Hey I guys I think i really messed up my cpu. So I have an Phenom X4 which was using a stock cooler. I decided today I was going to get the coolmaster hyper 212. Installation went smoothly, but being new at this I put on WAY too much thermal paste -- I put on the whole thing. I found out I did after reading online I immediately opened my computer up to take it apart and try to salvage it. The Whole cpu chip was covered and some of it had come off from the sides and gotten onto the border where the actual chip is. I tried to take off as much of the excess with 90% isopropyl and qtips (from both the CPU and the heat sync. Is it it bad I used the alcohol to clean the paste that was on the chip? Also I didn't completely wash off all the paste because I don't have any paste left, so I cleaned off as much from the border of the CPU as I could with the alchohol. I think it might be possible i might have gotten a hint of alcohol on some of the paste near the middle. Is that bad? What should I do? Should I completely stop using my computer right now and wait to get some new thermal paste and start new? The weird thing is that I'm running at 25-29 C idle-full load. However, in games I the framerate goes down very low after every few seconds. Oh there's one more thing, on the green chip (where I got some thermal paste) part that borders the metal part of the CPU I think I see some thermal paste lodged in the the crack that lies between the chip and the metal. What do I do? Is my CPU basically gone? I'm so stressed I should have just kept my stock, it was actually working very well :/ Thanks guys.