nForce4 chipset woes (prz help srsly)

[Alive]

Thats "thermal tape" he's talking about, and after you removed the little sticky protector all's you needed to do was stick the whole shebang onto the northbridge and 'voila! you would have been home free form your little tech journery into the hsf abyss (no little plastic/screw adjusters needed, held on by thermal tape alone -but now who knows..)

But cutting away a little hole into the thermal tape may have caused you a little connection problem afterall, and the tape sides may be riding higher then the contact to the core is. you made an incredibly easy job hard in the long run, but if you can get a little thermal paste into that "cutout" portion this may still work providing the existing tape has enough adhesive to still make good contact.