Hey guys. I was excited about doing my first water cooled build so I decided to do a project log.
A while back I upgraded from an i7 920 to a 3770k, and I was tired of the noise from my reference 670s so I decided I may as well go big.
System Specs:
New stuff I bought for the build - I was fortunate enough to get some hand-me-down radiators, so that made the build a bit more affordable:
Apologies for the phone cameral, especially the ones taken late at night since it's awful in low light. I'm hoping to take some nicer pictures once it's 'complete'.
First some silliness:
Assemble the pump/res:
Put everything back together and pray it still works (had a cheeky boot into BIOS with the old cooler to check it wasn't dead):
Block mounted using Thermalright CF3:
Next up the cards:
It's a bit of a shame I didn't go for full cover blocks, but I couldn't really justify the cost for such old cards. Maybe next time eh. Truth be told with the bridge fitting you don't see a whole lot of them anyway. I might put some heatsinks on the VRAM later; from current testing they don't seem to get too hot.
Mounted with the link:
In their new home:
I ended up flipping the rear fan to an intake, and moving the GTs into the roof in a pull configuration to give me more room.
Tubing up started:
I actually had a bit of a problem deciding where to mount the pump. I'd originally planned to have it on the pump mount in the back compartment, but with the reservoir it wouldn't fit - plus it would have been difficult to get the tubing around there.
In the ended I mounted it on top of the floor radiator. I used a screw in the fan mount hole with some o-rings and washers, as well as some of the handy foam pads that come with the case. Once everything was tubed up it doesn't budge at all.
You can also see I used the stock Phanteks fans for my bottom radiator. I didn't have any more GTs, and I'd originally planned to use just the 480 to cool the entire loop. I saw there was clearance to mount the radiator to the bracket with 140mm fans in place so it seemed like a good idea to me.
Ready for leak testing:
I was pretty nervous at this point, I had mental images of everything getting flooded as soon as I flicked the pump on. Luckily everything went okay though. You can just about make out my drain port going under the HDD bays. The floor-mounted radiator meant that it didn't really work so well, unfortunately.
Filling the loop for the first time:
Loop was running through with no immediate leaks; I was a bit surprised at how loud it was though. Most of the pump noise was just because of bubbles, so after some rocking and stop/starting it quietened down. I left it running like this for around 24 hours, one because I had to go to work, and two just to make sure!
As you can probably see in the pictures, I filled with DI water first to... flush it through? To be honest I don't actually remember why I did that. I think I wanted to make sure everything was clean inside before I used the 'real' coolant.
I don't have any pictures of draining the loop, but it was a pain! I did it totally wrong, and ended up flipping the case around all directions a lot to get as much as possible out. I had to tilt the last of the water through the fill port on the reservoir. On the upside, a few more drains like that and I'll be on the road to an 8pack-like physique!
For next time I think I'll make a small length of tubing to screw in to the fill port, that way I can open the tap on the drain port and blow through to flush everything out (at least, that's what I'm hoping).
Filling for what I hope is the last time for a little while:
Again with the bubbles! I'm happy these just take a little bit of time to dissipate:
Home straight, connecting everything up and moving the HDDs over:
Radiator bracket makes it nice and easy to keep the cables hidden
Lifting this thing is definitely not for the faint of heart! It was a bit of a mission getting it back to its proper home.
Here's a size comparison with my previous case:
At first all the fans were running at full whack so it was quite noisy, but thanks to doyll it's all up and running nicely now, and so quiet! I haven't seen temperatures go above 50 during Prime, and the cards don't seem to budge above 40 or so (I do need to do some more challenging gaming with them though).
Future checklist:
Thanks for reading! Let me know if you have any questions.
A while back I upgraded from an i7 920 to a 3770k, and I was tired of the noise from my reference 670s so I decided I may as well go big.
