Water Cooling noob pls help

trmn8r10

trmn8r10

trmn8r10

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I have finnaly taken the plunge to the Watercooling world and I need help.

I have chosen a case for watercooling, the rads but I need help with the rest.

Specs for upcoming build:

NZXT Switch 810 Big Tower Case - Gun Metal
1 x XSPC AX360 with 6 Gentle Typhoon 120mm 1850 RPM Push-Pull
1 x XSPC AX240 with 4 Gentle Typhoon 120mm 1850 RPM Push-Pull
Aerocool Strike-X 1100W '80 Plus Gold' Modular Power Supply
Asus Z77 Maximus V Formula
Corsair Vengeance Black 16GB 1866MHz
I5 3570K (What is the best mount?)
2 x GTX 680 (Full block or invidual bits, will it be bottlenecked?)

What is the best pump for this loop, Which reservoir and pump.
Best fluids?, I would like a crimson red.

Cheers for the help.
 
OK in no particular order

1. Where possible I would say it is preferable to use full cover waterblocks for your GPU's. You have a few to choose from for the 680s and they all perform much the same so just pick the design you like the most

2. With a good overclock (say around 4.5ghz), which should be easy under watercooling, the 3570k shouldn't be a bottleneck for your 680's.

3. I would personally change the PSU but that is only because aerocool is not a brand I am very aware of. It may be a rebrand of another PSU which is fine, but someone else would need to confirm this. Personally I would go with a corsair, thermaltake, coolermaster etc for PSU's.

4. Fluid wise I think the best coloured fluids for long term use are probably the mayhems pastel range. However a lot of people prefer to use coloured tubing instead because the fluid stains the blocks etc. The staining can be cleaned though with a little effort and it doesn't affect performance so don't fret too much over this.

5. The best pumps would be either the laing ddc 18w if you are going to use blocks with high restriction, or the laing d5 or one of its many rebrands if you are going to be using blocks with minimal restriction. In either case you will be happy with either of those two pumps, between them they represent the best available at the moment.

6. Reservoirs don't affect performance so pick one that you like, they really only aid in bleeding the loop and act as a convenient fill point. Personally I go with bay res's because I like to see the fluid in the front of my case, however these have a habit of vibrating slightly and usually need dampening of some sort. Tube res's are another option and provide more flexible positioning options whilst mostly negating the vibrating issues caused by bay res's. Alternatively you could go with a t-line and not have a reservoir at all, the choice is entirely yours :)

I hope that helps a bit
 
Cheers for the help, I have a Palit gtx 670, is it possible to remove the cooler and a a full block cooler to it, I am way out of my league so I have no idea where to begin looking for the answer. If It is possible could I buy another gtx 670 remove the cooler and add full block or would that make them incompatible becasue theyre different brands.

How to tell if a block has high restriction?
 
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OK...

1. Mixing and matching brands with graphics cards is not a problem. As long as the second card is also a gtx 670 it will not matter. If one is clocked higher (i.e. has a factory overclock) then it will be downclocked to match the slower card automatically. Equally if one has more memory than the other then the card with more memory can only use the same amount as the card with less memory.

2. Do you have the palit with the reference cooler or the jetstream? If you have the reference version then you should be able to buy any full cover gtx670 waterblock (my favourite is the xspc razor) and fit it in place of the reference one. If you have the jetstream then I think it uses a non reference PCB and therefore may be incompatible with the full cover waterblocks, I am not certain of this though.
 
I have the jetstream, and I believe I am buggered. Should I sell the GTX 670 and save up cash for a GTX 680 full block?

I have selected some more parts:

EK Multioption Reservoir X2 250 Advanced
Laing D5 Vario Pump -T12 VPP655
EK-Supremacy - CPU Waterblock - Copper Acetal
XSPC AX240 Dual Fan Radiator
XSPC AX360 Triple Fan Radiator

Are all of these parts the same metals, because I heard you shouldnt mix metals. What GPU block is best and is the same metal as the rest of the parts, I want to buy one from Overclocker UK so its already attached.

