Need help/advice re watercooling (check specs)

Gommsta · 18 Nov 2006 at 13:59

Hi all,

I'm looking to watercool the following setup which resides in a PC-7+ ....
E6700 (will be overclocked)
Asus P5W
Ati x1950 xtx (will overclock)

I want performance but it to be as silent as is possible.
I've read a few guides and i've come up with the following specs. What would you change in this or advise me to add/forget.

Pump - AlphaCool Laing DDC-Pump Ultra 12V
Rad - Thermochill PA120.2
Res - DangerDen 3.5" reservoir (takes up both bays)
CPU- Swiftech Storm
NB Block - needed? thinking that this board runs hot. advice please
GPU block - I don't really know? looking at EK stuff
Tubing - 3/8"

Any advice, or suggestions would be really appreciated. Thanks

Mr_Flibble · 18 Nov 2006 at 14:54

Hi,
Your cooling system looks similar to mine, which im very happy with so far.
For the graphics card im using, and recommend the Danger Den Maze 4 and use some heat sinks for the memory. This keeps my GPU temp at around 40 degrees when under load.

2bullish · 18 Nov 2006 at 15:52

Gommsta said:
Hi all,

I'm looking to watercool the following setup which resides in a PC-7+ ....
E6700 (will be overclocked)
Asus P5W
Ati x1950 xtx (will overclock)

I want performance but it to be as silent as is possible.
I've read a few guides and i've come up with the following specs. What would you change in this or advise me to add/forget.

Pump - AlphaCool Laing DDC-Pump Ultra 12V
Rad - Thermochill PA120.2
Res - DangerDen 3.5" reservoir (takes up both bays)
CPU- Swiftech Storm
NB Block - needed? thinking that this board runs hot. advice please
GPU block - I don't really know? looking at EK stuff
Tubing - 3/8"

Any advice, or suggestions would be really appreciated. Thanks

Excellent choice of pump

Get the pa120.3 if it will fit in the case, if not your choice is excellent. With the Pa120.3 you can run all the fans at 7v and it will be silent

Get the Swiftech micro res or a bay res that only uses one bay, personally I prefer a t-line

Storm is the best but will you find one? If not the Aquaextreme is excellent.

No need for an NB block as it will restrict your flow for no appreciable gains, restricting your flow will hurt the Storms performance, get an aftermark fan.
Swiftech gpu blocks are very good

Yateloon or Nexus fans for your rad, very quiet with excellent cfm

Get 1/2 or 7/16 tubing

Distilled water with Zerex

Metal jubilee clips for all connections

Gommsta · 18 Nov 2006 at 16:28

Excellent, thanks for your advice 2bullish.
Just had a look at the micro-res and it looks perfect. Not sure about a 120.3 in a pc-7+ size wise, will get templates for all these parts and fit em up i think.

Do i want 5/8 or 9/16 outside diameter on the tubing? and is Masterkleer a decent enough make?

Anyone else got any help to give?

2bullish · 18 Nov 2006 at 16:30

Gommsta said:
Excellent, thanks for your advice 2bullish.
Just had a look at the micro-res and it looks perfect. Not sure about a 120.3 in a pc-7+ size wise, will get templates for all these parts and fit em up i think.

Do i want 5/8 or 9/16 outside diameter on the tubing? and is Masterkleer a decent enough make?

Anyone else got any help to give?

Tygon 1/2 is considered the best, the Storm needs maximum flow rate because of its design. The pa120.3 is the best rad on the market, if you can get it to fit do so.

Mr_Flibble · 18 Nov 2006 at 16:45

With the tubing i have tried 1/2" and 7/16" id maskerkleer tubing and by far recommend the 7/16" size as its easier to route and bend, it has a tighter bend radius before the tubing starts to pinch.
It is slightly harder to get onto the fittings but if you heat the tubing in hot water then it goes on pretty easy with the added bonus seems to shrink onto the fitting has it cools making it very secure.
On the other had i havant tried any of the tygon tubing so dont know how it compares to that

Gommsta · 18 Nov 2006 at 16:54

yeah that was my thinking on that type of tubing mrflibble.

I'll go see about the 120.3 and i'll be fitting nexus fans to whatever i buy.

2bullish · 18 Nov 2006 at 16:56

Gommsta said:
yeah that was my thinking on that type of tubing mrflibble.

I'll go see about the 120.3 and i'll be fitting nexus fans to whatever i buy.

Nexus are excellent as are the Yateloons, at 7v your nexus will be silent but with good airflow.

Gommsta · 19 Nov 2006 at 13:27

Ok, i've looked at dimensions a fair bit and i'm not gonna be able to make a nice install in the PC-7 so i'm looking at creating a top box out of the same alu used in the case. I may be able to fit a 120.3 in there now.

Can you quickly look over my leet sketch and tell me if everything looks ok.
If so i'll go order the parts

Thanks all

2bullish · 19 Nov 2006 at 13:35

Gommsta said:
Ok, i've looked at dimensions a fair bit and i'm not gonna be able to make a nice install in the PC-7 so i'm looking at creating a top box out of the same alu used in the case. I may be able to fit a 120.3 in there now.

Can you quickly look over my leet sketch and tell me if everything looks ok.
If so i'll go order the parts

Thanks all

Nothing wrong with that diagram, good luck with the build and even greater luck finding a Storm block.

Its_Me · 19 Nov 2006 at 14:01

Thick walled silicone or tygon(tygon is clear) will give good resistance to kinking when going through a tigh raduius.

Also check your flow:

You have a serious lack of air coming into the case. You want blue = red as much as possible - otherwise you have a negative pressure and will hinder rad perfromance.

Another consideration is the flow, idealy you want to be extracting the very last degree out of the system, to do this the pump should be before the rad.
the best configuration for you:

RES > PUMP > RAD > CPU> GFX.
Also check the GPU block, if its too restrictive then maybe consider a bypass loop (with a check valve).

I would also swap the CPU block to the Apogee block, far betetr for the CPU's with IHS.
http://www.swiftnets.com/products/APOGEE.asp

Gommsta · 19 Nov 2006 at 14:53

Thanks for the input. I didn't think the order of things mattered much as long as res was before pump?

I can't add anymore fans to the front or the side. I want the thing to look good too. Do you reckon i should have the rear fan as intake then?

2bullish · 19 Nov 2006 at 15:18

Gommsta said:
Thanks for the input. I didn't think the order of things mattered much as long as res was before pump?

I can't add anymore fans to the front or the side. I want the thing to look good too. Do you reckon i should have the rear fan as intake then?

You are quite right, as long as the res is before the pump none of the other connections matter in real terms. Having the pump before the rad, and the rad say, straight to the cpu may give you a net yield of .2 of a degree, miniscule in real terms and absolutely nothing in overclocking.

As heat rises and you have your out take fans before any heat hits the rad and also as nealry all of your heat is being absorbed by your rad there is absolutely nothing wrong with that setup. Make sure your intake sucks enough air into your rig.

Its_Me · 19 Nov 2006 at 15:30

2bullish said:
You are quite right, as long as the res is before the pump none of the other connections matter in real terms. Having the pump before the rad, and the rad say, straight to the cpu may give you a net yield of .2 of a degree, miniscule in real terms and absolutely nothing in overclocking.

As heat rises and you have your out take fans before any heat hits the rad and also as nealry all of your heat is being absorbed by your rad there is absolutely nothing wrong with that setup. Make sure your intake sucks enough air into your rig.

how do you work this out then, the only air supply to the rad is the hot air from the mainboard.

Also the flow design is not always to do with temp, it has a lot to do with pressure drop.

Gommsta · 19 Nov 2006 at 16:00

Isn't the pressure drop largely irrelevant if you have a powerful enough pump?
We're not talking hydraulics, so surely flow rate is the important thing rather than overall system pressure?

Also, i thought the purpose of the rad was to dissipate the heat in the watercooling system, with the help of the fans sitting on it. Isn't the only heat source not connected to the water cooling going to be the motherboard so therefore not a big factor?

My aim is to build a silent well cooled system so that I can get some decent overclocks as well. I'm new to this and maybe missing something obvious so i bow to any knowledge that is provided.

cheers

Its_Me · 19 Nov 2006 at 16:43

Gommsta said:
Isn't the pressure drop largely irrelevant if you have a powerful enough pump?
We're not talking hydraulics, so surely flow rate is the important thing rather than overall system pressure?

Also, i thought the purpose of the rad was to dissipate the heat in the watercooling system, with the help of the fans sitting on it. Isn't the only heat source not connected to the water cooling going to be the motherboard so therefore not a big factor?

My aim is to build a silent well cooled system so that I can get some decent overclocks as well. I'm new to this and maybe missing something obvious so i bow to any knowledge that is provided.

cheers

it all depends largely on if you consider switching to the APOGEE block.

I suppose you could switch the rear exhaust fan to suck in, that would at least romote airflow over the CPU area (PMW's etc).
The obvious problem is the fact your PSU is exhausting close to the fan.

MikeTimbers · 19 Nov 2006 at 17:38

Pump pressure is important in order to achieve flow-rate. A pump with low head won't be able to push a lot of water through a restrictive water-cooling system and flow-rate is what gets your temps down.

Gommsta · 19 Nov 2006 at 18:02

You're right

but we're not talking about pump pressure. The pump i've selected should be more than good enough to give good flow rates I would have thought? I was referring to overall system pressure.

Anyway i've decided what to buy now, thanks very much for your help guys, will post pics when its done

2bullish · 19 Nov 2006 at 22:39

Its_Me said:
how do you work this out then, the only air supply to the rad is the hot air from the mainboard.

Also the flow design is not always to do with temp, it has a lot to do with pressure drop.

Turn the red arrows going out to blue coming in at the top of the case.

That pump will give more than enough pressure in that loop.

Its_Me · 19 Nov 2006 at 23:00

2bullish said:
Turn the red arrows going out to blue coming in at the top of the case.

That pump will give more than enough pressure in that loop.

well i suppose thats an options, but your then going against the convection flow. But thats not what you have said in that post I quoted anyway.

Just aswell to move the rad to the base of the case and have it sucking in.

As for pump, does'nt matter how powerful it is, if the restriction limits it.

A pump is measured at free flow - not resatrictive flow - hence why I recomended changing the waterblock.
if you check the performance curve for the Storm V's Apogee (http://www.swiftnets.com/products/APOGEE.asp) you will understand why pressure is important for the Storm block.

As I said I don't consider the Storm a good choice for the IHS based CPU's ,but I based my advice upon its choice.
If he has decided upon an Apogee then its not likely to be such a problem.