Stubborn connectors

[SageOfSpice]

So I was taking apart the girlfriend's GPU today to re-paste it since it was having some temp issues, and all was going pretty well until it came to disconnecting the fan connector for the front plate. It's a simple little 3 pin connector, no locks or anything, should slide right out. Nope, won't budge. Not wanting to rip the wires straight out of the connector, I grab a pair of pliers and pull for my life. For fear of damaging the male end on the PCB, I decide to tackle it from another angle. Get the pliers lined up, go to give it a pull, aaannnd.... snip. Pliers slip off and cut all the wires running to the connector.

 

Well, now I've got them out in pieces, but good luck trying to uncrimp a little connector less than a 1/10th the size of your pinky nail, right?

So now I get to wait for parts to come from half way across the world, for a task that shouldn't of taken more than 5 minutes.

 

So, my question is, have you ever encountered situations like this? If so, what are things you've tried that have either worked, or failed spectacularly? Share your stories. 

[suchamoneypit]

Taking apart some old quadro's, I found the fan connectors extremely difficult to unplug. No such problem on my newer 5870 (newer in respects to the quadros). I ended up completely destroying the fan connectors on the quadros, although I didn't care. There was no way I was unplugging those intact.

 

When pulling on the plug with pliers I was using two hands and squeezing and pulling the pliers as hard as I could, and it wasn't budging at all.