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Water CooleD Or?

S

Smooth_Criminal

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 20, 2002
Messages
381
I'm a MaJoR NoObZor when it comes to water cooling so I have a few questions for you experts out there.

1. Whats a good water kit to start out with that will cool my cpu substantially lower than my air cooled Alpha 8942 w/6k Tornado? I ask this because after reading some reviews some water cooling kits barely (if at all) stand up to some of the best air cooled HSF's on the market.

2. If I have to buy parts individually where should I start looking?


3. What other alternatives are there beyond water cooling. Starting from budget to $.


Sorry for the newb questions but I’m on a quest to cool this Prescott! 56c idle is not kosher although stable not kosher! Thanks for any advice/replies in advance!
 
yeah watercooling will lowerthat tremendously from 56, the reaason some times some watercooling kits perfor a few degrees cooler then top of the line hsf's is because the kits suck and the new hsf's are getting REALLY good, i was a noob to watercooling and my first setup was OK, one word of advice is get good stuf now, because buying bad stuff t hen good stuff later is more expensive, i learned it the hard way :S

DONT buy a kit, maybe a kit from dangerden but the cheapest/best thing to do it piece it together ur self

look on dangerden.com, they have tons of stuff...

alternitives are
1) kickass air( thermalright sp-94 with 92mm tornado and side blow hole)

2)OK air cooling, zalman 7000a-cu/alcu

3) phase change!!! prommy, vapochill or DIY(do it urself)
 
WEll i prefer to have my imagnary friends keep pouring Liquid nitrogen in my home made vat.

The vat is connected to my cpu... gpu... ram and gpu ram.... System in between -70 and -110

But some reason the friends dont keep pouring it :/ ive gone through 16 processors. I keep telling them they need to pour fast... but they dont listen... almost like they arnt even there
 
I went from an alpha pal8045 with a 50cfm sunnon on it to a danger den maze3...which I loved..but then got a wild hair up my ass and bought a D-tek TC-4 rev2 and modded that sum bitch real nice like :)
and to be honest modded or not or even with the maze3 my system was running cooler and a hell of alot quieter than on air !
but take peoples advice dont get a kit unless its a danger den or d-tek kit..that way you KNOW your getting some good stuff from jump...none of that 1/4in OD hose that koolance and what not use.
 
There is no such thing as "kit to start out with" that is why you need to read up before planning to watercool. When I did it I didn't want to get a temporary WC setup then end up spending more to get a better one. Plan it out carefully, read the faqs and stickies. Browse the W/C gallery so you can get ideas.
 
Im definately doing research as we speak. I also wanted opinions/experience/advice etc etc. Im going to gather all my info and decide what would best fit my needs. My goal is to shave10C-20C off my current temps so I dont need to go to extreme. All I need to do is find out what setup would meet my requirment.

NOobzor question: I have read some reviews and browsed through danger den but I wasnt supplied with quit enough info. Can sumone list all the parts to a water cooled system? Thanks for all the advice guys.
 
cpu waterblock,
radiator
pump
tubing
hose clamps
resovour,
fans to cool radiator

OPTIONAL
nb waterblock
gpu water block
hdd water block
T line
2nd radiator
 
Thanks, that narrows my research considerably. Currently I'm only intrested in water cooling the CPU and then decide if I want to go further. As always you guys rock and keep up the good OC's!
 
I don't know how much your idle will be lowered by but full load is where watercooling really struts its stuff.
 
Originally posted by unix_foo
There is no such thing as "kit to start out with" that is why you need to read up before planning to watercool. When I did it I didn't want to get a temporary WC setup then end up spending more to get a better one. Plan it out carefully, read the faqs and stickies. Browse the W/C gallery so you can get ideas.
Click to expand...


Total noob question. Hehe. Just like putting a PC together urself is always better than buying a whole system @ once. Just wanted to know if there was a good noobie kit out there, guess not. Some guy offered me an Aquarius II but the review left me in disbelief as some of the best HSF outperformed the water cooled Aquarius II. Frankly noise factor is not an issue as the Tornado I currently have sounds like a leaf blower, literally. My GF would LOVE for me to get rid of that, hehe. Good looking out guys.


Originally posted by DaveX
I don't know how much your idle will be lowered by but full load is where watercooling really struts its stuff.
Click to expand...

True I'm intrested in dropping temps of both my idle and full load.

Do CPU waterblocks come with adhesive/thermal paste or can you use arctive silver? As always reviews fail to mention this. I guess cause most people that go watercooling aren't noobies.
 
You can use Artic Silver or whatever you use for your heatsink. Like others have said, all the entry-level kits suck ass. I'd get maybe like a Dtek WhiteWater cpu block, an Eheim 1250, a Dtek Pro Core, some Clearflex or Tygon tubing, some clamps, and maybe a Maze4 gpu block if you want. Just some suggestions off the top of my head, you can get whatever you want. Just keep in mind if it will fit in the case, portability, ID compatibility, and what not.
 
