Sorjal

If you bought it from a store and haven't done anything, bring it back and return it. Not worth it, particularly if there are going to be future problems. One reboot I ran into recently was a "power event". It doesn't blue screen, just starts up then goes into the shutting down or restarting screen. If you can get to your sign in window, go to the power and while selecting restart, hold down the shift key. This will reboot into safe mode so you can look into the event logs.

Assuming you have an internal speaker, you can disconnect just about everything and try powering up and slowly adding parts back. Some of the old video cards drew a surprising amount of power. My initial guess is power supply (and that it's the source of the smell). Also if it still smells, follow your nose to a rough area.

Removal bits (like drill bits, but have a reversed direction), mentioned above Tapping in a larger screwdriver can be rough given delicacy Glue idea is good, could also use solder if careful If you have access to the outside flat, unlikely, you can tap a flat head around into a notch on the edge (again probably not likely) Regular drill (must be super careful, I put this in the "nothing else worked" category. You us a drill bit that is the same size or a hair larger and essentially drill down to cut the head off of the bit (or break it up so you can bend part of the head up to try and loosen it with that). Again a true last resort given the potential damage. Also try putting a bit of rubbing alcohol on it to soak down through the threads to what minor threadlock they may have used on it.

And yes I tried to use cryonaught to clean it, hence the bits of it in the guide tray.

Lighting made it look like a lot of the text on the surface was removed. Here is another picture (leaving original, as it seems to be easier to note the residual thermal compound as well as increase in glossiness)

So after seeing the quasi brillo pad of a removal method for Coollaboraties Liquid Ultra, I looked into other cleanup methods as well as tried something outside the box. Figured I'd share my experience and information... Response from Thermal Grizzly support after it got everywhere (including pretty impossible to reach spots... And for my outside the box, I thought about what the scrubbing pad is essentially doing and figured there were a bunch of products out there that may do similar. Eventually I decided to try an automotive exterior compound liquid as it's designed to mildly clean and polish a surface. I used Meguire's Ultimate Compound as I've used Meguire's with my cars for years with no damage to my paint, etc. and it was one of the few solutions that was just a compound without a bunch of extra stuff designed to stay on the surface afterwards (figured that would be extremely important ). It still took a few applications as I wanted to use as little as possible overall. During the applications, I also found that the best "scrubber/applicator" for the compound was my finger as the fingerprint ridges acted like a miniscule squeegee and also provided the most control. Afterwards I thoroughly cleaned with alchohol to make sure there wasn't any remaining residue. Feel free to chime in with your thoughts. I originally tested this on an old 6600k before this enclosed after-cleaning pic of a 1950x. I used part of the original packaging to make sure I had a good grip as well as make sure I didn't damage any of the contacts. n close inspection, you can still see some of the tarnish like after effects of the thermal compound and note that the cpu ihs surface is a little more glossy than it was originally.