CM 690 First time water cool

[max51]

More pics of my water cooling build.

 

[max51]

Here are some temp and benchmark guides, max GPU temps for MSI Kombustor, and max CPU temps on prime 95. The GPU temps on watercooling have dropped by over 20 degrees. I have also added idle temps and a unigine benchmark

As you can guess i am well happy with my first ever attempt at watercooling

 

[max51]

Review.
Starting with the case. A Cooler Master 690 II advanced.
I am well impressed with the quality of this case for the price and it has taken everything i have put into it without much problem. I have found it is a very easy case to work with , also plenty of room for even my duel graphics cards.
I have a couple of minor gripes, the side panel should have the option of no fan vent window as well as one with a vent, also i would have liked just a little more room behind the mobo tray for cable manegment as it is a bit of a squeeze to lay the cables flat enough.

 

[max51]

Review for the cooling loop
CPU and GPU water blocks. EK Copper and Plexi. Full cover for the GPU's.
I found them very easy to install with a good set of instructions and instalation guide. Just be careful when stripping the air coolers of the GPU's and replacing them with the blocks.
Res with pump.
The bay res is the XSPC for the VPP655 or D5 pump.
SILENCE As you can see from the pics i removed the tool free clips from the drive bay holders, as it is better to screw the res into place, and doing so it is very quiet with only a slight background hum.
Coolant used is the Mayhems UV blue.
Fan Controller i chose as it matched the case well is the Lamptron FC3. Clean and simple to use.

 

[max51]

Struggling to make out from the pictures, what were your max temps in Prime95 and Heaven?

The temps in the top pic look pretty high so I'm guessing they were with the old setup?

All looks good though. Getting temped by the RX240 rad, although might just get an external 1080 rad (or 2) if my noise & temps don't improve.

Hi to answer your questions on the temps. The top one is a 20 min run with MSI Kombustor a full on extreme torture test. With the GPU's on aircool after that time the temps hit 90c and still climbing but with the water cool they stayed around the 70c mark. The next test i ran was the prime 95 for the cpu and the temps hit a temp max of 32c after a 30 min run which to be honest with you are no different to when i had the H70 on the cpu, but my main concern for watercooling was the GPU's. The idle temps have dropped from 45+ degrees on air to mid to high thirties on water. Heaven benchmark only hit a high of 54 degree c where on air it was very quickly gong into the 70's and even eighties at times. So as you can see there is quite a big difference for having the GPU's watercooled. As for the bay res and pump, they are so quiet. the only time i hear quite a bit of noise is when the fans are on 100%but the fan sweetspot seems to be around 50% for the system fans and 65% for the rad fans and then it runs very quiet. i am well impressed with it thus far. hope you get your noisy res and pump sorted.

 

[max51]

Looking good mate, nice job.

Though I dont really rate XSPC rads tbh, I had the RX480 and RS240, and I got better temps using my old Alphacool triple rad using the same fans. (the Alphacool rad was only 45mm thick as opposed to the 56mm thick RX series)

The new Thermochill TA series rads are much nicer imo.

I've tried the TFC quad X-Changer, XSPC TX480, and Thermochill PA and TA series, and the TA rad is by far the best out of them all.

I expected to see a dramatic drop in temps going from a dual and triple to a dual and quad (the XSPC RX480), but instead I ended up having worse temps, and a year down the line about 2 weeks after my warranty expired the RX rad developed a leak from one of the center tubes.

They are one of the most expensive quad rads out there, that's what made me buy the thing in the first place, but like I said it didn't perform as well as any of the other rads I have tested personally.

Also the finish on them is pretty poor as well, the paint was flaking off my RX480 when I bought it, and it only got worse as time went on, same with the Feser X-changer, but my Thermochill rads have a much durable finish on them imo.

I got a good deal on my RX480 I got it from OcUK for £60 as opposed to the prices they sell for now (I got it when they were selling off all the old WC stock), but after owning one there's no way I'd advise anybody to go out and spend £114 on the RX480 simply because of the issues I had, like I said, I expected to see a change in temps going from a triple and double to a quad and double, but instead I ended up with higher temps.

Thanks for the advice on the XSPC rads i will keep an eye on them and update if i have any problems with any of the kit i have installed in my system. At the moment all seems to be running well and my temps seem to be very good. The good thing about that bottom rad is it hides a lot of the cables

 

[max51]

Thanks everyone so far for your help and comments.
Now my turn to ask you guys a question?
The side panel i have is the Cooler Master standard windowed panel with the fan placement vent. I am not that keen on the vent, good yes to add an extra fan for air cool but for watercool i do not think it is needed. So i feel a change coming on but which?
Total clear acrylic.
Blue tint acrylic
Or a nice mirrored finish acrylic.

