Asus Z370 Apex socket short circuit protection ?

[angrybluebird]

Hello,

i've bought an Intel 8700 k pretested and delided, from someone. But he was so stupid and put some liquid metal outside in the intel plastic box of the cpu. Maybe it comes through the hole in the silicon of the cpu outside. Every time i install a cpu im looking for the contact area, to be sure its clean. On this day it was pretty dark in my room and i had only my led ceiling lighting on, which is not extreme bright and i looked maybe not so intensive, because i would never expect that someone is so stupid, so im not 100 % sure that there was nothing.

Later when i clean up my room, i found the package of the cpu. There was a little drop on in the box on the top (~3 mm ) and on the bottom (~1,5 mm) on the edge. I think it drops from the top to bottom when i removed the cpu . The mantles of the drops werent fluid any more. The bottom drop was 3-4 mm away where the cpu sits in the package.

My theory is that the liquid metal comes from to much liquid metal on the cpu through transporting out.

I reinstalled the cpu. And saw a tiny liquid metal spot (no drop, a thin, round film) on the green pcb of the cpu, ~1,5 mm away from the edge. I removed the liquid metal from there.

I used a very bright led light to investigate the socket and the contact area of the cpu very long and close.

Nothing visible in the socket or on the contact area. But its possible that a tiny trace could be on or under some pins.

Which you cant see because all pins are metalic and you cant look below. There is now a subliminal fear that a short circuit could happen.

Dont understand be wrong, the system runs fine also before the reinstallation of the cpu.

But has the intel socket on the Apex motherboard a short circuit protection ?

Best regards

angrybluebird

[Korth]

A little TIM can leak or cook out before it fully "cures" ... especially if too much is used (probably the most common blunder). Solder-like TIMs can behave like solders when heated, flow towards heat and get sucked or pushed by capillary action between mating surfaces.

All TIMs are thermally conductive but not all are electrically conductive - if your TIM isn't electrically conductive then it wouldn't "short circuit" anything. CPU voltages are low enough that they couldn't puncture the plastics or the onboard solder mask, so the only real concern is TIM on the silicon "filaments" or TIM in the socket pins. A big mess with lots of liquid spilled on board would be a concern since it could bridge solder points or even seep into the solder balls under BGA parts.

If it's gotten into the socket or other places it shouldn't be then it could be interfering with proper mechanical fit. If it's electrically non-conductive then it could actually be preventing normal electrical contact inside a CPU pin (which wouldn't "short circuit" or burn/explode anything but would inhibit normal part functions). Tolerances and mounting pressures on CPU coolers are pretty tight and Intel didn't actually design the thing to be de-lidded in any event, lol.

The only guaranteed way to get it all out from inside tiny pinholes or under surface parts would be immersion in an ultrasonic cleaning machine (of the specific sort used by repair technicians). Otherwise try wiping and scrubbing and air-blasting what you can and hope no damage was actually inflicted by the leak.

I don't expect the CPU socket would have any short-circuit protection built into it, beyond perhaps some teeny tiny FIVR-style diodes (as likely to be in the CPU package as in the socket) ... since the motherboard just wasn't designed for anything other than a socket-compatible CPU to be plugged into that socket. Stuff like power inputs, USB ports, network connectors, and maybe even PCIe slots might have ESD shielding and electrical hardening since you never know what sort of electrical junk people will stick into these holes, but the CPU socket doesn't normally need such failsafes (they'd likely just add cost and complexity while slightly impacting performance).

[angrybluebird]

Thank you for your detailed answer.

The liquid metal (on gallium base) is electric conductive.

You mean the voltage of the cpu is with 1,2 - 1,35 V to low for a short circuit. But the cpu is pulling arround 95 watts normal load usage or 230 watt s full overclocked with prime 95 small fft avx out of the socket . So there must be high ampere to deliver this power consumption. So a short circuit cant be so harmless.

But i've read in the Intel forum who a Intel staff said, a bended cpu pin does not harm the cpu. Also if the bended pin touches another pin.