Any advice for first time soldering?

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siphillis said:

dc jacks have usually 3 pins, there are two ways to unsolder it, you can either try to heat all 3 pads so that you can pick it up with a tweezer, or you heat up one pad and lift it with a little bit of force, then heat the next pad until its out, if it has 3 pins use the second way as its much easier for first time solderers.
 if it has just 2 pins just heat both pads and take it out.

be careful the dc jack gets very hot

Or you can use solder wick, soak up the melted solder and that way you have a clean hole that after doing each pin falls out. :D

Solder wick is your friend.  Your best friend when desoldering.