A friend of mine bought a used dual Pentium 3 motherboard online recently but wasn't happy with it. When asked why, he just said something burnt. I have never used a dual CPU PC before and considering that the current dual core setups are a bit too expensive for me, I decided to swap a used Pentium 4 motherboard which I had lying around with his dual Pentium 3 set.
While cleaning the motherboard, I realised what he meant by "something burnt". The thermal sensor on the second CPU socket was burnt. It had caused burn marks on both the motherboard as well as the CPU.
While cleaning the motherboard, I realised what he meant by "something burnt". The thermal sensor on the second CPU socket was burnt. It had caused burn marks on both the motherboard as well as the CPU.
 | I wasted no time to try booting it up. If it was dead, it would be pointless to continue cleaning it. Luck was on my side - it still worked. The temperature reading in BIOS confirmed that the sensor on the second CPU socket was dead. Well, it shouldn't be too difficult to get it replaced. All that would be required were some soldering/desoldering. I managed to find a replacement sensor from a spoilt motherboard - the replacement sensor was somewhat shorter than the original one but it didn't bother me. |
 | A quick check after that showed the motherboard being able to sense the temperature on the second CPU again. Yeah!!! |
