First watercooler - Advice required

[Marshy82]

Hi Guys,

I'm looking at using a watercooling kit to cool my CPU, however I've not done this before so haven't got the first clue.

I have a CoolMaster CM690 II Lite case which I'm informed was designed with watercooling in mind. I think the CoolIT Eco A.L.C. CPU Watercooler would be a good "starter" kit to be getting on with, however my question is, will this fit ok in my case? Also I've read that the stock fan that comes with this is pretty rubbish so any recommendations for a replacement would be appreciated.

 

[TheCenturion]

Even if it's your first build, why not go the full whack and assemble your own custom kit?

 

[Marshy82]

I'm just not confident enough to give it a go, I'm only an amatuer at this PC building lark, so I don't really want the hassle. I want to just be able to open the box, fit it in and away we go!

Sounds lazy and being honest, it is!

 

[sunjoo2012]

watercooling aint that bad i done my first watercooling around 3 weeks ago but i need money and have decided to sell.

also the eco fans are pretty loud i would say get a pair of scythe gentle typhoon 1450rpm or akasa apache's

 

[Marshy82]

Just been looking at the Corsair H70, what do people have to say about that?

 

[sunjoo2012]

the h70 is slightly better then the h50 but cost more
for that price if i were you i would either add a few ££ and build a water cooling loop or just get a decent air cooler like the dh-14 or silver arrow

 

[scrlk]

The CoolIT is only a LCLC (low cost liquid cooling) which means everything is in one unit. When you hit the 'wall' for cooling potential and you want to cool other things like your GPU, MOSFETS and NB/SB you will have to start from scratch and spend more money. The great thing about watercooling is you can start off with a simple CPU loop and then add more things as time goes by.

 

[TheCenturion]

To be honest, a lot of those pre made type kits are supposed to be only as good as high end air cooling. I wouldn't consider them to be a great introduction into watercooling, in fact I wouldn't think that they'd even bridge the gap between air and watercooling.

It will honestly be so worth it if you get your own loop together. There's loads of guides on the internet, and of course, OcUK is here for all the questions and help you might want

 

[trisp]

Megahamlems air cooler does the same or better then the eco/h50/h70s so i would buy that tbh. aslong as it fits!!

 

[OLDPHART]

I had a H50 with a Viper-push / Apache-pull and my temps at i7 920 at 4.2 never went over 70'c even on the hotest day, so go for the H70 when you have time replace the stack fans with a Viper-push / Yate Loon-pull.

If you decide to go a step further after a while and build a custom loop to cool CPU + GPU about £300, you could just save for that and sell your H70 or what ever and recoperate some money thats what l did.

If an Oldphart coming upto 56 like me can build a loop anyone can, first read up on it theres plenty of info on the net. Plus theres plenty of help of the more knowledgeable guys in this forum, l got plenty of sound advice of them.