Thoughts and Comments on my first water cooling setup

[NatePo717]

Hey there everyone. I had a thread a while ago regarding the Define R3 and water cooling, and have since decided to go with a different case. My current thoughts are going between the Corsair Vengeance (white/black version) and the CM 690 II Advanced. They have very similar internal layouts with room for 2 x 240mm radiators. I am leaning towards the Corsair as I do like the clean look of the case. I considered the Switch 810, however I was wanting something smaller.

My system as it stands currently is:
CPU: 2600k @ 4.6 (think my motherboard is the limiting factor.. can only manage x44 on it. Tried different cpu's and always limited to x44)
Motherboard: Asus p8Z68 v pro.
Graphics: Currently SLI Zotac 560 Ti OC (will upgrade to 670's. Preferably with the 680 pcb for full water block use)
Memory: 4 x 4 Samsung DDR3 1600.
Storage: Crucial M4 512 and a 2TB 3.5.
PSU: PCP&C Silencer 750W (it's rather old now. Might consider a modular)

My parts list is as follows. I am not sure if it is complete or if that pump will be able to handle what I have in that system. From what I have been able to determine it should be sufficient.



For the flow.. I made up a quick little image of what I was thinking for the flow of the setup. This picture shows an h100 which is about the same size as the XSPC rad. To give an idea of how much room is in this case.



So... there it is. My first attempts at this. Thoughts, comments, suggestions? Been itching to do this for a while now.

 

[Kenmitch]

Looks pretty good to me. The Y block I'm trying to figure out where your using it viewing your photo.

Seems strange your MB won't go over 44x did you try internal pll over voltage?

 

[BrightCandle]

2x 670 overclocked is probably about 200W each = 400W
1x 2600k overclocked heavily ~=150W
Total 550W

Cooling setup
4 x 120mm of means you need 140W per radiator which needs 1000 rpm on the fan.

A D5 should be able to achieve sufficient head pressure for a loop with 3 low resistance blocks.

Pressure looks good, temperature looks good, cooling profile looks adequate. Should all work nicely. You might find your current PSU is a little underpowered however but that is a separate concern.

 

[NatePo717]

Looks pretty good to me. The Y block I'm trying to figure out where your using it viewing your photo.

Seems strange your MB won't go over 44x did you try internal pll over voltage?

The Y is for draining. I am not entirely sure where to put that. Probably on the out side of the res?

As for the motherboard, I did try the pll over voltage. I can be stable-ish at x45 but it requires more volts than I want to throw at it and was much to hot. It benched ok at x45 but I'd blue screen while idle just browsing the web. Currently doing 4.6 at 1.38V. x45 required close to 1.5V. I have a Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme on this right now and it gets toasty when I'm pushing it. 80C+. Game load is closer to 65C. Idle is 37C.

@BrightCandle My 560Ti's have similar power draw to the 670's (at least according to Anandtech benches.) I have the Tuniq 120 fan, 3 x 120, and 2 x 140 Cougar Vortex fans in my case right now and this power supply seems to be able to handle it all. I probably should consider bumping up to an 850.

 

[BrightCandle]

The Y is for draining. I am not entirely sure where to put that. Probably on the out side of the res?

Get a T instead of the Y and then stick it somewhere near the bottom with a set of pipe and a cap on it. You could also get a valve for the end of the pipe. The T is what people normally use for this task.

I probably should consider bumping up to an 850.

Its closer than ideal but it looks like it should fit. The water pump is going to push another 20W or so and the additional fans will take a little more so you are going to to increase your draw moderately with water cooling. I think you'll be just fine, I am not certain of it however.

 

[Subyman]

2x 670 overclocked is probably about 200W each = 400W
1x 2600k overclocked heavily ~=150W
Total 550W

Cooling setup
4 x 120mm of means you need 140W per radiator which needs 1000 rpm on the fan.

A D5 should be able to achieve sufficient head pressure for a loop with 3 low resistance blocks.

Pressure looks good, temperature looks good, cooling profile looks adequate. Should all work nicely. You might find your current PSU is a little underpowered however but that is a separate concern.

Are you saying each radiator will dissipate 140W or that the fans on that rad will draw 140W? A performance 120mm fan will only draw ~1W each at high flow. Fans are pretty much negligible when calculating wattage.

A decent pump will draw 20W. However, watercooled PCs typically need 10-15% less power because the components are much cooler and run more efficiently.

That tubing seems pretty damn expensive. Tygon will be just as good and it is less than 1 dollar a foot. Since you have a smaller case, you may want to think about using 3/8in tubing instead of 1/2. There is practically no difference in benchmarks between the two, however 3/8 is a lot easier to work with in smaller cases.

Lastly, I use Yate Loon medium speed fans in my EX360 and they are very quiet and push plenty of air. They also only cost 4 dollars each... Most "high end" fans are a complete rip off. Sure they may be 1db lower or push 5% more air, but the price premium is ridiculous on them. Use that savings to buy games 🙂

Looks like a good project. Enjoy the build.

