Ioan, the chances are that you don't care about trying to salvage the IC at this point. It sounds like you know which ball is the problem, but since its not on an outside row you can't see it. If you have access to a rotary tool such as a Dremel and a decent 10x-30x stereoscope, then just buy a cylindrical diamond burr from the McMaster Carr company (www.mcmaster.com) and grind through the device down to the suspect connection. Use a little DI or distilled water to lubricate the cut and remove debris. You need some hand skills for this job, but it's really pretty easy. Just don't ding the board. Wayne Thayer >>> [log in to unmask] 6/16/2006 9:05 am >>> Hi, first it was the cracked capacitor question, thanks to all who answered. Now I have another one on the ethernal dilemma: is the BGA poorly soldered or there is a design issue? The question is: how can I assess whether the BGA that fails test is properly soldered? I do not have a 5DX and whatever I can see with the Ersascope looks OK. Needless to say, I cannot get the location of the failed pin. Will cross sectioning parallel to the surface of the board tell me anything? Can this be done? Any particularities regarding the polishing of the surfaces? What to look for? Thanks, Ioan --------------------------------------------------- Technet Mail List provided as a service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8e To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet To temporarily halt or (re-start) delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL or (MAIL) To receive ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest Search the archives of previous posts at: http://listserv.ipc.org/archives Please visit IPC web site http://www.ipc.org/contentpage.asp?Pageid=4.3.16 for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-615-7100 ext.2815 ----------------------------------------------------- --------------------------------------------------- Technet Mail List provided as a service by IPC using LISTSERV 1.8e To unsubscribe, send a message to [log in to unmask] with following text in the BODY (NOT the subject field): SIGNOFF Technet To temporarily halt or (re-start) delivery of Technet send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet NOMAIL or (MAIL) To receive ONE mailing per day of all the posts: send e-mail to [log in to unmask]: SET Technet Digest Search the archives of previous posts at: http://listserv.ipc.org/archives Please visit IPC web site http://www.ipc.org/contentpage.asp?Pageid=4.3.16 for additional information, or contact Keach Sasamori at [log in to unmask] or 847-615-7100 ext.2815 -----------------------------------------------------