How does this setup look?

I've been doing some research into water cooling over the past 2 weeks or so and am hoping to implement a water cooling setup in my CM Stacker case. Here's what I have planned so far:

Pump- DangerDen DD12v Pump

Radiator- DangerDen Double Heater Core w/ 4x fans (not sure what type of fans yet, going to be external)

Water Block- DangerDen TDX Athlon 64 Block w/ 5 accelerator nozzles

Reservoir- AngelEye Fill & Bleed Reservoir (the one from Xoxide)

Tubing- ClearFlex60 1/2" ID Tubing (15'... is that excessive for my setup?)

Along with all the hose clamps and thermal compound needed. For the coolant I'm planning on using 75% distilled water with 25% Pentosin (blue antifreeze) and mixing in some blue UV reactive dye (going for a blue case theme).

I'm planning on mounting this all in a CM Stacker case, as I said before, besides the heater core which I am going to sit behind the computer on the desk or something. I'm going to hook the 4 fans up to a fan controller (they're really the only ones that matter in the whole system) and connect them with a PCI pass through which takes a 4-pin molex and splits it into five 3-pin connections. I don't think I'm going to use the temperature probes on the radiator fans, since it doesn't really matter what temperature the radiator is. I'll stick the temp probes on more important places and just have the fans controlled by the fan controller. I'll route the tubing through the punch-out fan holes at the bottom of the case.

The rest of it will be mounted normally inside the case. The reservoir will go on the top 80mm fan mount.

So how does it look? Anything you guys would change?

What fans would you guys recommend using on the radiator? Does it really matter if I get high performance fans, or could I just go with a relatively cheap ones in a 4x push/pull configuration? I'd rather not spend $50 on fans alone if I can avoid it.

How will a VGA block affect the performance of the entire system? Will it raise the temps of the water by a lot? I guess if it's going to raise the temps a lot I will stick with just a CPU block, but if I would be better off with a VGA block as well I would definitely get one.


Thanks for any advice,

only suggestion is consider a swiftech mcw6002 instead. Performance probably slightly better but not bad components overall. As I remember from what I read, adding vga block raises water temp only few degrees but of course logic says it (temp raise) depends on what's the heat output of the card.

Yeah, I was looking for a Swiftech MCW6002-64, but I couldn't find one in stock. If it was in stock it would be the one I would go with. Thanks for the advice and feedback,

Bump... anyone else?

I just set up my first WC setup a day ago with almost the same parts as you,(diff res and case) but I added a DD maze 4 NB chipset block also. My double heatercore is internal w/ 2 fans pulling and my cpu temp is 2c over the mobo temp when idle. Im very happy with it and think that you will be too

Get the Swiftech MCW6002, MCP650, the fedco 2-342 heater-core (4x120mm), the swiftech fill & bleed kit, and primoflex tubing. Much better than the setup you have listed and it will cost less as well.

I thought the d4 and the MCP650 were the same pumps w\differant labels?

thats gonna look really good in that stacker case. i was soo close to getting that exact case for my setup as well, but for the money i can get alot more in cooling products. everything looks good to me, dont forget to post some pics when your done !

lazua said:

I just set up my first WC setup a day ago with almost the same parts as you,(diff res and case) but I added a DD maze 4 NB chipset block also. My double heatercore is internal w/ 2 fans pulling and my cpu temp is 2c over the mobo temp when idle. Im very happy with it and think that you will be too

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Congrats on your setup. Hope mine works as well as yours

Cyrix_2k said:

Get the Swiftech MCW6002, MCP650, the fedco 2-342 heater-core (4x120mm), the swiftech fill & bleed kit, and primoflex tubing. Much better than the setup you have listed and it will cost less as well.

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Not to say that you are wrong in any way, but why should I use those items over the ones I have selected now? Again, I'm not saying your wrong at all, I just want to understand why that would be better than what I have no in my own mind. I like to understand everything I'm getting before I buy it

lazua said:

I thought the d4 and the MCP650 were the same pumps w\differant labels?

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Last time I checked they were

tricknasty said:

thats gonna look really good in that stacker case. i was soo close to getting that exact case for my setup as well, but for the money i can get alot more in cooling products. everything looks good to me, dont forget to post some pics when your done !

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Thanks Yeah I really like the CM Stacker. Expensive, but should last me for a LONG time w/ BTX support etc. I'll definitely post pics when I'm done

Thanks for the advice, everyone. I really appreciate it,

Also, Cyrix_2k...

Would I have to mod that heater core that you suggested to get the right barbs? This is my first computer build... I really don't want to whip out the blow torch and start welding on my first baby

Ariste said:

Also, Cyrix_2k...

Would I have to mod that heater core that you suggested to get the right barbs? This is my first computer build... I really don't want to whip out the blow torch and start welding on my first baby

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The heater core will need to be "Lightly modded". Basically you need to hacksaw the tubes off leaving aprox 1 to 2 inches of metal tube left. Then simply boil your 1/2"ID tubing and with some effort it will stretch over the metal heater-core tubes.

