Watercooled Upgrade

Discussion in 'General Hardware' started by Cartman372, Jun 10, 2015.

  1. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    So I've finally decided to go down the watercooled route. Up until now I've always gone with air cooling and this will be my first time actually laying my hands on a watercooled system, so I'm going to need some help :)

    With that said I have a decent idea of what I need and have started a parts list for the upgrade. I plan to have it completed in about a month.

    I plan on a single loop, cooling a 4.4GHz 3570k and dual 980 Tis.

    There are a few things I am unsure of and I have yet to work out. My case is a Phanteks Enthoo Luxe and according to their site the largest rad I can fit up top is a 360 or a 420. The problem is I already have a card reader and a disc drive in place and I am also planning on a 5.25 single bay res. This means that the amount of room I'll have near the end of the rad is limited, so I'm not sure if a 420 or even a 360 would fit properly.

    I do plan on creating a cardboard mockup of the rad so that I can get a general idea of what will be in the way.

    I'm also not sure if a single 360 or 420 would be enough to cool the loop properly. I'd prefer to get away with one radiator, but I could add a 120mm at the rear without having to move my hard drives around and swapping drive cages around. If this amount of cooling isn't sufficient then I'll have to move my drives around and see what can be done.

    Parts List (Updated July 6th 0600)
    http://pcpartpicker.com/p/mhkqMp


    I'm most likely going to go with black Bitspower compression fittings, just not sure on what I'm going to need yet.

    Also the Titan X blocks and backplate are placeholders until the 980Ti ones arrive. EK says the waterblock fits the Ti, but makes no mention of the backplate.

    I'm also not sure on the fluid. I'd like a UV fluid and I've heard Fesser is great, but I don't know how much to get or if I should run distilled with a UV additive.
     
    Last edited: Jul 6, 2015
  2. Veteran

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    If your going with dual Ti's and i high oc on cpu i would deffo go for the bigger rad. I would also make sure you can install this bigger rad before progressing any further. Could you fit a Monsta rad in there?

    http://www.watercoolinguk.co.uk/p/Alphacool-NexXxoS-Monsta-480mm-Radiator_25158.html

    You can always go with a cyclindrical res and drop the bay if your struggling for room.

    Also gaming at 1080/1200p is complete overkill for 2x980ti's, you will never use the 2nd card, even with 2 screens i wouldn't bother.

    Also i would only use distilled or deionzed water with silver coil/pt nuke. Dont bother with mixxed coolants as they clog up your loop quicker and you have to tear it down more frequently for a cleanout.
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2015
  3. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    No, there's no way that 480 would fit in my case. Largest I could get away with up top would be a 420. According to the Phanteks spec page I could fit a 240 up front and a 240 on the bottom (probably not at the same time though).

    As far as the res goes, there's an out of the way spot I could put a regular cylinder res, if for whatever reason a 420 gets in the way of my drive bays. Sometime this week I'll have to mock up a cardboard template of the radiators and see what I can do with them.

    But realistically for this setup you would suggest a 360 or 420 with an additional 240?

    As far as the screens go, I already have one 2412M and I'm planning on doing a triple screen setup. I enjoy playing on high IQ settings while also getting 60fps+ and two Tis should be perfect for that at 5760x1200.

    My estimates place GTAV and The Witcher 3 right around 60fps at that resolution with max graphics.

    As far as the liquid goes, I guess I should get colored tubing and leave the liquid pure? Are there any UV dyes that you would suggest? I'm not worried about stained tubing as much as I am clogged blocks.
     
    Last edited: Jun 10, 2015
  4. Veteran

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    I would go for the biggest rads possible. Using 3 screens is gonna make those cards run hot. Also I'm not sure how much vram you will use with three screens but 6gb may not be enough, I'm not sure how demanding this will be as shadow modor uses 6gb on 1 screen. Maybe look at 3 titans? As for tubing and coloured water, that's fine but it will clog up more than running with distilled etc.

    My last loop I ran for 3years on distilled,little bit of gunk but not alot. Coloured water loops are normally tore down within 6 months cause of additional strain on the pump and flow decreases.
     

  5. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Two or three Titans is a bit too expensive for me. As far as games go, I know Shadow of Mordor loves vram, but it's a game I've already beaten. For my budget and needs two 980 Tis seem to be the sweet spot.

    I enjoy longevity more than looks so I guess I'll just go for a colored tubing and leave the loop clean of UV additives and such.
     
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  7. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Thanks! I have that first thread bookmarked already. It's already helped me with a few ideas on how I can lay everything out.
     
  8. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Did some test fitting, the 360mm will be the perfect fit for up top. I'll mock up a 240 on the bottom sometime this week. Gotta move my SSDs to behind the motherboard and my hard drives to the upper cage.
     
  9. Veteran

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    Try to get the thickest rads you can like a monsta rad or rx.
     
