new amd 1.2@266 hsf

[rdr2go]

OK, I may be paranoid, but I have heard many horror stories, like screensavers tv show broke 2 amd cpu's.
I have brand new abit KT7A-raid, amd 1.2 266, coolermaster hsf w/melting thermal conductor that came with it. there was a little peice of packaging stuck to the side of the thermal stuff, so I wiped it off, then dabbed the stuff with clean cottan cloth. Then I read next section-DON'T LET THERMAL CONDUCTOR COME IN CONTACT WITH ANY FOREIGN SURFACE. crappers1

Question-should I go ahead and boot her up?
Should I go out and clean off thermal stuff that came with it and get high performance heat dissapater stuff?
Was I a fool to get the coolermaster recommended by website and amd, and get fancy smancy global orb or sim-what do you rec?

 

[Lvsheng]

Well, if you can't wait you can boot it up. But make sure the thermal paste if applied between the HSF and CPU. My friend fried a AMD Duron because he didn't put the thermal paste between them. Why not consider getting a Alpha HSF, it is better in cooling, check out those review on HSF on Anandtech. No I dun think you are a fool.

 

[shiznut123]

As long as there is no foreign substances on the part of thermal pad that touches the cpu.You should be fine. Take your time installing the HS.