Thinking about watercooling my GTX680's... complete noob to this

[Beavermatic]

Hello all!

Just watercooled my i7 3770k with a corsair H100 solution... runs like a dream.

Now, I have (2) SLI'd EVGA Geforce GTX680's, compeltely stock fan slot coolers of course in the giant CoolerMaster Cosmos 2 case.



Curious what I need to convert them to be water cooled. What's the best waterblock/cooling equipments for the price, and how diffcult is it?

Treat me like a noob when it comes to water cooling. I know ALOT about building systems, but literally nothing about water cooling other than it uses pipes, watrblocks, and a radiator of some kind.

 

[JAG87]

It's not the same thing as buying an H100 and setting it up. Water cooling two GPUs properly will cost you around $500. Unlike the H100, it's a huge pain in the ass if something goes wrong and for whatever reason you have to take cards out. I strongly discourage you from doing it unless you have a specific reason for it.

 

[blackened23]

Hello all!

Just watercooled my i7 3770k with a corsair H100 solution... runs like a dream.

Now, I have (2) SLI'd EVGA Geforce GTX680's, compeltely stock fan slot coolers of course in the giant CoolerMaster Cosmos 2 case.



Curious what I need to convert them to be water cooled. What's the best waterblock/cooling equipments for the price, and how diffcult is it?

Treat me like a noob when it comes to water cooling. I know ALOT about building systems, but literally nothing about water cooling other than it uses pipes, watrblocks, and a radiator of some kind.

What are your goals for water cooling? Noise? Overclocking? You won't get additional performance on reference 680s via water cooling.

Furthermore, watercooling your GPU is not the same as putting a H100 on your CPU. It was way more involved, way more difficult, and significantly more maintenance. You'll have to read up on it for months because there is a LOT to know about setting up a custom loop.. A good start is reading all of the stickies at the overclock.net water cooling forum. You'll have to lurk there for a few months probably lol.

 

[thilanliyan]

Watercooling is great...I have my CPU and one of my 6950s watercooled right now, but it is definitely more involved than a Corsair H100.

You have to get a pump, waterblock, radiator (1 large or 2 small), resevoir, tubing, coolant, and hose clamps if you choose to use them.

The waterblock is probably the toughest part to choose. Getting a full cover block means you won't be able to use it on any other card in the future, and you have to make sure that the block actually does fit your card, since there are so many different PCB configurations.

Go by the "Cases and Cooling" forum as there is a sticky on watercooling there.

 

[chimaxi83]

lol it doesn't require months of planning. I built mine after reading at overclock.net for about 2 weeks. Blackened is right though, the only benefit to reference cards is lower temperatures. You won't necessarily gain more MHz, in case you were wondering.

What is your budget? This might be better in the Cases and Cooling subforum.

 

[Beavermatic]

So while it's effectively commercial for a CPU now, its still experimental and high matienance for GPU's?

I was looking at GPU and CPU cooling years ago, and only after the H100, I reconsidered hoping to see the same simplicty as for my CPU with the H100.

Just to do it is my main reason, they run cool as they can right now, no real noise issues, wouldnt overclock. Was considering it out of boredom... money really isnt a issue, but if its still high matienance and unsafe, may just leave it be as you've suggested.

 

[cmdrdredd]

So while it's effectively commercial for a CPU now, its still experimental and high matienance for GPU's?

I was looking at GPU and CPU cooling years ago, and only after the H100, I reconsidered hoping to see the same simplicty as for my CPU with the H100.

Just to do it is my main reason, they run cool as they can right now, no real noise issues, wouldnt overclock. Was considering it out of boredom... money really isnt a issue, but if its still high matienance and unsafe, may just leave it be as you've suggested.

Not experimental, but there are not any bolt on and go kits for GPUs like there is for your CPU. There is no Corsair all in one thing you can get. You have to buy blocks, a radiator, a pump, tubing, connectors, leak test it for like 24 hours and check for cracks in the blocks, leaks in the tubing and connectors and all that. It's a lot of work. It also needs to be maintained (i.e drained and fluid changed). Then there's more complex setups like using t-line vs using a reservoir.

 

[blackened23]

So while it's effectively commercial for a CPU now, its still experimental and high matienance for GPU's?

I was looking at GPU and CPU cooling years ago, and only after the H100, I reconsidered hoping to see the same simplicty as for my CPU with the H100.