System Specs:
- NZXT Hades
- Asus P8Z77-V
- Intel i7 3770k @ 4.4GHz / 1.3v w/ CNPS12X
- 16GB Crucial Ballistix @ 1600MHz (8-8-8-24)
- 2 x nVidia GTX670 (reference)
- 256GB Crucial RealSSD C300
- Corsair TX850 PSU
New stuff I bought for the build - I was fortunate enough to get some hand-me-down radiators, so that made the build a bit more affordable:
- Enthoo Primo
- XSPC D5 Pump
- XSPC Tank D5 Reservoir
- Magicool Xtreme 480mm Radiator
- Alphacool ST30 240mm Radiator
- EK Supremacy CPU Block
- 2x EK Supremacy VGA Bridge Edition w/ EK-FC Bridge
- 4x Scythe Gentle Typhoon 1850RPM
- Mayhems X1 UV Blue Coolant
- XSPC Compressions
- Primochill 16/11 Clear Tubing
Apologies for the phone cameral, especially the ones taken late at night since it's awful in low light. I'm hoping to take some nicer pictures once it's 'complete'.
First some silliness:
Assemble the pump/res:
Put everything back together and pray it still works (had a cheeky boot into BIOS with the old cooler to check it wasn't dead):
Block mounted using Thermalright CF3:
Next up the cards:
It's a bit of a shame I didn't go for full cover blocks, but I couldn't really justify the cost for such old cards. Maybe next time eh. Truth be told with the bridge fitting you don't see a whole lot of them anyway. I might put some heatsinks on the VRAM later; from current testing they don't seem to get too hot.
Mounted with the link:
In their new home:
I ended up flipping the rear fan to an intake, and moving the GTs into the roof in a pull configuration to give me more room.
Tubing up started:
I actually had a bit of a problem deciding where to mount the pump. I'd originally planned to have it on the pump mount in the back compartment, but with the reservoir it wouldn't fit - plus it would have been difficult to get the tubing around there.
In the ended I mounted it on top of the floor radiator. I used a screw in the fan mount hole with some o-rings and washers, as well as some of the handy foam pads that come with the case. Once everything was tubed up it doesn't budge at all.
You can also see I used the stock Phanteks fans for my bottom radiator. I didn't have any more GTs, and I'd originally planned to use just the 480 to cool the entire loop. I saw there was clearance to mount the radiator to the bracket with 140mm fans in place so it seemed like a good idea to me.
Ready for leak testing:
I was pretty nervous at this point, I had mental images of everything getting flooded as soon as I flicked the pump on. Luckily everything went okay though. You can just about make out my drain port going under the HDD bays. The floor-mounted radiator meant that it didn't really work so well, unfortunately.
Filling the loop for the first time:
Loop was running through with no immediate leaks; I was a bit surprised at how loud it was though. Most of the pump noise was just because of bubbles, so after some rocking and stop/starting it quietened down. I left it running like this for around 24 hours, one because I had to go to work, and two just to make sure!
As you can probably see in the pictures, I filled with DI water first to... flush it through? To be honest I don't actually remember why I did that. I think I wanted to make sure everything was clean inside before I used the 'real' coolant.
I don't have any pictures of draining the loop, but it was a pain! I did it totally wrong, and ended up flipping the case around all directions a lot to get as much as possible out. I had to tilt the last of the water through the fill port on the reservoir. On the upside, a few more drains like that and I'll be on the road to an 8pack-like physique!
For next time I think I'll make a small length of tubing to screw in to the fill port, that way I can open the tap on the drain port and blow through to flush everything out (at least, that's what I'm hoping).
Filling for what I hope is the last time for a little while:
Again with the bubbles! I'm happy these just take a little bit of time to dissipate:
Home straight, connecting everything up and moving the HDDs over:
Radiator bracket makes it nice and easy to keep the cables hidden
Lifting this thing is definitely not for the faint of heart! It was a bit of a mission getting it back to its proper home.
Here's a size comparison with my previous case:
At first all the fans were running at full whack so it was quite noisy, but thanks to doyll it's all up and running nicely now, and so quiet! I haven't seen temperatures go above 50 during Prime, and the cards don't seem to budge above 40 or so (I do need to do some more challenging gaming with them though).
Future checklist:
- Braided cable extensions (4x GPU, CPU 8pin, ATX 24pin)
- Route the pump sensor wire properly (need an extension for this)
- LED strip
- Modded SLI bridge
- Get rid of that yellow on the RAM
- Coolant temperature sensor
Thanks for reading! Let me know if you have any questions.
I made a castor base for mine. Raised case 42mm with an added 350sq cm of area. Bottom fans flow more air and are quieter too.. not like they are noisy anyway. 