Love the build! I have a soft spot for multi-processor machines. The cable management is super clean, and the individual sleeving on the molex connector for the GPU is a nice touch.
Glad people are liking the build, it's been fun to revive it.
I'm now at a dilemma though, the stock Voodoo 5 fans are both dying and so is my third spare unit.
I bought a couple larger heatsinks that fit perfectly to the PCB holes of the V5, but I can't get the factory heatsinks off. Tried the freezer trick and an old credit card between the ceramic and heatsink, but there's literally zero gap in there to get anything to go between. Also tried a butter knife but all it does is start to scratch the ceramic package.
Any ideas?
Edit: Scratch that. Added some more pressure to the credit card+knife trick and both popped off. One heatsink came off really clean, the other one... not so much.
just take a flat carpenters blade and go slowly.
It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes.
The trick that ended up working was 5 minutes of freezer, quickly slot a credit card between the VSA-100 PCB and heatsink, then popping it off using firm force on the knife, no wear on the packages.
One hour, bottle of acetone, 500 Q-tips and toothpicks later, everything is nice and clean. The PCB heatsink holes ended up being just couple millimeters off, so I'll introduce the larger heatsinks to Mr Dremel tomorrow and see if that will make them line up perfectly.
Got the heatsinks modified and fitted, sitting at 39C idle on both VSA-100 chips now, full load doesn't exceed 45C.
Used Fractal Design Zero thermal paste between the chips and heatsinks, had good experiences with it previously on retro hardware and ceramic packages.
Quite happy with the result, worth the hassle!
Awesome work! I like your style 😁 - I plan to do the same thing when I get my V5 5500 AGP. I dont have one yet.