I selected this heater-core because it performs VERY well (it's single pass so it has very little flow resistance) and it's cheap.

Oh, ok, I see. The heater core you're talking about is the one in this thread, right? So basically I just cut off all that extra tubing to make it look like normal barbs?

Ariste said:

Congrats on your setup. Hope mine works as well as yours



Not to say that you are wrong in any way, but why should I use those items over the ones I have selected now? Again, I'm not saying your wrong at all, I just want to understand why that would be better than what I have no in my own mind. I like to understand everything I'm getting before I buy it



Last time I checked they were



Thanks Yeah I really like the CM Stacker. Expensive, but should last me for a LONG time w/ BTX support etc. I'll definitely post pics when I'm done

Thanks for the advice, everyone. I really appreciate it,

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Yes, the DD 12v pump and the MCP650 are the same pump. I told you to go swifty because you can buy the other parts from them (And for other reasons that don't really matter).

I chose the MCM6002 over the DD TDX since performance wise it's currently the best block available performance wise (it outperforms the WW, and the WW outperforms the TDX), and it's cheap too.

Since you want a fill and bleed kit, I chose the swifty kit since you might as well order everything from them.

I already explained the HC.

Last reason... **WARNING!!! Highly opinionated text follows** A little water-cooling history. Cathar created the WW which killed every other block out there performance wise. He then wholly licensed the WW to D-tek Customs Inc. who produce the block to this day. DD then slapped the WW on a photocopier, applied some white-out so that block no longer sits on AMD's crush pads and kills CPU's and out pops the RBX, a blatent copy of Cathar/D-tek's WW. Bad DD. But it doesn't stop there. Cathar produces the Cascade which outperforms even the WW. He then produces the silver cascade, the Cascade SS, which one up's the Cascade. DD follows suite producing the RBX in silver. (It wouldn't have been an issue if they hadn't had copied the WW). Then out comes the TDX, which is the WW tilted 90 degrees so it can use two barbs, yet another WW clone. Infact DD led an example and other companies followed DD. No longer is the WW just produced by D-tek, it is now produced by several companies who simply changed it's name. I now refuse to buy any DD products because of what they have done.

To put in other terms: You design a record-breaking RC car, and a company approaches you and offers you $5000 for the design. You agree. The company goes on to produce the car and make lots of dough. Then another company, cheater's inc, buys the record-breaking car, reverse-engineers it, then begins producing it themsleves which puts Cheater's Inc. in direct competion with the company that owns the design. Cheater's Inc. did basically nothing, they didn't design the car, they didn't buy the plans for the car, they COPIED the car and get to enjoy all benefits of the design without sacraficing anything. The original company is now out of a substancial amount of money because of what Cheater's Inc. did. Now is that right?

Ariste said:

Oh, ok, I see. The heater core you're talking about is the one in this thread, right? So basically I just cut off all that extra tubing to make it look like normal barbs?

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yep.

I think with the pump you are getting, the bonneville HC will give you the best performance. It has a bigger core than the 2-342 heater core works better with pumps with lower head rating. You will need to cut the tubes much like the 2-342
http://www.napaonline.com/cgi-bin/n...r=15557093&prmenbr=5806&usrcommgrpid=78770907

Thanks for all the advice guys.

Just out of curiosity, how much lower do you think my CPU temps would be with either of the two heater cores you suggested as compared to a DangerDen double heater core. I only ask this because if the difference isn't going to be very noticable, then I'd rather go with the DangerDen just for the convenience. If it will be a big difference, though, I'll definitely go with one of the ones that you guys selected.

With a high head pump the 2-342 would cool about the same as the DangerDen double HC(Bonneville without AC). It has the same core size. The Bonneville with AC has a slightly larger cooling area(7-10%) and usually sells for around $20.

What do you consider "high head"? The one that I'm looking at now (DangerDen DD12v) has a 10' head, I believe. Would that qualify as high?

fhanderson said:

With a high head pump the 2-342 would cool about the same as the DangerDen double HC(Bonneville without AC). It has the same core size. The Bonneville with AC has a slightly larger cooling area(7-10%) and usually sells for around $20.

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2-342 should kick the DD double heater-core *** 'cause it's singlepass. We're talking 2-3c here and that's a HUGE decrease in temps considering people are willing top upwards of $200 to get that kind of decrease. Plus the 2-342 (GDI 399090) is $30 from Napa autoparts.

Ariste said:

What do you consider "high head"? The one that I'm looking at now (DangerDen DD12v) has a 10' head, I believe. Would that qualify as high?

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The laing D4 has more than a 10 foot dead-head... But yeah, the D4 is considered a high-head pump.

Also, we're talking flow-resistance here... Head hight doesn't matter. It's the fact that the 2-342 has less resistance than the bonneville w/ac or the DD double rad (which is just a pre-modded HC) and will flow more water which will allow more water through the CPU block which will lower the C/W of the entire system which means better temps and a better overclock. Whew, that was a lot of typing.