Is this still a viable setup?

Hi Guys,

I’ve been a long time lurker and finally decided to post, and pick the collective hive mind that is OC on the subject of water cooling. What follows is a rough outline of my current build, most of the parts are out of warranty and this is one of the reasons I’m willing to dip my toes into water cooling, the other reason is to teach myself the subtleties of overclocking.

Intel i7 860
MSI P55-GD65
4Gb Kingston Hyper X
EVGA GTX 680
Samsung 840 SSD paired with a 500Gb WD HDD
Antec 80+ 620W PSU

I was originally planning on Importing the following XSPC kit: http://goo.gl/cC1dbX but found the ZALMAN Reserator XT locally. Now to my questions…

1) This being a old kit, think it was released in 2007. Would it be advisable to use it on my current CPU and future upgrades? In other words, will it manage to cool current generation hardware? As I am only able to find reviews where it’s tested on the than latest Core 2 duo’s and nothing like a I7 4770K for instance.
2) The included ZALMAN cpu block states it’s compatible with the old 775 socket, will it fit on my 1156?
3) Has anyone owned this kit or still does, what are the pro’s and con’s?

Any advise would be very much appreciated!

ooh the XT... Zalman knows how to build a nice looking kit
Don't know if it is still up to scratch, thou.
For a CPU only system, it would/should work, but only IF your MB also has 775 holes, like some Asrock boards do. Otherwise you have to go down the road of trying to order a 1155 mount kit/plate---if they are available, you'ld would need to check the Zalman site for that.
Or modify the system using an existing plate (hammer/drill/cusswords). It depends how much time/sweat you want to invest If you dont plan to add a couple of Titans to the loop or do some crazy OC and are willing to tinker/hammer a bit and you like the look of the ResXT, and if its cheaper as the XSPC kit, then the ResXT is viable.

However, the XSPC kit is a more "modern" kit, it is actually a very good kit IF you take the D5 variant. If only CPU cooling, then the 750 might be good enough. But the 750pump is a bit on the "just enough" side... It doesn't have the proven history the D5 pump has. Hence the "get the D5 variant" advice.

That reserator won't do much good for modern processors. It is likely to be outperformed by most high end air coolers.
That being said it isn't compatible with LGA1156 socket anyway.
It is effectively just a fancy kit cooler by today's cooling standards.
If you are looking for silent cooler and are ready to underclock your CPU it might work for you with modern CPU block.
You are better off with your original plan.

Welcome to OCFs!

I will start by saying that I also agree as you should go with the XSPC D5 variant. So incase you think of adding more to the loop down the road you are set on the pump. The tubing and fans could be changed for better but the kit itself is really the best starter kit out there in the market next to the swiftech kits which are more expensive. You get a great performing cpu block with the XSPC kit. If budget permits, I would advise going with one of these kits (AX240) for a cpu only loop and if you're looking to add the GPU by picking one of these kits (AX360) as well. I posted a listing to give you the option of which reservoir you like better or can fit in your existing case.

If you haven't done it yet I would like to add that you should read up our water cooling stickies to better understand water cooling. There's maintenance involved to what fluids should be used etc.

come on I use a reserator V1, if you DEMAND silent it works, if you like performance get the cspc kit.

the advantage to the zalman V1 is that i can drop 2 frozen water bottles in it and bench away!!!!