My watercooling debut - gtx 580 & i7 920

mountaincow · 21 Jan 2011 at 23:43

I installed my first ever loop the other day, running a GTX 580 972mhz at 1.213v, 4.6ghz on vram and i7 920 c0 at 4ghz at 1.38v. Using a D5 and Phobya xtreme 200 rad, EK block on the 580 and apogee xt on cpu.

I saw a maximum 59 on the GPU and 78 on the CPU whilst running Bad Company 2 for around 2 hours. I saw 58 on the GPU and 75 on the CPU running Crysis Warhead.

I don't know the exact water temperature, but are these acceptable as running temps? I was planning on adding a second 120.2 to the loop, but hopefully at a later date, however if the temps are dangerous for running the pump then I will of course buy one asap.

Terribly sorry for the blurry pictures.

The tool for the job:

The hand made brackets:

The sacrificial tin:

I was doing this early in the morning and couldn't afford to wake anyone, which is why I resorted to the pliers and self tapper, luckily there was a marathon of Red Dwarf on Dave which kept me going

The drill and the cat:

The fitted rad:

I then had to wait for the rest of the gear to arrive, which took a while... I was planning to take a bunch of pictures of the bits I used, but words will have to do, and I am sure your eyes are already full of tears.

The finished product:

I went for the nickel plated acetal EK gtx 580 block and backplate, EK 150 x2 advanced res, and D5 as already stated. The swiftech apogee xt was bought second hand as I was feeling cheap at the time.

I was hoping to go for compression fittings as they do look very nice and save using any clips but it turns out this would cost too much, especially with the adapters I would have needed for the cpu block, so I went for stubby bitspower black barbs and then stuck those ugly jubilees around them all to satisfy my worries =D

I have yet to create a shroud for the rad, but still deciding on materials.

Anyway enjoy your chuckle and good night!

Exsurgo · 21 Jan 2011 at 23:57

GPU temps seem fine but those CPU temps are a little hot. Thing is that 75 ish c is probably ok for gaming use, but if you did any really demanding CPU stuff like rendering it would probably climb into the high 80s, and stability tests would be worst.

What type of fans are you running out of curiosity, and what setting is the D5 on?

I think if you get your loop optomised a bit high 60s is a more desirable temp on the CPU while gaming, although long term I would aim for a bit more cooling power. It probably is that your 200 rad just is not enough for the combined Thermal output of the GTX and an OC'd i7, in which case it might be easiest replacing it with a 240 rad. although most people on here would probably go a 360 with that setup.

mountaincow · 22 Jan 2011 at 00:35

Well I will not be replacing the rad but adding to it, as I have managed to fit it inside my antec 1200 with the fan at the top pulling out.

Running prime 95 I saw a maximum of 78c on the CPU, which is a C0 btw. On air on this overclock I was seeing nearly 100c which was obviously unacceptable, so I dropped down to 3.8ghz. I have never had any crashes running anything including prime on this overclock, just pretty high temps.

The fans I am using are stock antec tri speed fans on the lowest setting, which I am planning to replace in the future, and the D5 is running on it's maximum setting.

Monkey Puzzle · 22 Jan 2011 at 02:29

Another option might be to replace the bigboy 200mm fan with a fan that has better static pressure (silverstone 18cm air penetrator maybe?) - the radiator's fins are widely spaced but that 200mm fan spins really slowly (800rpm max iirc). Is there a lot of air coming through the radiator atm?

mountaincow · 22 Jan 2011 at 02:45

Well I have turned the fans on the rear of the case around so I now have five in and just the top out, so there seems to be a reasonable amount of air coming out of there. I will definitely look into the replacement top fan though, along with the rest of the 120's.

As I said I have all the fans on lowest rpm, including the bigboy, I will run some more benchmarks later today with varying fan speeds so I know exactly how much difference the air flow will make, however I think creating a shroud between the fan and rad will be my first attempt on improvement, as I am sure a decent amount of air is being sucked in around the sides of the rad.

MikeHiow · 22 Jan 2011 at 02:56

Can we have bigger pics, please?

mountaincow · 22 Jan 2011 at 03:04

Hehe, sorry about that... I can't do bigger but I can try for blurrier

SeraphX · 22 Jan 2011 at 09:27

nice build, but pictures are only good if people can actually see them without having to scroll all over the place

dandos23 · 22 Jan 2011 at 09:56

Nice build Jazzerman!

I was planing to get the same rad as you have, any chance you could give me the measurements as I know that it is bigger than 200x200 and I need to work out space?