  10. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Definitely won't work for a top rad. Even 60mm thickness is pushing it as it'd be right against my ram modules.
     

  11. Veteran

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    Is that in Push and Pull fan config or either of one of those?
     
  12. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    With my case I can mount pull fans with no addition to radiator size. The fans mount in an empty space above where the radiator mounts to.

    Like this (not my pic)
    [​IMG]

    With a slim 35cm radiator, I could fit my 25mm fans and have a perfect fit. 60mm is against the memory modules, and that's without pusher fans.

    EDIT: Did some more measuring, there's 40mm of space between the hard drive cages and the front panel. The 240mm rad I'm looking at is 30mm so there is plenty of space there. Removing the bottom cage would give me enough room to mount a single puller fan on it, so I could go that route and still have plenty of room for a pump on the bottom of the case.
     
    Last edited: Jun 13, 2015
  13. Veteran

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    Ok good stuff. There are lots of rads you can choose from, try to get the thickest possible depending what you can fit. I dont think its worth having push and pull tbh. The extra fans using power and noise, sacrificing room etc does not trade off regarding the decreased temps. Even when using a shroud its only couple degrees extra. Ive always used one fan config, nice sweetspot for noise, temps and powerdraw.
     
  14. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Not having to run a push/pull config would be great for fitment and let me upgrade from 30mm to 45mm thickness. Looking at an Alphacool XT45 360mm for a top rad instead.
     
  15. Veteran

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    Ok post some pics of your progress.
     

  16. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Will do. I'll probably buy the two radiators next week and start figuring out the routing and what fittings I'll need.

    Don't want to buy too much right now as I just bought two more monitors and a new stand and the Steam summer sale is happening currently.

    Also I probably should have stated that the top pic of the rad isn't mine, but one I found in that Phanteks case thread.
     
  17. Megabiv

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    From what I've gathered the push/pull configs don't massively improve the cooling. I mean it will improve cooling somewhat obviously but from what I've read it's not worth the extra cash on the fans, the increased space, power and of course fan headers.

    I'll also chime in that my previous setup of an XSPC AX360 rad and an XSPC 140mm rad managed to keep my SLI 580's and i950 at decent temps but with OC's on them it could easily raise the temps a bit too much for my liking and I ended up having the fans on almost full speed to cope (it was originally specced for a single 570 and CPU), so bear that in mind if you're looking to keep it cool & quiet. I'm now running a stupid amount of radiators in my 900D (2x480mm, 1x360 and 1x140mm) and I can have the fans on the very lowest of speeds with the temps all staying at or below 50'c whilst remaining whisper quiet. It's overkill but I was planning on "futureproofing" my setup as best I could since water loops rarely become outdated. Oh and a cylinder res is very helpful on space saving, plus my old EK bay res was a real pain to fill up and fit since it had the D5 pump built in.


    ***Edit***

    I've had a look at your case on the web and managed to find someone who has squeezed a 240mm in the front (removing HDD bays) and a 360mm at the top plus a tube res. This is how I'd plan of cooling it after my previous itterations - Link here

    If anything it can perhaps give you a few more ideas.
     
    Last edited: Jun 13, 2015
  18. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Yeah I'm looking at a 360 up top and a 240 in the front. Initial measurements look like the 240 will fit up front without having to remove the HDD cages entirely. I'll just have to remove the bottom cage to at least have one fan on it. If that doesn't work then I can mount the 240 on the bottom. I'll figure out final mounting for the 240 once I actually have the radiators on hand.

    Also I might just go with a tube res after seeing how much easier it makes things over a bay res.
     
  19. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    Decided to clean my case out and move the hard drives around last week. Didn't have the cable length to mount my SSDs behind the motherboard and still keep everything plugged in. Mounted them together behind the 5.25" bays so they're nice and out of the way now. Also removed the 2nd hard drive cage.

    I considered mounting the radiator on the front panel, but if I did that I'd only be able to have one fan on it and I feel that wouldn't give me enough airflow through the case nor would it provide enough airflow over the radiator.

    What I'm thinking of doing now is mounting an Alphacool UT60 240mm on the bottom. That way I get to keep my 200mm 110CFM fan up front. Just gotta check the measurements to make sure that the rad+fans will clear the PSU cover plate.
     
  20. Cartman372

    Cartman372 Maha Guru

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    So I decided to do some research on Performance-PCs before purchasing through them.

    According to everything I can find, they're horrible. Zero customer service and a lot of the stuff on the website isn't updated to say if it's actually in stock or not. Many pieces that are in stock could actually be out of stock.

    With that said is there another retailer that has the selection of Performance PCs? With Frozen CPU dead where else can I go? EK and Alphacool both list Performance PCs as an authorized reseller, but I'm not sure I want to get screwed.

    NCIX doesn't have the radiators in stock and nor do they know when they'll have more. So I'm not sure what to do here.
     
    Last edited: Jul 2, 2015

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