X-clamp Help Options

[raxrain]

Hi all

I've done the x-clamp fix and it let me boot up just fine and allow 5-10 minutes of game play where it then freezes. After reboot it then displays the 3 rrod. If I leave it for about 10-15 minutes the same thing happens again.......it boots fine game play for about 5-10 min then 3 rrod.

My x-clamp fix contained:-
8 x Machine Screws
8 x Spring Washers
8 x Nylon Washers
8 x Metal Washers
I used the arctic silver 5 thermal paste.

Any idea/help on solving this problem?

Thanks
RR

[MadMaxGR]

Probably your mainboard is bending and when the heat raise up, it freeze. If you used any washers under the board.. remove them. Also loosen up a bit the screws so the heatsink of the GPU get parallel to the mainboard.
Let me know what happened.

[raxrain]

Hi MadMaxGR

It is the first time I have booted up with top tray off....Whilst playing I saw the fans start to spin from normal speed for a few minutes then rapidly speeds up and keeps getting insanely faster...then it conks out and freezes.

This all takes place in 5 mins or so.

I did loosen up the screws but still the above.
Anything else I can do?

Cheers
RR

This post has been edited by raxrain: Jun 11 2009, 01:21 PM

[STKD]

Things to look at would be - the thermal paste; is it possibly too thick (which results in the heat not transferring away properly)? Not covering well enough? This is hugely important to get right for heat transfer away from the chips to the heatsinks. It actually needs to be a *very* thin layer.

The heatsinks - are they making good contact? Hot to touch? Try tightening or loosening one screw at a time making *very* slight adjustments. One area of the heatsink might not be touching properly. This can obviously take a lot of trial and error, but something clearly seems to be going wrong with the heat transferring away from the processor. It's all in getting the tension right so that it's hard enough a grip to do the job with the flexing, but not too much that the board gets damaged.

Just a minor thought, but does the same happen if left on the NXE/Dashboard menu? If so that *might* indicate that the CPU is the one overheating (since the GPU is doing fairly minimal work at that point compared to gaming).

This post has been edited by STKD: Jun 11 2009, 02:07 PM

[MadMaxGR]

Clean the thermal paste off, completely. Don't leave anything at all. make it like a mirror.

Then use a thin layer of Arctic Silver 5 on each (CPU and GPU).

Re-apply the x-clamp fix and be sure your mainboard don't bend or flex. You can find out when you look at the GPU heatsink to be exact parallel to the board.

Don't unscrew much more than needed the GPU screws, otherwise the heatsink won't touch the GPU. The CPU heatsink doesn't have such problem because is a square.

Good luck!

[raxrain]

Hi

I have loosened up the screws and at the mo it’s not going to the dashboard.

Also just checked my error code it’s 0102.

Will be re-applying the arctic paste later on today.

Thanks for the help so far.

RR

edit MadMaxGR, STKD will try tonight thanks alot guys.

This post has been edited by raxrain: Jun 11 2009, 02:50 PM

[MadMaxGR]

0102 is needing reballing on GPU probably. Reflow GPU and 99% will be fine. ( I used to follow Llama's tutorial with the fan over CPU to overheat the GPU for 15 minutes).

[raxrain]

0102 is needing reballing on GPU probably. Reflow GPU and 99% will be fine. ( I used to follow Llama's tutorial with the fan over CPU to overheat the GPU for 15 minutes).

Thanks for the advice I tried this.....It would load the dash and play like 3mins of a game then freeze...after doing this a few times eventually I would get the rrod same error code 0102.

Okay It was a do or die moment and I decided to go ahead and use the heat gun on the board...I covered the board with aluminium foil and only left the gpu on display. I blasted the chip for about 10 mins on max heat setting then another 10 mins gradually lowering the heat to cool it down. Left it for another 30mins to cool down before I put it back together...I didn’t bother with heating the cpu as it wasn’t the problem.

It’s been working for 3 weeks now on heavy usage.

Cheers
RR

This post has been edited by raxrain: Jul 10 2009, 10:21 PM

[MadMaxGR]

I am glad we helped you with your problem. Have fun!