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Is Water cooling for CPU safe? How does it work?

M

M8triX

Member
I was woundering and curious about CPU water cooling and was woundering if its safe. Can someone give me some info on how it works and what is the best water cooling system out there . I plan on overclocking my AMD XP 2000 and if i was to overclock how much can i overclock with a watercooling system . thx
 
A watercooling setup consists of a radiator (to cool the water), waterblock (this goes on your cpu), a bracket, a pump, sealed hoses and a resevoir (store the water)

The water usually goes from resevoir->pump->radiator->waterblock (some setups may have waterblock first), therefore the pump pums the cooled water to the waterblock first thus cooling your cpu

The radiator is usually located where your front harddrive is, waterblock goes over your cpu, and pump is usually at the bottom of your case along with the resevoir

A fan is usually required for the radiator and hoses are the "highways" from each major item: pump, radiator etc

Watercooling is known to give you temps in the low 20s =0

You use only distilled water (tastes nasty) in watercooling

But watercooling is quite expensive...about $100 if you plan on getting each part individually, or $135 from frozencpu for a complete kit

You must take extreme caution while installing it, making sure all the tubing is securely set on the pipes, because electricity+water=fubared computer
 
what would you say is the best put together kit?

I know a broken tube is deadly, so i want a kit with sturdy tubes, but i also here condensation is a major problem. Anyway to prevent that from happenin?

But moreover i want sturdy tubes, cause i may plan on moving my computer about, since i frequently go to LAN parties.
 
maurvo, the best way to do so is make sure the setup is air tight, so there can be no leakage or pressure loss, it really depends on you, not the tubes themselves

You will probably add 5 pounds to your computer with watercooling <--made a bs figure
 
Danger Den and D-Tek both make excellent kits. Plan on spending around $200 for a kit from either of them, though. If you are hoping to achieve serious overclocks, you need to buy a kit with 1/2" fittings instead of the typical 3/8" fittings. You'll get significantly higher flow rates, which lead to significantly better cooling. You can put your own water cooling setup together for $50-100 less than buying a kit, but I don't know enough about watercooling yet to help you do this. With plain water cooling, you don't have a problem with condensation. For condensation to be a problem, you have to go below ambient temps, and without some active (peltier) cooling, you'll never get a water cooling rig below ambient.

If you want a kit in place such that you can still freely move your system about, you need to invest in an inline kit instead of a reservior based kit. Inlines are harder to setup, as you have to bleed all the air out of them, but they are fully sealed, and barring a seal leak, you won't have any worries of water leaking once they are running. With a reservoir, you have to be concerned with the reservoir coming open every time you move the case. The upside of reservoir based systems are you don't have to worry as much about air, as it will collect in the reservoir if you built your system properly. Finally, hose breakage is unlikely, as the hoses are fairly soft and pliable. Kinks, on the other hand, are a real concern. You have to make sure you don't bend any hoses too tightly, or they will kink, reduce water flow, and fry your processor.

RagManX
 
I dunno, im just nervous about it.

On a scale to one to 10, id put myself as a 4, as that i know a lot about dealing with comps. But this will be my first computer i put together. Is there a guide that gives me fail-safe ways of installing a water kit, cause i DO NO wanna screw up my whole computer because i messed up on the water cooling.

If anyone has the patience, i'd really appreciate someone telling me what to do.
 
Id get the computer up and running first with some bs hsf, and not overclocking. Then, when everything works, install the water cooling system.

edit: since you've never put together a computer before.
 
I am about to put a watercooling system in with a peltier after I setup the watercooling and it runs for a few days. Although this is my first, I am confident I will be fine with it since I definetly know my way around computers. After I put in mine, I could help you...you may not want if since it's my first one, but I'd be willing to help if you need it.
 


<< I dunno, im just nervous about it.

On a scale to one to 10, id put myself as a 4, as that i know a lot about dealing with comps. But this will be my first computer i put together. Is there a guide that gives me fail-safe ways of installing a water kit, cause i DO NO wanna screw up my whole computer because i messed up on the water cooling.

If anyone has the patience, i'd really appreciate someone telling me what to do. >>



heres a watercooling guide (scroll down to bottom to W)

As i said before, it all depends on you...
 
Listen.. I haven't read this whole thread.. but the best water cooling setup out there is the one YOU put together yourself. With a bit of reading and hands on.. you can set up a really good water cooling setup for minimum dollars.

First things first..

Get a good water block.. these you need to buy pre-made.. unless you are handy in the workshop. They usually cost 40 to 80 dollars (USD) depending on the quality and design and .. yadda yadda..

Next would be the water pump.. You want something that is going to put atleast 300GPH through.. unless your water block is specified for a low rate of water flow.

Tubing is importent.. haha.. anyway.. Go down to your local home depot.. or lowes or whatever.. If you are really worried about a tube break.. get the double walled clear PVC tubing.. it's real thick and has a white mesh running through it.. cost around 50 to 70 cents a foot.. THAT TUBING WILL NOT BREAK ON YOU.. It's spec'd for 200 to 300 PSI.. which is far more then you will be running.

use metal hose clamps on EVERY possible connections.. I CANNOT stress this enough.. as when you put a hose on a fitting.. the hose will expand over time.. getting bigger.. allowing for leaks and or the blow off of the tube. Using metal hose clamps and a good screw driver or power drill and clamping them real tight will save you a lot of hassle.