What about tubbing and barbs, what are they and which ones are best?
 
Wow lots more questions... OK here I go :)

In no particular order:

1. Don't jump the gun and sell your 670 yet. Let me confirm if it is indeed incompatible with the full cover waterblocks first.

2. Mixing metals is not as big of a problem as you seem to think. The only metals that you should not mix are copper and aluminium. Any combination of copper, brass and nickel is fine though. The AX series radiators have copper / brass cores and the CPU block you have chosen is a combination of copper and acetal (plastic) so you will be fine.

3. GPU blocks should all perform similarly so just choose based on design. As I mentioned earlier my personal favourite for the GTX 670/680/690 series is the XSPC Razor. As a rule though I would currently avoid any nickel blocks made by EK. They had some plating problems not so long ago and it is still unclear if they are completely fixed. Their copper blocks should be fine though.

4. When you say tubing and barbs you actually mean tubing and fittings.

Tubing:
Tubing pretty much speaks for itself. It carries the liquid around your loop to the various components. There are multiple sizes of tubing with varying ID's (Inner Diameters). Basically larger ID tubing offers greater flow rates but doesnt bend as easily. I think the general favourites are 7/16" ID and 1/2" ID. 7/16" is easier to work with and there is virtually no performance difference between the two so that is what I would recommend. As for brand I personally use XSPC Highflex tubing and it seems to be pretty good quality.

Fittings:
Fittings are what connect your tubing to the various components in your loop. You will need two fittings for every component in your loop (i.e. two per radiator, pump, reservoir, waterblock etc), basically one per inlet and one per outlet.

There are two types of fittings, barbs and compression. barbs are much cheaper but don't offer as tight a fit as compressions. However the general consensus is that if you go with barbs get barbs that are slightly larger than your tubing (i.e. if you have 7/16" ID tubing then get 1/2" barbs). This creates a tight fit that is unlikely to leak. also you can combine barbs with hose clamps (or even zip ties) to make sure the seal is as tight as can be.

Compression fittings are much more expensive but hose clamps etc are not necessary as they already create the tightest possible seal... in theroy. TBH if you go with 7/16" tubing and 1/2" barbed fittings as mentioned above then you are highly unlikely to have any leaks. I combine mine with hose clamps just to be sure though ;). And either setup can leak, but that is what leak testing is for :)

Right, I am going to get some sleep. I will be happy to answer any more questions tomorrow for you :D
 
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Cheers, so all the parts I have chosen are ok. I would like some dye in my system, but most people say it will build up in the blocks, is it better to get coloured tubing?

Cheers
 
Dye won't really affect performance unless you neglect maintaining your loop. As long as you flush it out every 6 months or so it won't cause you a problem. It may stain the blocks a little over time though. Coloured tubing of course has neither of those issues, though your loop will still need flushing at least every 12 months.

If you do go for coloured tubing and plain distilled water then make sure that you also add a biocide of some sort to the loop. Either a silver coil or a chemical of some description, otherwise you risk small bacterial growths and they will definitely hinder cooling performance.
 
XSPC Twin D5 Dual Bay Reservoir/Pump Combo, would this do as a pump for the 2 rads. it has 1200 litres per hour flow rate.
 
trmn8r10 said:
XSPC Twin D5 Dual Bay Reservoir/Pump Combo, would this do as a pump for the 2 rads. it has 1200 litres per hour flow rate.
Click to expand...

That would be overkill for the loop you are planning. A single D5 is more than capable of handling almost any watercooling loop. The only reason to have a second in series really is for redundancy but the d5 is not exactly known for failing.

If you want to get a combined reservoir and pump then this will do just as well and save you a lot of money.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=WC-140-XS
 
Thanks for the info and the black finish looks better that the see throught one. Have you been able to find out if a full cover block is available for the Palit gtx 670 jetstream, when I watercool should I leave a fan for cooling of the motherboard, or could I use all fans for rads.

Cheers
 
Yes as per the link given by rich it seems your card should be fine with any EK gtx670 waterblock or in theory any full cover block at all.
 
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