I thought i'd try this out for kicks. I have a couple old celeron single core proc's laying around that i dont have a use for. Perfect! I scavanged some glass from a candle holder lantern thing, grabed some 240, 400, 600 grit dry paper and went to town. I wasnt peticularily worried if i messed up so i did a super fast job, about 40 min total. I started with the 400 just to see how it would go. It was taking forever so i went to the 240 and started really hauling on it. When the aluminum top coat was removed and the surface started to flaten out the concave surface and became smooth, i switched to the 400 grit and started to haul away on it some more. Went to 600. Then i had a stupid idea. I thought i'd try some polishing compound on the glass the same as i did the paper. That made a mess and i had to restart at 400 to fix the big scratches it put in it. All's well that ends well i guess. Exceptional quality surface and i managed to not bend a single pin.
I could have gone to a further grit paper and or a buffing wheel on a grinder to get it to a mirror finish but its not worth the money i'd have to spend on the sand paper. I think it's a pretty damn good improvment over what it was like before
I took pic's of the whole operation but imageshack is being a whore today and is going at a snails pace. I'll upload the pics tomorrow afternoon when i get home from work.
[edit] Images were done faster than i thought.
I made sure to copy the specs and serials just incase
Awesome tutorial, I feel confident now that i could attempt this on a much more expencive processor.
A+++