D-Tek Fuzion & Not Impressed

Well, I finally got around to re-doing my WC setup and changed out my Apogee (the original before they started calling it the GT) to the Fuzion. What a mistake that was. At first I though that the hold down plate being separate from the block was a great idea, but that turned out not to be true. They only send one set of screws for the mounting and if you have a socket 939 motherboard, those screws are too small to screw into the back plate on the motherboard. Thankfully, I had the same length screws with a thread that did work with the back plate because I was not about to take out my motherboard. I basically had to rig up the screws with spacers and such in order for them to work correctly this way. I tightened the screws down to just before the hold down plate for the Fuzion began to bow. Even if I had used the method in the instructions, this still would have been the case. This is now why I don't like the idea of the hold down plate being separate from the actual block. My next complaint is the closeness of the barbs. Getting 1/2" ID 3/4"OD on there with clamps was a pain! I suspect trying to get them off will be just as much fun. When I finally got my system up and running, I noticed my idle temps were about 6 degrees higher then they were with the Apogee. While the system was on still on, I began tightening down the two screws on the Fuzion. As I did so, I saw the temps begin to fall. Doing so, however, resulted in the hold down plate bowing and eventually the motherboard bowing. So I ignored the Fuzion's plate bowing and tightened the screws down to the point where the motherboard bowed, and then backed down a little to get it unbowed. This got temps down around where they were with the Apogee, but created a "nice" bow to the hold down plate on the Fuzion. It turned out that load temps where about 2 degrees higher with the Fuzion then they were with the Apogee! This block was not worth the $60 and the headache that it caused. I don't know about other sockets, but if you have a socket 939 system, do not buy the Fuzion. Its just not worth it. Get yourself the Apogee GT and you will be very happy.

Swiftech Apogee GTX copper topped FTW!

I use the Thermalright backplate for LGA775 and can screw the block down to its heart content and not bow the MB.

Have you tried remounting the Fuzion? One mount does not a case make. It however may not be surprising if you didn't see some huge improvement over switching blocks as the performance gap has narrowed to within a few C on the modern blocks, and the Apogee GT isn't exactly a dinosaur. I would still expect however to see some improvement in temps.

The Fuzion was designed for or less for higher heat loads like quads if I remember right. I imagine that if you pumped more volts through your 170 and compared the APogee to the Fuzion, you'd see the fuzion perform better. The space inside the Apogee block is significantly less than the Fuzion. What pump are you using? It could be that the cpu isn't heating the water enough to really let the fuzion's design shine... Just a thought...

I've already remounted it a few times, it doesn't help. Like I said, I have to have the system running and monitor the temp while I screw down the hold down plate in order to get "good" temps.

I'm running 1.575 volts through my 170. So I think that is plenty to put the Fuzion to the test. As far as the pump goes, I'm using the MCP655. So the pump is not the issue here.

I wasn't expecting a miracle in temp drop. I defiantly wasn't expecting to see higher temps though. Temps aside, I just don't like the design (as stated in first post) now that I have used the Fuzion. The Apogee is just so much easier to work with and it also does its job very well (better than the Fuzion in my case). I guess the old (socket 939) need to stick with the old (Apogee) in order to get along well.

Most of the temp problem is due to the crappy way the IHS is affixed to the CPU on AMD's... anyway, on a C2D chip, the fuzion will give you about a 5-6C advantage over the apogee. C2D IHS's are soldered to the core(s) where AMD's are not (at least the older CPU's). The barbs are very close together on the fuzion, no doubt. I use 7/16" tubing so it is not as bad but I have heard that 3/4" OD tubing is tough with that block.

Go lidless and get a Storm. Then you'll see a miracle drop in temps. My 165 and Storm got along great together.

I just put a Fuzions on a dual socket 940 setup and other than the barbs being to close together (I just used zip ties on the barbs) I was pretty impressed. I must ask do you have a back plate on your motherboard. To mount the Fuzions all I had to do was just screw the included 6/32" machine screws in and tighten down with the included thumbscrews. Finally yes the mounting plates suck but who wants there Fuzion to cost an extra $2 for decent mounting plates.

Yeah that was my biggest criticism of the fuzion also the barbs being far to close together, with 1/2' tubing, not sure about wall thickness but i think its thick. So the two tubing lines were smack up against each other, it was a royal pain to get two hose clamps in between them and tightened, but i managed it eventually after much cursing.

anyway can't fault the fuzion apart from that with a q6600, i have awesome low temps and live in a very hot climate, and run stable @ 3.89


fuzions kick ***.