Also forgot to add - specific heating function is not really useful IMO. I find cleaning die for ~3 mins is sufficient, no benefit to running longer. It is not difficult to externally warm bath water.
A good nozzle for an air compressor to blow dry the die is worthwhile.

I clean die in a small beaker of acetone sitting in a warm water bath in the ultrasonic cleaner. I think any of the cheap ultrasonic jewelry cleaners will work well. (Make sure you buy one for the correct voltage - my first one I bought on eBay was set for UK voltage, and was not adaptable).

Nice images! BTW that is not an AMD wafer, your wafer was made by AMI semiconductors. They were bought by ONSemi and they have a wafer fab in Nampa Idaho (Outside of Boise) that is still operational. Which is presumably where yours originally came from (Given the Idaho artwork). Coincidentally the w...

This is an LCD display from a portable DVD player (Just the LCD layer after the backplane was removed). I thought it was interesting looking at it with different illumination. First with transmitted light (unusual for me I normally use microscope in metallurgical mode) http://www.photomacrography.ne...

Just large value resistors. In an chip you only have a few layers to work with that you can use to make resistors. Each layer has a specific sheet resistance (Depends on the layer material and doping level) expressed in ohms/square. The value of a resistor is sheet resistance * # of squares or sheet...

The (Aluminum) metal tracks have been etched out during the decap. You can see the silicon residues that have precipitated out of the Aluminum tracks (The Aluminum typically contains ~1% silicon to improve electromigration.) This doesn't normally happen as the metal is covered with a dielectric pass...

That lens of mine almost looks like some vapours have attacked it. Are there any chemicals known to cause that? Methylene chloride? Maybe a specimen had been etched with hydrogen fluoride and they forgot to wash it all off :D? A bit off topic but back in the 80's I worked in a chip wafer fab in the...

Nice piece from the lost world of silicon art. It is becoming much rarer to find these 'easter eggs' in modern chips, they seem to have died down from the 90's to today where they are very rare. From a processing point of view it is funny how the CD is very precise circles but the 'pick-up arm' is c...

As a old process guy I will admit that I used to be a bit jealous of you cool designers getting to put your initials onto the chips :D (Even though probably only a few dozen people ever saw them normally.) I think high frequency chips alway look interesting, the symmetry and precise layout is so tid...

That's a great image! The thick top metal layer gold? (Or is it Cu) layer on the surface really jumps out. Do I see your initials in the bottom right corner of the chip? :-)

Thanks for the feedback, and for your generous offer Ray. I think for my needs I probably want a good working system with reasonable lighting and zoom, without vibration issues, but not necessarily the best or top quality optics possible. With the cost of shipping to Canada (+ duty taxes) and the ri...

I am considering getting a stereo microscope. At first glance the choice seems a bit overwhelming, so I am seeking advice from the experts here on what is important for a stereo microscope. I want it primarily to aid in plucking bond wires ~25 um diameter gold wire attached to silicon chips using tw...

I am considering getting a stereo microscope. At first glance the choice seems a bit overwhelming, so I am seeking advice from the experts here on what is important for a stereo microscope. I want it primarily to aid in plucking bond wires ~25 ?m diameter gold wire attached to silicon chips using tw...

They're not metal plates, that is the silicon die you are looking at! In a modern CPU the die has hundreds of solder ball connections down to a small PCB (Which has 6-10 layers of interconnect) and has the package solder balls on one side (And the die on the other). In your image you can see the top...

So who would the customers be for this type of lens and what sort of things would they photograph with it?