Answers please on a post card

 

[max51]

Great build! What about a smoky/charcoal fininshed acrylic?

Thanks will have to add that to my list, as that would look good as well. Now even more confused Will have to see if i can see some Acrylic samples before i get a new window. Or put it to the vote.

 

[max51]

I think it looks much nicer than my build and I think you did the right thing getting the parts you did up front (EK CPU block and the 650 pump). I bought a cheaper kit and ended up replacing mine, making it more expensive in the end.

Few too many lights in it for me (I prefer my PCs to be dark in case I leave them on overnight) but I think it looks good. Also glad you managed to get a 240mm rad to fit in the bottom. there's not a lot of space once you have a PSU down there is there!?

Surprised you haven't overclocked the CPU a bit though. As it is your load temps are like my idle temps! (1055T @ 3.5GHz)
Mind you my chip/mobo does require quite a few volts when overclocking.

If my results turned out as good as yours I suspect I'd have been happier with mine.

Lets hope for both our sakes that DavyBoy's experience with the XSPC Rads was a one-off. If the bottom one leaked it would be bad enough, if the tops one leaked...

Thanks for the comments. I will be doing a bit of overclocking now i have a good cooling system. The CPU has already been pushed to its limit on aircooling, a 1090T running at 4.1GHz which i thought was a fairly good OC for that chip. Those Phenoms will never clock as high as the intel chips, but i use AMD as it is such a good allrounder and extremly good performance for the price. If you look at the bencmarks against the previous £900 i7's there is not that much between them.

 

[max51]

Update.
Braid has arrived so i can now tidy and sort the rest of my cables, also the clear Acrylic as well all marked and ready to cut.
Had to get a new toy to do the cutting

 

[max51]

very impressive, i hope i gain enough confidence to try watercooling at some point too

Thanks guys.
I just took the bull by the horns and and built my system. Never having watercooled before had to start some where, any questions or problems the guys on here will help you and point you in the right direction, they did me and many thanks to all.

 

[max51]

Hi all.
Another update, had a play with my Dremel today and cut out the Acrylic for the new side window. When i had cut to size got it fitted and now looking good, also added a fan to the back panel to help keep the Mobo a little cooler.

 

[max51]

Just incase anyone was wondering. The fan i used is a 80mm x 15mm Silenx Xtrema pro series quiet fan, as there is not enough room to use a std 80mm fan. Also that fan will fit in the GPU bracket that comes with the 690 II advanced case.

 

[max51]

Now a little more cable management and a final tidy and more pics for you of my first time having a go at water cooling.

 

[max51]

Looks a lot better without the vented side panel.
In a couple of months starting with asking questions about watercooling i have gone from this.

To this.

Thanks again for every one that has commented and given advice, any questions or more advice would be good.
Any one else need help please feel free to ask, fun as well as a challange.

 

[max51]

now for the tech stuff a few benchies and temps.

I am very pleased with how the system is working, all seems to be running very well. Even with a 3.8GHz overclock did not break into a sweat.
Even with the fans on 100% it is nice and quiet.

 

[max51]

Looks very nice mate.

One thing I'd point out is that the tube WITHOUT the anti-kink on at the bottom (The tube that's cable tied to the HDD caddy) looks quite harshly bent round to the point where it looks like it could kink, perhaps you could loosen the bend on it slightly?

Thanks for that. It is ok but i have put some anti kink coil on to be on the safe side.

 

[max51]

This

Thanks for that Lunawolfy

 

[max51]

Cheers guys. It was a bit daunting at first alex2k10. I have been working on air cooled PCs for some years now , so had the basics and with an engineering background i found it went together quite easy. Just took my time and looked at all the other systems on here for ideas and a guide, asked a few questions and away i went.

 

[max51]

How thick is the acrylic sheet?
Did you cut it with your dremel?
Also noticed that there is a 1200mm fan in the other side of the case, did you cut that with dremel as well?

Hi Avathar77. The Acrylic sheet is 3mm and yes i did cut with the dremel. I used the original vented window as a template so i could use the original fixings as well. As for the fan on the other side panel, the vent is allready there on that case to put the fan. But it has to be a 80mm x 15mm fan as the standard 8ommx25mm will not fit.
Also that fan fits nicely into the GPU bracket that comes with the CM690 II Advanced case.