would be uploading them up soon.. the pics should be up tml then.

Dang I am so awake now, just woke up from 2x 10hrs sleep blocks fromt he last 48hrs. Oh well, since I am very much up myself… lets just recap some happenings yesterday.

Literally slept the whole morning-afternoon when I came back from AHM yesterday. Its a joint run together with the sheares bridge run held in the morning. Had only 1 1/2 hours of sleep the night before where we set up the waterpoints the moment we reached there saturday afternoon, only to start resting around 6pm then waiting till 1am where we can put up the overhead banners when the road closes. Set up a hammock between 2 coconut tress (no falling ones) & rested till 3am where we did finishing touches & most of the stores preps started when the ice supply truck arrived.

The run kicked off about 5.30am just in time when everything’s done. The first runner reached us around 6.15am- an African runner, all chasing the front LSV scout, they were literally sprinting- all 21km! Then came few of the relatively faster runners then the bulk of the 21km runners around 6.30am till 7am. Drink demand wasn’t so high then till about 7.30am. Most seriously competitive runners don’t drink, its only those leisure runners who drink lots- demand surged high around 7.45am & we can say that we were literally one & soaked with the Gatorade we were serving, given the frantic demands for it. Demand seem endless & theres even queues at our water point just the gatorade… dang. It was so bad I guess any longer, I guess my hands & the guys helping out at my waterpoint would have our hands “Gatorade” further (yes our hands were a yellow-oranage hue to it thereafter, due to the constant scoping/mixing/blending of Gatorade). Not to mention the danger of frost bites when where we have to mix the super chilled drinks at the peakl of demand. Litter was everywhere, & the road were very much a littered- green & white mess of paper & Styrofoam cups all tramped & meshed to a spread of green-white flakes being contrasted onto the road, a quite spectacular sight. Furthermore given the endless number of runners, we can’t even pick the litter off the road, they just keep coming, all 8000 of them! Thank goodness we had park cleaners who saved the day by helping us clean up after the event. No hesitation to offer them drinks for their service too.

We went out of Gatorade around 8.15am then & whats left were slightly yellow hued plain water with a very diluted Gatorade taste. Can’t help it! we were out… by around 8.30am all 4 waterpoints on our side were all serving ice water, which slowly turned to warm water when we start to run of of ice around 9am. At this time, mostly left are all the “sio gan” ones who literally only care about walking the whole 21km distance. We started packing up around 9.15am & loaded everything up our transport back to camp. it would be a 2 day off for us (mon & tues). Whew! thats all for the sunday. The results of the waterpoint competition are not up though, hope we would win!

Before the day started, woke up at 6.15am halfdead, ate breakfast.. do normal morning stuffs.. blah blah, next thing there I was walking up to chonggen’s house after dad dropped me off for work. Kinda slept (rested) there for a while. Got his uncle to drive us to the venue for the day thereafter, its 8am then. & yea, the coffee CG’s maid served did wake my morning up alittle, really needed that morning caffine boost anyway.

Today is ATC aniversary day & celebrations were held at Safra Yishun country club where we had watergames, rockclimbing, shooting & langames free for all to play. Very much spent the time after the opening ceromontion with most of the specs in the arcade lanning & playing arcadegames. Completed time crisis II with only $2.50 spent for continues.. hehe. Even Tanyi & darryl brought their own bowling balls to bowl there. Had lunch there before leaving the place at around 12noon.

Went to Jason’s house which was in the area for some slack while Jason got him self ready to go go for more Langames with us, which we already planned. & so the group comprised of CG, Jason, Tanyi, Janan & me who kinda got to appreciate how its like to be packed like sardines in a car. Got to parklane where we had about 4 hours of lanning with 3 matches of C&C generals & battlefield vietam (we had enough of Counter-Strike & warcraft in the morning lan). Sunshine plaza was the next venue where we intro-ed Tanyi to the place. all he could say was wow… As for me, I finally got the Patlabor whole TV series DVD set. Can say that each esiposde costs a dollar, as there are about 100++ esp in all. Everyone left after that, around 7pm. Went back to Parklane’s music nolverty store where I got a new guitar cool tunner with a large LCD display with a good bargain for $31 from #35, I like the store uncle there, very homyly & friendly. Dropped down to the basement arcade for some time crisis III (stopped halfway) before meeting up with my parents who picked me up thereafter. Had dinner at Golden Mile steam boat restaurant before heading home.

