Water cooling questions.

I plan on making a water cooled computer sometime in the near future when I start making a bit more money for parts. I'm still slightly new with everything, but I spend a lot of my time online studying what I can about doing such.

I haven't exactly choose what pump, reservoir, radiator or blocks I want to use yet, but I have an idea of how I'd like it set up. Anyways, I made a little diagram for what I'd like to go for; Pump>CPU>Chip>Video>Res>Rad>repeat.



Wanted to use a Lian Li PC-V1000, and remove the drive bays to make space for the radiator and pump, and use a Lian Li EX-23B Aluminum 3 Drive Extension to hold my HD's instead. I also wanted to use a bay reservoir too, perferably a nice looking one, so any suggestions would be helpful.

Wanted to know if this set up would run nicely or if I should move things around a bit? I also would like some suggestions on a good motherboard because most of the ones I've looked at have heat pipes on the north and south, and from what I've read it's not good to invert those. Looking for it to be a C2D compatible board, SLI peferably for future upgrades.

Thanks in advanced, and sorry for my inexpirience.

Your proposed setup doesn't look bad so far. I had my ASUS P5B-D inverted while I had it water cooled in my other case and I never had any issues with it.

The biggest thing with water cooling setups are;

1. using a decent reliable pump, eheim, mag5, etc.

2. clamping all of your hose connections (I prefer worm drive clamps, but there are many other types out there)

3. Try to keep your loop relatively short.

4. Try using at least a 3/8" diameter hose and up, 1/2" is even better. Stay away from 1/4" setups, they restrict your system a lot.

5. Use a decent radiator/heater core with a decent CFM fan. (Black Ice series are really nice and work well but there are many others out there.) At least 120mmx120mm and go up from there. You may want something larger if you plan on adding other things into your loop like the NB cooler. A lot of this will also depend on your placement options and case size.

6. Always leak test your setup prior to booting up, so that you dont fry your new system, some prefer to do this for a little while just to make sure.

7. The order for most of the compnents in a loop do not matter as much as most people think due to an average balance of temps that stay within the liquid. Read the stickies regarding this. Most of us still prefer to put the rad before the CPU or other water blocks, but when I played around with my last setup, it honsetly didn't make much of a difference that I could notice as far as temps.

This place has some decent bay reservoir options, however there are many other sites as well who carry similar res. that you may be looking for.

http://www.crazypc.com/products/cooling/reservoirs.htm#reservoirs

I hope this helps a little. There is a lot of really good info on here, just do a search and go from there.

Yeah, this site has been very helpful with information, and was the reason I decided to register, this way I could ask questions directly instead of looking for others questions that are similar to my own.

As for the heatpipe thing, I've been reading a lot about it overheating, then again, if I plan on water cooling the chip anyways, if it's possible to remove it I suppose that would work aswell. As for the pump and hose clamps, I've read about picking a good one. I took a look into the stickie for montly round up, and the Laing D5 was obviously my first thought since it was at the top of the list, but I still wanted to see my options before I started choosing which to use.

I'm trying to keep the tubing pretty short, and I think the longest tubes I'll probably have is the one between the video card and the reservoir, which probably won't even be as long as it looks from the diagram. And yeah, I do plan on 1/2" tubing. I learned that during the begining of my reading up. For the radiator, I need to wait on choosing until either after I decide to get my case, or if someone has it and would be kind enouugh to give me dimensions for that area. I probably won't do SLI, but I wanted the choice if I ever did, so at most, I'd probably only be water blocking the CPU, video card and NB. If it fits, I think a dual 120 mm fanned radiator should be good, no?

Also, if it came down to it, I could probably figure a way to set it up so pump goes to radiator and then from radiator to CPU if I'm having trouble with temperatures, but if the numbers say it doesn't matter, I suppose it's not the biggest of deals.

Thanks for the site, I shall be looking through it!

I never had any over-heating issues with my heat-pipe on that board being upside down, and I did have a fan that came with it on there, so it wasn't entirely passively cooled. The dual 120mm radiator setup is ideal if you have the room for it. NP, glad to help. I'm sure others who have been on here a little longer will also give you some more advice. Some of this stuff will come down to simple trial and error to see what fits your needs the best.

Well, thats a bit more reassuring if I decide to get a board that has a heat pipe on it. I'd still like to look at what boards are out there before I choose one though, but thats normal.

