$5 Centris 610

[oneboyarmy]

I haven't added anything to my arsenal in a while and I found myself bored and browsing listings on everybody's favorite auction site. Not being overly optimistic, I threw a $10 bid at an as-is Centris 610. Incredibly surprised, there wasn't a single bid against me - I won and it showed up yesterday. In the auction photos, the case looked to be in pretty great shape, a bit dirty, no rusting on the ports. Upon receiving it, there's a very tight crack on the front corner - I thought it was a scratch until I removed the cover. I checked for a leaky PRAM battery or any other obvious signs that I shouldn't power it on. I noticed the CPU looked a little improperly situated (and had no heat sink) so I popped it out. Well, it was halfway rammed into the socket with a bunch of bent pins - and one broken off. Crud. 

Not to be discouraged, I borrowed the CPU out of my LC 475 to see if this thing was bootable before I relegated it to the project pile. It boots! Bare bones configuration, 80MB hard drive, 512KB VRAM but 20MB of RAM. My borrowed CPU is a full 040, and I thought I still had the original FPU-less one, but I can't find it at the moment. Replacements look to be expensive - it was recommended to me that I could repair the damaged CPU but I'm not confident in my soldering skills to do such a thing.

 

[MOS8_030]

With patience, care, and some fine needle-nose pliers you can straighten those pins. I have fixed worse.

You have nothing to lose by trying.

Oh, whoops, just the saw the missing pin part. Well, nm.

 

[Bolle]

Depending on what pin broke off it might still be worth trying to straighten the bent ones.

If the missing one is a power or ground pin the CPU might still work without it.

 

[trag]

I haven't done it myself, but a number of folks have recommended using a .7mm mechanical pencil without lead, to straighten the bent pins.   Basically, the pencil gives you a little straight metal tube about the diameter of the CPU pins with a handle.  

 

[Juror22]

I've use hemostats to un-bend pins on bad CPU's and other chips and they work pretty well.  I like the mech pencil idea, I will definitely give that a go.

What chip was the bad one?  Someone here might have a cheap spare laying about.

That carpet mouse pad is the coolest!

 

[ClassicMac]

I used a credit card to straighten them out.

 

[Jon183]

I can vouch for the mechanical pencil method, used it before and its a faster way of realigning pins, the BIC Atlantis 0.7mm Mechanical Pencil 2-Pack is under $5 where I am, so its pretty affordable and you could just use them as pencils after you're done.