Take inventory and familiarize yourself with the mounting hardware. The nipples have threaded studs on each side and the fixing screws are larger black thumbscrews. Also included are smaller metal fixing screws that the springs are initially attached to. These are used in lieu of the black ones if you have SLI or Crossfire. The PVC washers are die-cut in a small clear sheet.
First, remove the old heatsink and clean all of the thermal goop from the GPU die surface. I use 91% isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol and a coffee filter, which makes an excellent lint-free cleaning cloth. If the goop is particularly tough, use either Oops or Goof-Off - xylene-based solvents available at most larger department stores. If you use either, clean the die surface with alcohol afterwards, as xylene leaves a film after it dries. Also, clean the ram surfaces and the heatsink base with alcohol and a lint-free cloth.
There was a huge amount of goop under the stock cooler, and I made a pretty good mess of it trying to clean it off.
Install the ramsinks by carefully peeling the backing from the tape and firmly press the ramsink onto the ram surface Be sure to hold it for a few seconds. The adhesive reaches 90% of its holding power in 24 hours, so you should be able to reposition it in the first few minutes if you don't like how you put it the first time.
