Processors in Lahore

Buying processors second-hand

Processors are the safest used component you can buy. They have no moving parts, no wear surfaces and no capacitors to dry out, and a chip that posts and passes a stress test is very unlikely to fail later. The real risks are bent pins on the chip or the board, and buying the right performance for the wrong socket.

Check the socket before anything else. An AM4 chip will not go into an AM5 board, and an LGA1700 chip will not go into an LGA1200 one, no matter how close the numbers look. If you are upgrading rather than building fresh, confirm your motherboard supports that specific generation — a BIOS update is often required, and on some boards it has to be done before the new chip goes in.

What to check before you pay

• Confirm the socket matches your motherboard exactly, and that the board has a BIOS supporting that generation.
• Inspect the pins under a bright light — on AMD they are on the chip, on Intel they are in the board.
• Run a stress test long enough to reach a steady temperature, not just to boot.
• Ask whether it was ever delidded or run with an aggressive overclock.

Read how to benchmark anything before you buy it →