Madshrimps Forum Madness - HOW-TO: not to kill hardware

OK, post here all experiences and advice concerning damaged/dead hardware. there are often small stupid things that cause a lot of voltage. I started this thread because I've killed too much hardware last months, all because of stupid things

1. Mainboard fan connectors can fail mysteriously
2. if you mount a heatsink on a CPU, make sure the fan wire doens't get between the CPU and cooler (almost killed 2500+)
3. before starting a machine, after you've been modding it or messing with wires, check all components. check for loose parts. check if nothing can be short-circuited.
4. if you use a 3pin to 4pin fan adapter, watch out. because the pins of most 3pin connectors can touch things and shortcircuit it. Yesterday I forgot about a 3pin fan adapter. the pins of the 3pin fan connector touched my GF2Pro (yes the famous gf2pro, back from RMA) and killed it :grum:
5. after you've been working with the BIOS, make sure CPU overheat protection is enabled
6. If you mount a HS, use a large screwdriver
7. If you want to remove memoryheatsinks from a GFX, don't to it the hard way.
8. Zalman adhesive does NOT let go. some people already ripped off the core of their videocard, because the epoxy did not let go
9. when watercooling, tighten your hose clamps more firmly a few weeks after clamping them.
10. watch out with shims. before starting your PC after placing a shim, make sure the CPU die makes contact with the heatsink. Duron's and Palomino's are usually fine with the shims, bartons/tbreds NOT
11. when voltmodding, your potmeter usually has to be at MAX resistance. use multiturn cermets instead of regular potmeters, because you can slip when turning a regular potmeter, and give the HW way too much voltage

>>> complete this list of tricky, lousy things that can kill your HW
if the list get bigs enough, I'll categorize the info