Thinking of going the liquid route

[akira34]

Alright,

I'm still looking at the Tt BigWater item, but I'd also like to know what people think of the following...

DangerDen TDX 3/8" Copper Water Block - Athlon64
Danger Den Black Ice Xtreme 120mm Radiator (Black)
Swiftech MCP650? 12v Water Pump w/ 3/8" Conversion
5.25" Bay Reservoir
Tubing (shouldn't need more than 10' total, ever)

I'm looking to JUST cool my Athlon64 3400 processor. I'm not looking to OC, just make it dead silent. I'll be using one of the 120mm case fans that came with my V1100 on one side of the radiator, and possibly the Enermax that I'm using on the XP-120 on the inside (push/pull config.)... Without knowing what I'll need for misc fittings, or if 10' is too much tubing, it comes to about $285 with ground shipping... That's almost 3x the cost of the bigwater item (I can get it for about $110-$115 WITH shipping). Will the items I listed above really cool ~3x better than the bigwater at low dbA or would it be a waste of money since I have no plans to overcock the processor at all. I'm not even looking to cool my video card, JUST get the processor silent, at (what I call) good temps...

Post up your input...

 

[iamtrout]

Yeah... I think you may be going about this the wrong way. $285 is REALLY hefty for silence, especially if you're only doing CPU cooling with no overclock. Also note that this setup will NOT be dead silent. The pump makes noise that may bother you because it's kind if high pitched (just a little, but enough to distract I suppose). In other words, it's not a low frequency hum like white noise. Not to mention it'll probably vibrate against your case, which is aluminum, which is not as acoustically insulating as steel. So you'll have to find a way and spend more money on silencing the pump and possibly case. Then there's your vid card and chipset that are probably cooled by fans and are producing noise. Not to mention your hard drive and PSU.

Tips on saving money:
Get a car heatercore at autozone for $25 instead of the Black Ice. The fedco 2-342 is popular, can hold 2x120mm fans, but requires a shroud and is big.
Install a t-line instead of a res. Cost: $1.00
Go with 1/2" ID for more future upgrade options without the hassle of conversion adapters.
Get regular old vinyl tubing from the hardware store for a lot cheaper than Tygon. Or go with a Tygon alternative like Masterkleer or Clearflex 60. Shop around. Don't let shipping rape you.

But in the end it's still going to be very expensive JUST for silence. Are you really going for absolute dead silence?

It may be cheaper just to go ALL 120mm's. Cool your CPU with a 120. Take off your vid card's fans and jimmy rig a 120 to the HSF. Take off mobo chip's fan and plop a 120 pointed towards it. Install all 120s for case fans. Get a PSU with 120mm fan. Then control all those fans with a fan controller. Then elastic mount the hard drives. 🙂

 

[akira34]

I want the rig to be as silent as possible... As for silencing the case, Lian-Li pre-installes the sound dampening material on both side panels and top of the case. This is heavy gauge aluminum here, not the thin sheit found in antec cases. :shocked: IF I go liquid, I will go with a single 120mm fan radiator so that I won't have to do any physical modification to my case. The thing is just too damned pretty to hack up. My signature has the items inside my case at present (my only PC tower at this time)... The Arctic Cooling unit is VERY quiet... In fact, IF I could get the processor fan silent (or the same level as the rest of the hardware) I would barely be able to hear any of it. That's why I was thinking of going for liquid...

Maybe I'll get the bigwater item next month and see how that does... At $115 it's a hell of a lot cheaper than going the other route. Plus, it includes everything I'd need to cool the processor.

As for future upgrade options... I don't see myself ever adding more to this initial unit.

Oh, as for shipping... The entire order would cost me under $10 to ship from frozencpu and would be here in 2 days (NY to MA is 2 days via ground).

To give you an idea of my target sound level... I want to hear NOTHING from over 5' away. I wouldn't mind a minor amount from over 3' away, but it has to be dead silent at 5'+... Otherwise, I'm not going to blow my money on a custom water cooling rig... Not when I can get one already ready to roll for just over $100... At close to 3x the price, if it's no quieter, and performs pretty much the same, there's no point to blowing the extra ~$200...

 

[iamtrout]

I agree. In this instance it may certainly be better just to go with a kit. Just as long as you never end up getting overclock-happy.

Let us know how it goes 🙂 I'm actually pretty curious to see how this kit performs/sounds/etc.

 

[akira34]

I'm going to look into a duckting mod before I get a liquid cooler... I might get as good, or better, results that way at less $$ spent. Although doing it without cutting up the case could be a challenge, at least it will keep me busy while I wait for other things...