Everybody has to start somewhere!

What speed is your prescott? These things are little ovens.

The water block comes bare bottom metal. You can use any paste; artic silver or ceramique are great.

Do you have the fan sucking air into or away from the heatsink? The alpha's usually perform better with it sucking away. But try both and see what works best for you.

You know you can get a fan controller for about $10 and crank that tornado down to about 3000rpm and GREATLY reduce the noise it makes without losing much cooling.

In the meantime, you can also try reapplying the thermal paste. I have heard that with p4's you need to put a glob in the middle instead of spreading it thin. Then the pressure of the heatsink will squish it out evenly. Spreading thin will promote air bubbles on that big surface.
 
Originally posted by CSx-2011
Everybody has to start somewhere!

What speed is your prescott? These things are little ovens.

The water block comes bare bottom metal. You can use any paste; artic silver or ceramique are great.

Do you have the fan sucking air into or away from the heatsink? The alpha's usually perform better with it sucking away. But try both and see what works best for you.

You know you can get a fan controller for about $10 and crank that tornado down to about 3000rpm and GREATLY reduce the noise it makes without losing much cooling.

In the meantime, you can also try reapplying the thermal paste. I have heard that with p4's you need to put a glob in the middle instead of spreading it thin. Then the pressure of the heatsink will squish it out evenly. And spreading thin promotes air bubbles on that big surface.
Click to expand...


1. Prescott is a 2.8E @3.650 1.6v max stability Corsair PC3200 2x256MB @2-3-3-7 @ 5:4 with 2.8vdimm. My idle temps are through the roof @56c-60c!

2. Cool I will apply my arctic silver when I due in fact decide what I want to go with. Thanks.

3. Good tip and you are absolutely right, I have tried both possibilities. When I have my fan pointing towards the CPU I get 10c, yes 10c more OUCH! Just tried it since I had it the other way around. Since the Alpha gets hot all your doing is blowing more heat towards the Precott and that is bad.

4. I will def pick up an adapter as this fan is driving me crazy. This will hold me over until the cooling setup is decided upon.

5. I have tried that already and temps are concrete!:( Thanks for the advice though!

I also have intake/outtake fans in my case for better airflow. I can literally feel the heat in my case with the Prescott as opposed to my old Northwood, the difference is unbelievable and that’s what made me decide to opt for a new cooling solution. I don’t want the CPU to die in a few months, sigh.
 
Prescotts are the new cyrix, but they are actually fast.

Water cooling with a nice block and radiator should get those temps down nicely. How much though?, since it is pumping out so much heat.
 
Originally posted by CSx-2011
Prescotts are the new cyrix, but they are actually fast.

Water cooling with a nice block and radiator should get those temps down nicely. How much though?, since it is pumping out so much heat.
Click to expand...

Thats exactly what I want to know but seeing how there are so many configurations out there I guess it all depends on your hardware. I have seen some watercooled systems that cant clock their Prescotts as high as me and I'm on air. I guess if your CPU is maxed out then it doesn't matter if your air or watered cooled.

I have been reading opinions/advice/reviews all night and I need to choose carefully as the Prescott temps are no joke. I will not be haste and hopefully everything will work out for me in the end. I decided to go with the vdimm mod (IS7) and a PSU mod before I change to water.

Maybe I can get a slight FSB increase from this alone. This will most likely raise my CPU temps even more so I might just be forced to change to water first, I dunno but I'm going to give it a try.
 
Since your doing research, I'll add my $.02 worth.
You should choose a pump based on the work load you'll be putting on it. If all your running is a CPU block, than something near 6' head and 300 GPH should be good. This also depends on the type of block you get. Ideally, something high-flow with 1/2" barbs. I myself use a MaxiJet 1200 as it is inexpensive and performs good with my WhiteWater. If you plan on adding a chipset and GPU block, than a more powerful pump would be advisable. The rated head is more important than flowrate.
Reserviors are not an absolute necessity, but have enough benefits to make them worthwhile. the added capacty increases the overall thermal capacity of the water as well as provides a place where the flow will be slowed down enough to allow small bubbles to escape the flowing water. They also make filling & bleeding your system much easier.
Automotive heatercores are the best performing radiators, but the sizes and shapes are somewhat limited. If you want a better size/shape selection, look at oil coolers. I personally run a B&M oil cooler as it was was the perfect size for my application. It performs pretty damn good and flows very freely. The more heat your WC rig will need to dissapate, the bigger the rad you will want. Especially if your dealing with warm ambient temps. I also chose the B&M as it had a threaded inlet/outlet and 1/2" ID nylon barbs screwed right in. Nice and easy.
You can do this really cheaply if you DIY some of it. I built my own external reservior which holds a little over 1 gallon. It is the highest point in my system and very easily accessable.
Anyways, I hope this helps somewhat.
 
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