WHY NOT JUST USE THERMAL EPOXY?
Some may wonder why not just use thermal epoxy to attach the replacement heatsink/fan rather than this laborious process. While it has been done, there are many problems with this approach. First, it may be permanent no matter what the user intended. Secondly, attempts at removing an affixed heatsink may result in the GPU being ripped off the PCB. Without further ado:
"Normailly with older cards you can remove any epoxied parts just by freezing and cracking. So I did that or I tried. Don't get me wrong when I say this because I love the 9700 pro, but it is a very flimsy card. I heard the familar crack when the epoxy breaks but then I heard a nasty crunch. I peeked under the cooler and the entire vpu core had ripped away from the card and was still stuck to the cooler. Ah sh!t I just wrecked my video card, so I figured that I would make it a learned experience. So I procceeded to remove the heatsink as well. Same thing happened. The heat sinks ripped the memory clear off. I mean all of them. I tried to be as tender as possible but it all cases the memory was ripped clear.
http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33666131
I thought something similar happened to another person who provided several pictures of a GPU/memory-less PCB. If anyone has a link to the pictures I would appreciate an email so I can post it here.