PotatoHandle wrote on 2021-12-23, 05:47:

Ahoy there guys and gals, […]
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Ahoy there guys and gals,

I was recently fortunate enough to liberate a complete Slot 1 Pentium 2 system from a friend's clothes storage. Works great, but I've been trying to tidy it up a bit and install some modern conveniences (New PSU, CF-IDE adapter, Gotek FDD emulator, etc)

The main problem that remains is the failing and extremely noisy CPU fans, which are about as effective as a mouse blowing through a drinking straw. Embarrassingly I ordered a passive Slot 1 cooler on ebay and only later decided to research if all slot 1 coolers are the same; which as it turns out, they're not.

So the attached picture is what I have left. Top-left is the original cooler (In multiple pieces because I thought I could move the metal clamp hardware to the new cooler, I can't figure out how to get it back together), top-right is the passive aluminium cooler from ebay, which if I understand correctly now, is SECC2 when I need SECC1.

Is there any hope for either of these, or should I accept my losses, and order another one? If so, are there any more things I should take into account when ordering a new one?

Thankee for any help. o/

The metal straps still on the heatsink must clip into the matching holes on the PII cartridge heat transfer plate (reverse heatsink pic might help here)...

and then the additional separate pieces are to tension them together, tho not sure quite how atm; the webpage for the model isn't much help either - https://web.archive.org/web/20010419161448/ht … /cpu/p-05b.html

TBH, I usually dump these types clips in short order and thread zip ties into the cartridge & heatsink to lock them together.

You could zip tie them or use long enough case screws to secure it.

I did the former to an Athlon 750MHz Slot A and the latter to a P2 266MHz.

Biggest problem adapting a SECC2 cooler to a SECC1 cartridge is the pattern of the holes needed to mount them is different. Hole spacing on the SECC1 is 2.11" x .88" (53.6mm x 22.36mm) while the hole spacing on SECC2 is 1.906" x 1.37" (48.4mm x 34.8mm) - {note not official specs just what I measured from my 2 styles of heatsinks w/ calipers}

While drilling new holes in a SECC2 heatsink to the SECC1 pattern is doable the problem is the clearance slots in the two heatsinks are different and will probably require cutting clearance in a few fins of the SECC2 heatsink to clear the heads of the mounting screws with the new hole pattern. I have two different styles of SECC1 heatsinks, some use the mounting clips as yours has and some are screwed directly to the cartridge with factory screws. I have replaced the factory screws with 6-32" socket headed machine screws which screw in just fine.

As a person that has accesses to machines that would make this kind of conversion trivial, I figured out its not even worth my time as last year I was able to pickup six new in box SECC1 coolers with fans for about $7 a piece.

A piece of advice, some times you can find a very common SECC1 cartridge cpus with an attached heatsink cheaper than you can buy just the heatsink by itself...... strange but true. I have a few times bought a pentium 233, 350, 400 or 450 because buying the cpu w/ heatsink was cheaper than buying the SECC1 heatsink alone was selling for. (note not all 350, 400 or 450 pentium IIs are SECC1 many are SECC2) You can find 266, 300 or 333 cpus w/ heatsink cheap as well it just seems those a bit more desired then the other models I mentioned and tend to run more.

Keep all parts. This is a nice cooler and as long as nothing is bent or broken it can be reassembled. The fans can be swapped for newer quieter ones.
I believe I have the same retention mechanism somewhere in storage. Next time I'm there I'll take pics to help you reassemble yours.👍

Thanks for the replies fellas, very much appreciated.

@PC Hoarder Patrol and @PCBytes
Yeah, I've been having all sorts of trouble getting the clips to go into the slots in any convincing way; I would prefer to jank something together with the passive cooler if possible, I was thinking about drilling new holes and using cable ties, but I thought I might get arrested by the Jank Police if I talked about it too loudly.

@Grem Five
Thanks for all that info, TBH the probable need to remove fins is why I was thinking about going with new holes and cable ties; as long as it'll do a good enough job. Shipping rates to Australia are pretty heavy; I saw some really nice looking New old stock OEM coolers for sale on ebay for $9US but by the time I paid to get them here, it would have been about $60AU total (Making buying a whole CPU cheaper locally like you said, more-often true than not, haha), so that's a last-resort at the moment. Are there any online retailers you (Or anyone else reading) would recommend checking out for retro PC gear with shipping to Aus?

@Doornkaat
That'd be super-swell of you, even if I get the passive one on I'd still like to have the original one back together again so that'd be really handy if you could.

Thanks again for the help guys. o/

Well if you cant fix the clips on your original heasink you could remove the fans, mount the heatsink with M3.5 x .6 button head or socket head machine screws that have 9mm of thread length in the 4 holes I mentioned. Then replace the fans with some of the same size that are easy to find on aliexpress.

I'm guessing your original heatsink has the holes already in it as the ones I have that use those clips have provisions for both slots for clips and holes for screw mounting.

If you want any of the technical specs for the SECC1 check pages 42-62 of http://www.citi.umich.edu/projects/citi-netsc … df/24333503.pdf

PotatoHandle wrote on 2021-12-24, 03:49:

@Doornkaat
That'd be super-swell of you, even if I get the passive one on I'd still like to have the original one back together again so that'd be really handy if you could.

Hey dude, sorry it took so long. I had to dig pretty deep to even find my Slot A coolers.
The one I found is not totally identical but similar enough that you should be able to figure out reassembly with the pictures provided:
OK, so first this is what it looks like assembled:

This is how you disassemble it:

I hope this helps you or is useful to anybody else who has similar issues.