Importance of pressure

One important factor that doesnt get addressed is the need to have even and firm contact between the heatsink/cold plate and cpu.

In my case, I used zip lock tie ins to increase the pressure my alpha pep 66 put on my cpu (with peltier and cold plate) decreased my temp from -3 at idle 20 minutes to -9 C.

actually presure is stressed here, I think the one thing you HAVE to careful of is the danger of cracking the core. If you read the general discussion we are collecting the number of dead chips from this forum. It is already above 30 i believe, and we have only had a few replies so far. Pressure is good, you have to have good contact with everything, but too much(this is a very fine line) and you have lost your chip. But you are right about needing pressure.