The radiator is a real fun part 🙂 If you want something that is nice cheap.. yet efficient.. go to your local Kmart or wal-mart .. and get a small box fan.. I mean.. SMALL.. they have like miniture box fans.. I don't know the sizes.. but you'll see when you get there.

While you are at home depot buy some flexible copper tubing.. Most of the times you must buy this by the 10ft roll.. It's about $12.00 for 10ft. I think 10ft should suffice.

Take your newly bought box fan and remove the cover.. where the air blows out.. the "front" .. remove that plastic mesh front and start winding your copper tubing in side.. like.. going from left to right.. do it very carefully.. you don't want kinks in the copper tubing. Once you are finished use plastic tie straps to strap it down to the plastic mesh.. be sure to leave enough copper tubing sticking out of the mesh so you can easily plug your water tubing into it.

There you have it.. a very cheap yet very good radiator... the more copper tubing you have exposed to the air the more heat you will dissapate.. the shear size of the box fan will blow a ton of heat offa the tubing.

Now if you don't feel confident doing this.. then just buy a radiator from a water cooling store online.. or whatever.. i don't care.
The nice thing with the box fan is you have adjustable speed.. low, medium, high.. and of course off.

The resevior can be anything.. I find tubberware to be the easiest to cut up and modify if needed. Just fill it with 100% pure distilled water.. and for every gallon of distilled water put in the resevior.. add 2oz's of Red Line's Water Wetter. FYI 2oz's is the same as 1/4 a cup and 1 gallon of water is = to 128oz.
1 cup is 8oz's.

I think that's it.. That's just my 2cents.. although I have a lot of expirence in the water cooling field.. so you might find some of this over your head. I could go into much more xtreme setups for killing a TON of heat through radiator setups.. but I am sure since you are a newb.. you'd like to get your first time done easy 🙂.
 
Thanks a lot, i think i may just be confident enough to try water cooling now.

Last Question for now: how much space will this take in an SX1040 case. And before i go any further, i guess i should say i will have a window installed, so if this is in the way, i need to know.
 
You'll have to modify the case to make water cooling .. look and work properly.. I mean cutting metal and what not. The window won't get in the way.
 
heh... with all this talk about watercooling, I'm reminded of this one idiot who tried to fill his water resevoir while the comp was turned on, spilled, and started an electrical fire inside his case... his whine post was on anandtech awhile ago...
 
Something else I don't believe anyone has mentioned here is that you should never build your water cooling system inside your case. First, assemble and fill the whole thing outside of your case. Run it outside your case for a day to make sure you have no leaks. Once you are certain there are no leaks and you've bled air out, put it in your case without disassembling it. Run it with the system turned off for a while (a full day is best, less if you are eager and brave) to make sure there are still no leaks. If everything looks good at this point, turn your system on and see how it all works.

RagManX
 
but those of us who have the radiator behind the case (piggy-back) have only the option of your second comment. maybe for us, it's best (just to be safe) to remove everything first, then test it in the case w/ everything attached, then try with the system up and running.

quick note: our AMD chips will fry within 10-30sec if the block falls off. i saw that tomshardware vid clip of him taking off heatsinks while q3 was looping. Intel chips dont have this problem (they crash the system or slow to a crawl). i hear the AMD chips fry is because mobo mfg dont take advantage of AMD's thermal sensor register, then again it could just be a hopeful rumor.

what's the difference between the Acrylic Topped Copper Spir@l Waterblock and Gemini Cool High Flow Spiral other than one says "Spir@l" and the other is "Spiral"
 


<< what's the difference between the Acrylic Topped Copper Spir@l Waterblock and Gemini Cool High Flow Spiral other than one says "Spir@l" and the other is "Spiral" >>


The Gemini was designed for a kit with sound levels first in mind, while the Spir@l was designed with max performance first in mind. Both work very well, but the Gemini can't maintain the performance of the Spir@l. The Spir@l is over twice the size of the Gemini. Hit the forums at procooling.com and look for threads comparing them. Fixittt has pictures he took of the two blocks together. You'll see the difference there.

RagManX
 
I had the same question and I asked Danny from D-Tek, here's what he said:

"The original spir@l has large 3/8" x 1/2" deep channels and is considerably bigger than the gemini and more made for high flow 1/2" systems. Other than that they are pretty much the same design pattern. Either way the Gemini is a proven performer and a good price to go with it."

Really nice guy and either waterblock is really nice performer, but the Spir@l does have a waiting period. I'm putting mine on pre-order and getting the Gemini and then the Spri@l later.

Hope that helps.
 
churcheo,

does that mean the gemini spirals might be too small to handle an Eheim 317GPH pump? i'm also planning on watercooling my GeForce 3, would the flowrate be too much for the smaller waterblock on a gpu coming from the spir@l?
 
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