water cooling basics?

barnei

barnei

barnei

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Joined
27 Nov 2008
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62
I could upgrade the fans in my case but am I right in thinking its time to go water cooling rather than up grade all 5 fans in the antec?

My few questions are:

1) Should I cool my GPU aswell, will it allow extra OC potential?
2) Do I need a single, double or triple rad?
3) Do the more expensive rads perform noticeably better than the cheaper ones?
4) XSPC 200 or XSPC Dual 750 bay reservoir and pump?
 
Don't know much about watercooling myself, but im interested in giving it ago also. I'm also running the same case as you the Antec1200.

My thoughts are that the Antec1200 isn't really that good for watercooling, unless your happy to mount a triple mount out the back of it. Otherwise theres not huge amounts of room in the case, i'd prefer to use two loops one for GPU and one for CPU but then i wanna OC both of them to the max!

I guess it comes down to what you want from the watercooling setup, is it for OC'ing that little bit more, or are you just after better temps and a quieter PC in general?
 
I want to overclock everything to the max.

Previously I had my chip at 4ghz but it was very hot with no HT and I've had to turn the clocks down for summer.

So I'd like to be back at 4ghz permanently or as high as possible with HT on, with out worry of summer and descent general temps.

I think doing one loop for cpu sounds good then.
Then I can save up for the second loop on gpu.
Should be easier for a first time builder this way :)

Just need to work out how many radiators I need.
And as you said where to put them in the case.
 
As a first time water cooler i would reccommend you put the GPU and CPU in the same loop as 2 loops does not make a huge amount of difference. You will want atleast a double rad triple would be better also the better rad brands make do make a difference in cooling the system and also cleaning out the loop.

o/
 
To cool i7 at 4 Ghz ang 4870 X2 you need minimum triple rad or duble thick one.
Don't go for XSPC 200 it is too weak, 750 will be very goog choice - quiet and efficient.
XSPC rads are very good and good for value as well - go for it - I recommend RX240.
 
cooling my I7 on water oced to 4.2 with load temps below 70 and idle temps low 30's
not added my gpu as yet
got a triple xspc in roof of case with 3 120 fan pulling in, got 120 on back pulling out
 
Any case is suitable, but they vary in difficulty. Pretty much look at it and try to work out where you could fit radiators, the antec P183 is not the easiest one to attempt.

Colling the gpu will improve noise, improve gpu overclock (at least a bit), and hurt cpu overclock because it heats up the water which you're cooling the processor with. The best route for a novice is probably to cool the cpu only, then add in the gpu, possibly on a second loop later. Personally I cooled the gpu only to begin with, then added the cpu.

You want a triple if it will fit, but a double will do, especially if only cooling the processor. Consider a double + a single instead of a triple.

Yes and no. The 60mm thick ones are better than the 30mm thick ones, but beyond that there isn't that much difference. More important is matching fan speed to radiator, high fpi means higher static pressure needed. Thermochill are the favourites, with feser and the black ice ones coming second. I use feser.

Neither, the laing ddc or laing d5 if you can afford it. Otherwise get the xspc one which doesn't fit in a drive bay
 
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