 

[BrightCandle]

Are you saying each radiator will dissipate 140W or that the fans on that rad will draw 140W? A performance 120mm fan will only draw ~1W each at high flow. Fans are pretty much negligible when calculating wattage.

Neither. I am saying the radiator will dissipate that much heat from the loop. That is given an appropriate fan speed and 10C water temperature delta to ambient.

 

[Kenmitch]

The Y is for draining. I am not entirely sure where to put that. Probably on the out side of the res?

As for the motherboard, I did try the pll over voltage. I can be stable-ish at x45 but it requires more volts than I want to throw at it and was much to hot. It benched ok at x45 but I'd blue screen while idle just browsing the web. Currently doing 4.6 at 1.38V. x45 required close to 1.5V. I have a Tuniq Tower 120 Extreme on this right now and it gets toasty when I'm pushing it. 80C+. Game load is closer to 65C. Idle is 37C.

@BrightCandle My 560Ti's have similar power draw to the 670's (at least according to Anandtech benches.) I have the Tuniq 120 fan, 3 x 120, and 2 x 140 Cougar Vortex fans in my case right now and this power supply seems to be able to handle it all. I probably should consider bumping up to an 850.

If your gonna use the Y for a drain it should be down low such as between gpu and lower rad. Most likely you could use a cheaper solution for the drain tho.

So your using 44x with a 104.? bclk to get 4.6ghz? I would see no reason why using the 45x would require more voltage. The random bsod you got surfing the web sounds like it was caused by using offset vcore voltages. If so it has to do with the way the chip was made and how it calls for lower vcore with single, dual core load vs four core load. You can be stable under all core load but bsod under single core load. One way to eliminate it is to use more vcore. The other way is to just disable c3 and c6 states. You'll still throttle down speed and vcore at idle but under any load it'll pretty much feed the same loaded vcore.

My 2550k is sitting at 4.8ghz currently. Loaded vcore for prime is 1.368v's and stable. Max I've booted windows with the chip was 5.5ghz for quick testing. I think I could get around 5.2ghz under 1.5v's stable if I wanted to. Gonna downsize my rig to a mini-itx in the near future as I don't need the power anymore anyways.

 

[NatePo717]

If your gonna use the Y for a drain it should be down low such as between gpu and lower rad. Most likely you could use a cheaper solution for the drain tho.

So your using 44x with a 104.? bclk to get 4.6ghz? I would see no reason why using the 45x would require more voltage. The random bsod you got surfing the web sounds like it was caused by using offset vcore voltages. If so it has to do with the way the chip was made and how it calls for lower vcore with single, dual core load vs four core load. You can be stable under all core load but bsod under single core load. One way to eliminate it is to use more vcore. The other way is to just disable c3 and c6 states. You'll still throttle down speed and vcore at idle but under any load it'll pretty much feed the same loaded vcore.

My 2550k is sitting at 4.8ghz currently. Loaded vcore for prime is 1.368v's and stable. Max I've booted windows with the chip was 5.5ghz for quick testing. I think I could get around 5.2ghz under 1.5v's stable if I wanted to. Gonna downsize my rig to a mini-itx in the near future as I don't need the power anymore anyways.

I'm sitting at x44/104.5 @ 1.38v for 4.598 and it is stable as a rock. The newest bios for this board got me an extra 100mhz. I wasn't able to go above 4.5 previously. If I go for anything using x45 it requires more volts than I am comfortable running on just air and isn't nearly as stable. I just tried the c3 and c6 states but when I disabled them my computer refused to go to the lower clocks. Stayed at 4.7 @ 1.5v constantly. If I try to do a voltage offset of any amount I can't boot windows and blue screen. It is the same if I do x45/100. Requires over 1.4v and I can boot windows but am not stable. I've been considering giving the V Gene a try. It seems a better overclock board. And as I only have a wireless card and my two 560 Ti's it should fit no problem in the V Gene. I'd be all over it if they swapped that sound stuff on it for a wifi go option.

As a side note, I don't think I'll go for the 670's yet... I don't think I'm ready to drop 1,700-1,800 on this heh. Maybe next year when I get the upgrade bug again. I think my 560Ti's will last me. I can play most things at max settings as I am only running 2 x 24" 1080p monitors. It would be either the water cooling or the cards. I've revised the list a bit.. going with smaller dia tubing and fittings and blocks for my 560Ti's. I think the SLI bridge is the right size... Also think the crossover rad for the top would be a good idea for tube management. Much cleaner looking.



Also updated my planned tubing layout. I should be able to run the tube from the bottom rad to the res with the cabling in the back and put the T in there for draining to keep things clean looking. I'll have to play around with that connection to find a good place for it when I pull the trigger on this.