Just to do it is my main reason, they run cool as they can right now, no real noise issues, wouldnt overclock. Was considering it out of boredom... money really isnt a issue, but if its still high matienance and unsafe, may just leave it be as you've suggested.

Its not experimental, what makes you say that? You have to go out and assemble your own kit. I'm hesitant to even refer to the H100 as water cooling, it really isn't as good because it is a closed loops. Water cooling your GPU will require a REAL custom loop which requires 1-2 rads, water blocks, res, pump, tubing, etc etc etc. This is obviously not something you can learn overnight.

You can do it if you want but you need to be prepared to read up and study up on it.

 

[blackened23]

lol it doesn't require months of planning. I built mine after reading at overclock.net for about 2 weeks. Blackened is right though, the only benefit to reference cards is lower temperatures. You won't necessarily gain more MHz, in case you were wondering.

What is your budget? This might be better in the Cases and Cooling subforum.

Gotcha I was overwhelmed when I first started reading about it on OCN, but I only glanced over it for a few minutes at a time. Definitely not something that can be summed in a paragraph hehe.

 

[chimaxi83]

There actually might be a bolt on way to do it. There is a guy on overclock.net who is designing custom brackets for use with Antec Kuhler all in one cooler. That will allow you to easily install an all in one cooler to your graphics card.

You can also just do "the mod" and zip tie the Kuhler to your graphics card

 

[guskline]

Hello all!

Just watercooled my i7 3770k with a corsair H100 solution... runs like a dream.

Now, I have (2) SLI'd EVGA Geforce GTX680's, compeltely stock fan slot coolers of course in the giant CoolerMaster Cosmos 2 case.



Curious what I need to convert them to be water cooled. What's the best waterblock/cooling equipments for the price, and how diffcult is it?

Treat me like a noob when it comes to water cooling. I know ALOT about building systems, but literally nothing about water cooling other than it uses pipes, watrblocks, and a radiator of some kind.

Save your $$. Overclock the 3770k if you haven't done so; It was meant to be Overclocked ("k"). As for the GPUs? I have 2 EVGA GTX 670 FTWs in SLI and they run so quick and quietly I see no need to spend @$500 to gain a little speed. BTW, are you running multiple monitors on that SLI setup? You should spend the $$ on that to see the real power of GTX 680s in SLI.

 

[bleucharm28]

I wouldn't use any EK waterblocks due to poor manufacturing process. (That's another story) For GPU waterblock, look for Aquagrafx or Heatkiller or XSPC.

Here's pretty waterblock: http://shop.watercool.de/HEATKILLER-GPU-X-GTX-680-Hole-Edition-Ni-Bl/en

 

[RussianSensation]

Not experimental, but there are not any bolt on and go kits for GPUs like there is for your CPU. There is no Corsair all in one thing you can get. .

Actually, Arctic cooling finally has a self-enclosed watercooling GPU kit. It's $170 though.

320W cooling capacity.

 

[notty22]

Here it is bolted on a gtx 680
Looks like it puts you up over 3 slots.

Inno3D iChill GeForce GTX 680 tested

 

[guskline]

RussianSensation: I had seen that Hybrid cooler awhile ago and a few problems come to mind. First if your run cards in SLI where do you mount the second radiator. Second, if you already cool your CPU with a kit like Beavermatic has where do you mount the radiator for it?

 

[cmdrdredd]

interesting...ugly as heck though.

This is much nicer, but it's $700 and totally not worth that.

 

[bleucharm28]

interesting...ugly as heck though.

This is much nicer, but it's $700 and totally not worth that.

I'll take Heatkiller over this, I actually think the old GTX 580 HC2 looks better new waterblock.

 

[RussianSensation]

RussianSensation: I had seen that Hybrid cooler awhile ago and a few problems come to mind. First if your run cards in SLI where do you mount the second radiator. Second, if you already cool your CPU with a kit like Beavermatic has where do you mount the radiator for it?

You are right, that's why usually if someone wants to go all watercooling, they do a custom loop for the CPU and GPUs. Having 3 radiators is doable though (1 right above the top CPU socket, 1 at the front of the case where the 1st intake fan is, and 1 can be mounted completely outside the case where the 120mm exhaust fan is usually found). With a large case, it's doable. It wouldn't look great, but there is an adapter that allows you to mount the radiator outside the case like so: