Celemine HSF fits ok, but seems so loose?!

[Lancelot]

I lapped my heatsink today, and reseated it with some thermal grease and a stronger (old Pentium mmx) clip. It fits flat on and ok, but it can be moved so easily, is this normal for cele-/coppermines when the white thermal pad on the HSF isn't used?

[klosters64a]

The HSF doesn't need to be under the pressure of an SK7 clip from hell, except according to GlobalWin's design of the steel clip for FOP-32/38's and FOP-1-32/38's, and probably their new replacement, too.

However, it should remain stationary when you try to twist it with gentle to gently moderate force. It's possible to bend some SK7 clips so that they'll exert more or less pressure. Just take your time, and try to coax the SK7 clip into a new profile, rather than slap it into a vise and bend the crap out of it.

You can buy replacement SK7 clips from http://www.3dfxcool.com . You'll need one sooner or later.

[LimeyGreg]

That depends on how easy is easy. Put a very thin layer of thermal compound on your HSF, clean off the cpu and then mount HSF to CPU. Gently move HSF a little and then remove it, check your CPU to see if it is completely coated now. Where you see thermal compound on the CPU is where they touch.

If you've got no contact then look to see if HSF is resting on something. One other problem is that you may have a small foreign body between HSF and CPU - how are the temps?. I've seen some reports where the HSF has hit the ZIF lever - could that possibly be what has happened?

[Lancelot]

The contact is good and my temps are @ 29C idle and maxes out @ 45C under full load, it's a standard Intel HSF and I'm running a CeleronII 800 @1008 (8x126) with 1.75Vcore, so I guess I'll just leave it like this.