As the day passes with each going step, my driving test on the 8th next month draws closer too. Mmm, exciting… but I should be able to pass on this 3rd attempt. The 26th of this month, (which is this upcoming Sunday) is the army half Marathon day. I am am more of less in charge of the water point for my regiment, the project is finishing & is on schedule since 2 july, should go on well.

My computer is getting kinda corky & slow now, can’t wait to reformat my harddrive, but thats after I backup some stuff that is…

Some plans for next month: Get a New Harddrive, a new 256MB graphics card (maybe). Then I can finally throw my dinky old geforce 4 Ti4600 in my living room PC in place of it.

Hopefully my marksman pay will come in next month, then that would be a much welcomed spending boost!

On music, just download the Guitar Tabs for Good Charlotte, maybe I should start practising this rather good old song soon.

On the week to come, the prospects of nights of on wednesday may be quite high, so you can see me back on the light or so. Otherwise, this week would be the forst week my unit would be experiencing the 5 day week thingy, yes I would be booking out on friday evening that is.

Its finally up & ready! Check out the new computer related tutorials out on site at this URL.

One more Kit-modelling tutorial to go.

Well, its late now, time to get some much needed rest from a day of writing. Finished the HTPC & External Harddrive tutorial today, updated the old DIY PC tutorial with some niffy updates, freshened up the images & made them bigger & more pleasant to the eye. The DIY computer section will now spot an idependent tutorial sub-section featuring an index for all the computer related stuffs & an FAQ from quetions I have received over the months, thats alot of work man. As promised everything will be uploaded only once everything’s finished. Whats left is the kitmodel, CPU & GPU tutorials which I aim to finish by tomorrow, more typing to go… Which makes me think: dang! I should be paid for these contributions!

This tutorial aims to serve as basic guide for anyone who wants to go about safe upgrading of their computer central processing unit or CPU for short. Usually I will recommend cleaning be done at least once every 2 years. This include people who wish or are intending to do an upgrade & would like to know about the steps involved before carrying out on the process themselves.

Compatibility
Before performing an upgrade, make sure that the board you are using supports the processor you are using. Consult your motherboard manual or your respective technical support when in doubt on the following specifications & check whether it teles to the processor you intend to install

Though there are unofficial add-ons & converters which allows processors to be upgraded to a different process, eg using Intel 478pin processors on 423pin boards. I won’t be covering that here, however, do feel free to do a search on the net for more info on such converters if you intend to “cross-jump”.

The package
First off, for illustration we have the subject, a Intel Pentium class 4 2.80Ghz processor based on the 130 nm Northwood process 533FSB & 512KB L2 Cache (Fig 1.0) to replace my an old Pentium 4 2.53Ghz processor on a 478 pin motherboard.

The test subject

Fig 1.0

Do note that your processor may differ in specifications name or brand, but the procedures to insert the processor is the same throughout. Processors are always mounted straight onto the motherboard via a socket compatible with your chipset or silicon process, then lever locked into the socket itself. Thereafter, a heat sink and fan will be secured to the motherboard holders to lock the processor in place. For LGA processors and beyond, the logic is always the same.

Fig 2.0

Fig 2.1

What we have in the box (Fig 2.0) is pretty limited & more or less everything of what you can get when buying off the shelf processors from your local PC parts shop. Inside we have the processor sealed in-plastic, the processor heat sink for that model & fan. Documentation included will include a simple installation manual, copyright info and the intel sticker all can be found on the left.

Black thermal pad on heat sink

Fig 3.1

The swapping process
Upon opening up the the package we have the standard intel heat sink with thermal pad installed. You can choose to remove the heat pad in pace of thermal paste being applied. Alternatively you can choose to reuse back your old compatible heat sink & keep the new one for future needs or can choose to sell it instead. If you intend to overclock your processor, you might want to invest in a third party cooler which have better cooling pipes for heat dissipation and a more powerful fan for circulation.

Fig 4.0

Fig 4.1

Next we start by opening the computer to be upgraded. Identify the processor by locating the large similar black fan (Fig 4.0). This applies if you are using the standard OEM heat sink & fan Intel or AMD uses, they all bare similar resemblance, only that certain designs & dimensions are different. Unplug the CPU fan cable from the motherboard usually located beside the processor. Unlock the fan holder by lifting the white locking levers shown in Fig 4.1.

Fig 5.0

charred dusty goodness!

The fan should be loose once the levers are raised. To detached it from the motherboard (Fig 5.0), gently release the 4 black plastic hooks found at the corners of the heatsink holder by applying downward pressure, then lift downwards- outwards to unhook. Take caution as thin plastic frame could break if excessive pressure is applied, as so which happened to me on a few instances before, well but we always have a spare one for keeps.