Quick question though, do you think the front intake holes would be enough for radiator heat, or do you suggest maybe adding some slots or holes in the bottom of the case would be better? Or maybe even exhaust vents on the side panel next to it.

EDIT: For example:

This would mean setting the radiator on it's side, which would probably give me more room for fitting in the pump, and would probably also make the pump>res>CPU set up much easier. I honestly think this might be better for pushing the heat directly out of the case instead of letting it flow out through the back or other vents. I could even find a radiator that allows 120mm fans on both sides and drill holes on the other side of the case and mesh it so heat can be extracted that way aswell along with the 120 mm front intake fan.

If the dimensions of that case let you mount the radiator inside, then you will need some sort of "exhaust" basically to let that warm air out. If your case doesn't come with holes in the spot where you want to mount the rad in, then you can always drill or cut small holes or slots to let the hot air out. You will need to have the exhaust just on the other side of the rad so that it blows out of your case. The "catch" about water cooling is that you will never get below ambient temps. So you want to maximize the efficiency by using a larger radiator with more fans as well as good radiator placement so that it will not create extra heat in your case. In that diagram, that fan/rad setup looks like it is designed to be mounted externally in the back of the case, blowing the air outward, from your case.

Okay, here's a bit of a better example of how I was trying to explain it. This diagram is from a top view of the case, and the fans on the radiator would push the heat out the side of the case similar to say a port hole.

Here is something that may help, most people mount the fans behind the radiator so that it's pushing the air instead of pulling. It is more efficient. Some even use push/pull combos on both sides.

That would work too, and would probably be even better since the air would be pushed through the radiator, and if theres space, the idea of four 120 mm fans, two on each side all facing the same direction might give it even more of a boost to get the heat out quicker. EDIT: Just realized you stated the push/pull scenario.

I would assume the front intake fan wouldn't create a problem for the exhaust, right? Or would it be better since it's pulling in fresh air onto the radiator aswell?

I would keep the front "intake" fan just for that reason, to give some fresh air. The other thing is that you also still want air blowing onto the rest of your components like the RAM for example. Here are the dimensions for an average dual 120mm rad....
10.75 Lx 5.25 Hx 1.77 W inches, They are pretty slim for the most part and that should help you out if you are mounting it on it's side.

Yeah, I would probably keep the exhaust and side panel intake fan that comes with the case installed, aslong as they are at a decent dBA, if not, I'll find quiter fans for it. I'll probably use something like Thermaltake Active Memory Cooling Kit or Neon Crab Memory Cooler, just because I like how the crab thing looks. lol If I were to do a set up similar to the crab, I'd also put some Ramsinks on it aswell.

Also, is that dimension with the fans attached or no?

No that is just for the actual radiator. There are many different brands out there, however that seems to be an average dimension for them. I would add 1" for the fan, and at least 1.5" to 2" for the fan shroud on top of the rad width. That should give you a rough estimate of the space this will take up.

Well, the dimensions for the Lian Li case says it's 8.3" wide, so I think a dual 120mm radiator with four fans attached to it would fit in it just fine. Even if I round one shroud and the radiator to two and a half inches, it's still only five inches, which is pretty capable. Just depends if it'll be able to sit on it's side.

If it doesn't, then maybe doing the same thing with the dual exhaust ports except on the bottom of the case would be what I'd have to do. Until I can get dimensions for that area, I can only speculate.

Also, would you think a Thermochill 120.2 and a ThermoChill PS120.x shroud would be a good choice?

EDIT: I would need to use 3/8" tubing if I went with the Thermochill though.

The thernmochill unit isn't that bad at all and if you need to you can always get reducers that would allow you to run a 1/2" line. A lot of people run 3/8" loops and do well with them. 1/2" is obviously better due to being able to move more water, however some have issues with the large 1/2" tubes fitting inside of a tight area. But that is up to you. As far as having the rad sitting on it's side, it doesn't matter. It will be fine like that, just place a foam/rubber strip or something similar under it so it doesn't rattle inside the case. Basically insulate it for noise and vibration.

Oh, well that works too, aslong as it doesn't reduce flow drastically or anything. So far I've been able to gather a decent amount of info I wanted to know, but I do want to know how wide a 120.2 with two shrouds and four fans is, from end of fan to end of fan. Unfortunately, from info at Thermochill, they really don't give much dimensions with two shrouds fitted.