Repost from EB about my saga:
So a brief update...
I was going more than a bit nuts trying to figure out why my newly upgraded top-o-the-line system ran like a dog, I just couldn't nail down the problem! I ended up deciding it was the PSU and throwing a 955 in to lessen the power load and hopefully make it better...but it still sucked.
Fast forward a week or two, (with lots of fruitless and aggravating trouble-shooting/diagnosing), and I'm chatting with my good buddy AIStrong and he asks me "what is your slow switch set to?".
:|
"Slow switch"? Surely there isn't such a...
...yes there was. A little dip switch labelled "Slow", and it was on.
:|
Powered off, set the "slow switch" to off, rebooted, and the system was zippy quick! Much facepalming, but mainly happy that I'd found the problem...even if that problem was me being a moron and not reading the f-ing manual first! (Yes, I felt the irony) Was really happy, powered down and pulled the 955 to toss the 9590 in; and it wouldn't fit. Pull it out, look at the pins and there are just some bloody mangled ones! No clue how it happened, I'd thought I'd been careful as hell! (Honest, I usually am with the expensive bits) Bent to fuck, nothing to do but straighten 'em out. Not fun, but not impossible.
-snap!-
FUCK!
-snap!- -snap!-
F U C K ! !
-snap!- -snap!-
fuck.
5 broken pins. Got 'em all straight, but 5 snapped off. I was heartbroken, I'd been given a huge gift/opportunity and I'd gone and f-d it up. Felt sorry for myself, gave up, and fell in to a funk for a few days.
Then I got tired of being in a funk and giving up, so I did some googling on what to do for broken pins. Found some people recommending jamming a bit of ethernet wiring into the missing pin hole and fudging it that way, but then saw a viddy of a guy pulling some pins off an old CPU and using those in the holes. That seemed more sensible to me, muchly so!
So I dug an old 3500 out of the basement and tossed it in the oven at 420f for 20 minutes and pulled a bunch of pins out with a pair of tweezers and an oven mitt. Sat down and gave myself a serious headache looking and counting pins on the 9590 to chart out which ones were missing, got an even worse headache counting out and charting it on the socket after pulling the 955 and then nearly went nuts trying to manipulate pins that were too small for me to see into the correct holes with a pair of tweezers that felt HUUUGE! Finally got 'em all in, got the 9590 ready to drop in, (should mention that I had put her in the socket first to make sure I'd gotten the straightening right), and noticed I'd oriented myself the wrong way on the socket and had to pull all the pins and redo the whole county/pin-in-thingy. <sigh>
Finally managed to put all the pins in and get it right, hook everything back up, rig up my extry molex to 4-prong 12v CPU adapter I'd made, prayed to various computing gods, and fired her up.
AND SHE BOOTED!!! SHE FREAKING, GLORIOUSLY BOOTED!!!
She seems pretty stable, surprisingly so considering I'm still using a Corsair tx850 in a system needing 1200w. I fired up GTA IV real quick and was playing with everything pretty maxed at 3200x1800 and the fps never dipped below 53.
I LOVERS IT!!! IT WORKED!!! SOOOOOO HAPPY!!!
This upgrade has truly been a long, strange trip...but the destination is that much sweeter for the troubled journey. She's in no way completed, but man what a great step and I can't wait to finally see what AMD's fastest processor paired with the world's fastest graphics card can do!!!
Thank you again AMD, thank you so very much for all the joy you've given me over the years/decades now. Your hardware has become a part of my personal journey/history; and I find that slightly weird but very, VERY enjoyable! Big love, I can't wait to see what you come up with next! (Oh, and also to play with freesync...but I think Imma gonna get a new PSU before a new monitor!
)
TL/DR: Dig got new toy, Dig broke new toy, Dig fixed new toy, Dig is happy dancing.