Those temps do seem a little high. I would definitely change the fans on the rad, but if is a low fin density then apparently just a high CFM fan will bee good, you wont need a high static pressure fan.

shimy182 · 22 Jan 2011 at 11:11

good work Jazzer ! good to see pics of ziggy too

mountaincow · 22 Jan 2011 at 15:03

dandos23 said:
Nice build Jazzerman!

I was planing to get the same rad as you have, any chance you could give me the measurements as I know that it is bigger than 200x200 and I need to work out space?

It is 200mm wide and 230mm long, including the plugs in the end it is 240mm.

Hope this helps.

TheCenturion · 22 Jan 2011 at 15:08

Voltage is way higher than you should need for 4ghz, turn it down. It's what is causing your high temps

mountaincow · 22 Jan 2011 at 15:43

Dropped my voltage down to 1.35, my 1.38 was from my 4.2ghz profile, but it was unstable like that.

Running prime now and seems to be holding up nicely at 4ghz 1.35v, will report back on temps.

Okay, had to up to 1.355v, running Bad company I saw 77c highest on the CPU and 58c on the GPU after 2 hours play.
Prime run for Just under 2 hours I saw 74c highest.

dandos23 · 22 Jan 2011 at 18:24

Jazzerman said:
It is 200mm wide and 230mm long, including the plugs in the end it is 240mm.

Hope this helps.

That is just what I was after. It does mean that I will have to rethink the layout of my case though.

Keep us updated on those temps though!

Thanks again.

jamesfreddie · 22 Jan 2011 at 20:03

Add a 240mm Rad.

mountaincow · 22 Jan 2011 at 23:11

Had to bump my cpu voltage up to 1.36 as it was crashing on prime, not entirely sure how stable this clock is as I only ran prime for an hour or so.

Made a temporary shroud for the fan using cardboard and electrical tape and set the big boy to medium setting. The highest temp I saw on prime was 73c, and on BC2 74c with a gpu temp of 54c.

Will run prime again overnight and hopefully find that this voltage is stable.

TheCenturion · 23 Jan 2011 at 11:26

Do you have hyperthreading on? You really shouldn't need 1.36 to get to 4ghz. What stepping is it?

Try these settings, taken from Bifday 2k's post:

Ai Overclock Tuner.....................[Manual]
CPU Ratio Setting......................[20.0]
Intel(r) SpeedStep(tm) Tech............[Disabled]
Xtreme Phase Full Power Mode...........[Enabled]
BCLK Frequency.........................[200]
PCIE Frequency.........................[101]
DRAM Frequency.........................[DDR3-1600MHz]
UCLK Frequency.........................[3200MHz]
QPI Link Data Rate.....................[Auto]

CPU Voltage Control....................[Manual]
CPU Voltage............................[1.3]
CPU PLL Voltage........................[1.80]
QPI/DRAM Core Voltage..................[1.3]
IOH Voltage............................[1.12] <<< auto
IOH PCIE Voltage.......................[1.50] <<<auto
ICH Voltage............................[1.20] <<<auto
ICH PCIE Voltage.......................[1.50] <<< auto
DRAM Bus Voltage.......................[1.64]
DRAM DATA REF Voltage on CHA...........[Auto]
DRAM CTRL REF Voltage on CHA...........[Auto]
DRAM DATA REF Voltage on CHB...........[Auto]
DRAM CTRL REF Voltage on CHB...........[Auto]
DRAM DATA REF Voltage on CHC...........[Auto]
DRAM CTRL REF Voltage on CHC...........[Auto]

Load-Line Calibration..................[Enabled]
CPU Differential Amplitude.............[800mV] <<< auto
CPU Clock Skew.........................[Delay 300ps] <<< auto
CPU Spread Spectrum....................[Disabled]
IOH Clock Skew.........................[Auto]
PCIE Spread Spectrum...................[Disabled]

C1E Support............................[Disabled]
Hardware Prefetcher....................[Enabled]
Adjacent Cache Line Prefetch...........[Enabled]
Intel(r) Virtualization Tech...........[Disabled]
CPU TM Function........................[Enabled]
Execute Disable Bit....................[Enabled]
Intel(r) HT Technology.................[Disabled] <Enabled
Active Processor Cores.................[All]
A20M...................................[Disabled]
Intel(r) SpeedStep(tm) Tech............[Disabled]
Intel(r) C-STATE Tech..................[Disabled]

jaffveyda · 23 Jan 2011 at 12:33

The only thing that i have noticed that you are wearing 2 different socks.

mountaincow · 23 Jan 2011 at 15:59

Yes, I have HT enabled, as already stated it is a C0.

TheCenturion · 23 Jan 2011 at 16:52

Well, disable HT and see how you go