My first watercooling (pics)

[mk11232]

I finished putting together my first watercooled system and here are some pics from the project. I'm wc'ing the cpu and the gpu. As you look at the pics I know I need to cut down some of the tubing, but I"m gonna wait till much later b/c of how long it took the first time.

Specs: Swiftech Apex Ultra Plus kit (didn't use NB block)
Pent d 3.6 w/ 2 gig ram
Sapphire x1900xtx
Soundblaster Fatal1ty

So far the system stays around 32-34C idle and when I startup HL2, CSS, Oblivion, or even Photoshop it only goes up to 42-44C

The Kit

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the leaktest

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The full system

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Lit up

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With cover

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[SiGfever]

Very Nice! :beer:

[Milkman]

Nice job, it looks great and how is the performance?

[citronym]

Wow thats colorful. Good looking setup. I bet when you get around to shaving off some of the tubing you will trim your deltaT a few degrees, so thats something to look forward to.

[mk11232]

in terms of performance its great

I"ve been runing prime 95 now for about and hour and it never goes above 42c

[lowfat]

looks pimp

[R B Customs]

you know what... and im a sucker for looks... that acctually looks damn nice !... im all for the pink water too.
i dont htink first attemps get any better than this !

[Evilsizer]

what case is that? looks like you have plenty of room if you had the tools you could mount the rad in top of the 5 1/4 bay.

[voigts]

good job for a first go. When you have done this a few times you will find that it gets easier and easier to set up.

[mk11232]

The case is a Thermaltake Eureka case. I looked at mounting the rad inside the case but couldn't bear to cut into the case. The rad is a 2 x120 and I'm already using 3 bays. I'm content with the outside mount because the case is on my desktop and has plenty of ventallation.

[R B Customs]

are those coolsleeves, or the other kind ?
how do you rate them ?

[Owenator]

I finished putting together my first watercooled system and here are some pics from the project. I'm wc'ing the cpu and the gpu. As you look at the pics I know I need to cut down some of the tubing, but I"m gonna wait till much later b/c of how long it took the first time.

Specs: Swiftech Apex Ultra Plus kit (didn't use NB block)
Pent d 3.6 w/ 2 gig ram
Sapphire x1900xtx
Soundblaster Fatal1ty

So far the system stays around 32-34C idle and when I startup HL2, CSS, Oblivion, or even Photoshop it only goes up to 42-44C

Nice job! Do you want to sell me you NB block! :D

[mk11232]

Naw I'm not going to sell the nb block just yet. I may get the courage to later add it in when i start messing with the tubbing some more. But it seems to me the new 975x chip is so much BIGGER than the nb, not sure if I want to take the current heatsink off it.

And I'm still a noob, so what are coolsleaves?

[citronym]

The coils around your tubing.

[mk11232]

the coils are smatcoils from swiftech as part of the kit. Rating wise, a 10. I actually plumed out the tubing without them on, and estimated the tubing need, in terms of turns, pressure, size of twist. Then I put those on, and all my estimates were way off. With the smatcoils, I am able to easily make the sharper turns and see do tube deformation. Now I want to take out about 10 inches of tubing now because the length is wasted with the coils.

So I give :thup: :thup: :thup: :thup: :thup:

[clocker2]

You could also save quite a bit of tube run by changing the orientation of your pump.
Make the inlet point straight up and the outlet horizontal...this gives you a better shot to the graphics card and eliminates several inches of tube.

[mk11232]

I don't think I can change the orientation. The plate that the motherboard is attached is a pullout plate. It slides on and off some brackets that are attached to the case. Also the pictures don't show the real depth of the case. There are about 4 inches from where the pump is located and where the back of the case is located. But thanks for the advice

[citronym]

There is no reason you can't change it how clocker2 suggested, just switch the orientation of the barbs with one-another. You have extra tubing coming out of the horizontal barb when it would be shorter coming straight down into the pump. Likewise, the tube going down into the pump could be shorter if it was coming out the side of the pump straight to the gpu. It might take some work, but next time you rebuild your loop you definately want to focus on shorter tubing runs.

[NODES]

i like the pink coolant.

i like the swiftech theme.

i really have to get that new D5 pump, seems like everyone is using them.

[Arca_ex]

Yep, I have the D5 and it powers through 2 rads, with tons of 90 deg angles, no problem and I'm getting great temps, CPU 32-33 idle 35-36 load GPU 30-31 idle 34-35 load. Back on topic i like how the coolant looks, usually I dont like coolant in the red color spectrum, but it works nicely with those smartcoils, nice job.

[mk11232]

Thanks Arca. The coolant is the fluidxp + stuff. I know I could get better temps with distilled water but I have different animals around and after reading the sticky up top I didn't want to chance them getting into the stuff. Also its supposedly noconductive so that was a big plus in case I...um...screwed up, lol

[citronym]

IMO never count on non-conductive fluid remaining non-conductive. It is likely to begin aquiring conductive properties the moment it touches your waterblocks. Just a heads-up.

[Arca_ex]

Yeah, like if there's dust on your vid card and it leaks on there, Fluid XP+ with dust=conductive, it just takes a little but of junk to get into it and it's going to fry your stuff, so dont rely too heavily on it, I have distilled water with a couple drops of non-alcahol iodine and 2 bottles of FrzenCPU UV Blue dye, it only shows up with the UV lights on, its really cool, because its clear with them off.

[pcmaker401]

wow..that really looks good...i'm more of a blue person but this works pretty damn well. I hope to do a first good job as well as you did there.

[y2jed_2000]

looks great and clean....good job