Cleaning
If you intend to reuse your old heat sink, you may notice that after a few years of usage, there is nothing much left defined of the silvery heat sink shine anymore, only much of a contraption of fins most probably just back from an inferno dust trip.

vacuuming…

Fig 6.0

Start by using a vacuum to clear up most of the loose dirt & dust stuck to the heatsink fins. Use a scrapper or such in Fig 6.0 to remove stubborn compacted dust masses within the fin gaps. Vacuum cleanly thereafter. If you wish to install your processor straight way, try to make the process as dry as possible, which means exploding the whole heatsink in water or wiping it with damp cloth/wipes are a no no. Well, unless if you give it 1/2 – 1 day or so to completely dry. This is so as to make sure there’s no water not only on the physical surface but to be sure that no water is still harboring in the micro cracks & crevices of the heatsink, where thermal paste should be applied, thus affecting cooling efficiency.

Installing the new processor
One you are done with the cleaning, you can start to prep the installation of your new processor, but first you got to remove the old. Lift the processor locking lever, remove your old processor from the processor bed. While you are at it, try to get cleaning the North brige & South bridge too (Fig 7.0) its usually a passive heatsink-like structure located near the processor & ram slots & the other near the I/O ports.

The 2 processors side by side

Fig 8.0

With that done, insert the new processor into the processor bed, be sure to place it the right side (Fig 7.1) up by confirming the pin count & arrangement on the processor & that on the socket/processor bed.

Alternatively, you can use the notch on the corner of the processor (Fig 8.0) as an indicator. Note that placing it incorrectly will damage the processor & board. But normal manufacturers will make things fail safe & everything can only go in- one way. Lock the locking lever till you feel a locking click & is flushed flat to the board.

Applying thermal paste
As previously mentioned, almost all processors come with a thermal pad with you can simply just peel off and stick it to the heatsink, this is sufficient for most users who do not wish to overclock their systems. Otherwise, you can use third-party high grade thermal compound to replace the pad, which I will be using in this case. Though I had mentioned the thermal paste application procedure many times in my other tutorials, this is very much an independent tutorial too, oh well, I would go on the steps again.

slotting in the new processor

Fig 9.0

1. Apply a blob of paste onto the slotted processor (Fig 9.0)
2. Sandwich a clean, dry heatsink onto the processor blob you’ve just applied, you will get some thermal paste on the heatsink now.

Fig 11.0

Fig 11.1

Fig 12.0

3. Using a clean finger or one wrapped in plastic, spread the paste as thoroughly & thinly as possible on the sink surface which would come in contact with the processor (Fig 11.0), this is to get the paste into the micro surface of the heatsink, I will explain more later.
4. Wipe off excess thermal paste from the heat sink. The heat sink should have a dull look on the metal now.
5. Next, gently spread the remaining thermal paste on the processor you’ve applied previously. Spread consistently, ensuring a nice thin, even surface (Fig 11.1), use a razor or card to excess paste overflowing at the edges.

The reason of spreading thermal paste on the heat sink is to ensure that all thermal paste had all entered the microscopic gaps or crevices of the heat sink metal surface. This is to ensure optimum heat conduction from the processor to the heat sink for heat to to dissipated efficient & quickly. 

6. Next replace the heat sink onto the processor (Fig 12.0) & secure the 4 holding clips.
7. Lock the processor fan and heat sink onto the motherboard using the locking levers on the fan if any.
8. Plug in the CPU fan cable to the CPU fan power output on the motherboard.

All done!

With that done close up the casing & boot up, you should see the new processor registered on the power on self test (POST). Confirm the speed in you system BIOS, don’t be alarmed if the system shows another clock speed, as it takes time to adjust the multiplier to suit the new processor. Upon booting into an OS, e.g. windows, confirm the processor speed by checking under “My Computer” > “Properties”. Reboot the computer, this time the clock speed should show up correctly on POST.

That’s all folks.

I’ve been working on a few tutorials which I hope to launch altogether into the site sometime this week or so, so is the addition of a FAQ & updated tutorial of the old popular “DIY computer” article once I finish them all.

-Kitmodel tutorial (finally!)
-Building a HTPC (home theather PC)
-Asembling a 3.5″ External Harddrive

Upgrading your computer
-Processor (CPU)
-Graphics Card (& changing, GPU fan)
-Adding Case fans

Stay tuned for them!