Hey PC gaming fanatics - cause you probably have to be one to go with a water cooling solution, Am i right?
Well, I’ve decided to go with one since the fan for my GPU has started to make an awful racket. My entire case is essentially silent, but now, I can only play games with my headset on. I think something is wrong with the fan or the housing, but whatever, it’s given me the impetus to go ahead and go water cooling for my rig.
I think I picked out some nice parts. I’ve got a VGA and CPU block. A 2x 120mm fan radiator, a 500 L/H pump and a reservoir. All for $200!
All I need is the tubing and fittings, I guess, and that’s where my questions arise:
How do the fitting and tubing go together? I heard about using clamps, is this necessary always, or only with some types of fittings?
What about loop order? I was thinking resv -> pump -> rad -> CPU -> gpu then back to resv.
That loop order makes a lot of sense, you’ll have the coolest water hitting the CPU, where it’s needed and then slightly warmer water hitting the GPU, which can generally take the extra heat without issue.
I won a water cooling kit back in the day at a LAN, it came with tubes that had caps on them which just screwed onto the water blocks. If your stuff isn’t threaded to accommodate that, you’re going to use clamps. That isn’t a big deal though, unless they pop and destroy your system. (That’s why you use non-conductive fluid.) Personally, I’d get something that is florescent, clear tubes, and a UV cathode. That’d look cool.
What case are you jamming this stuff into? It was pretty simple with my Antec 1080, since that case is huge. I can’t imagine trying to do it with my Antec Sonata III.
I’ve got an CM Sniper. roomy for a mid tower, but I’ve got my stuff, and already I’m seeing issues. Full towers seem like the best solutions for this stuff.
I was planning on having the radiator be internal, but there’s just not enough space. Gonna have to go external at the back.
God, sorting out the sizes for the barbs and fittings was a nightmare. There’s like 10 different sizes, and NONE OF THEM were labeled!
Totally forgot about the SDMB Civ V game last night while doing this. I didn’t think it would take, jeebus 8 hours?
Well, that’s with the 1 hour trip to home depot because PNY decided it would be fun to use Torx screws on my GPU.
I ended up going:
Resv -> Pump -> rad1 -> CPU -> rad2 -> GPU then back to the resv.
I manage to fit one rad inside the case, and the other I mounted outside.
Load temps:
CPU: i7 920 @ 4 Ghz - 60 C
GPU: GTX 580 @ 900 Mhz (from stock 772) - 40 C
That GPU on load used to go as high as 95. 40C is a lower temp than my old idle.
Sweet upgrade - super silent which was important since the PC is in the living room, and the living room is small, and about 25% increase in FPS for $200, and no noticeable increase in footprint for m rig.
I can’t believe you got a double-rad setup for only $200. Rads are like $120 each. Water blocks are like $100 each. A pump is $50. Tubing is nothing. Compression fittings run you $20 each unless you get barbs and clamps. Fluid is $20/litre.
I always stayed away from water cooling 'cause of those prices, but if I could get temperatures like that for only $100 over high-end air coolers, I’d be a buyer. What’s your part list or trick?
40 C for an OC’d 580 GTX seems crazy low, even on water. I even looked up a 580 GTX water cooling review because I didn’t believe you and it’s also 40 C under load. Ridiculous. (Actually, it was 50C but that’s just the voltage difference)
Water cooling’s getting cheaper and easier to install, I think. My computer has a really simple $75 CPU-only setup that doesn’t cost much more than your standard fan/heatsink, and works quite well. It doesn’t hit my GPU, which still goes to about 70-80C under heavy load, but my CPU has never gone above 45C. Even with two fans on a push-pull config bracketing the radiator, the computer is really damn quiet.
Those self-contained loops are basically the Easy-Bake Oven of water cooling. They run louder and hotter than top-end air coolers like the Noctua D14 or Silver Arrow, despite costing more money.
Yeah price is way off. I was counting my own out of pocket expense, not what I actually paid for everything.
Open box discounted Kit with pump, CPU block, reservoir and 2x 120 mm radiator - $250
Extra stuff like coolant, fittings, clamps - $25
Second 2x 120 MM radiator - I got from a friend for free, would cost $80.
GPU block - $100
I got some money as an anniversary gift so I was taking that amount off the total.
