In the loop

Hi everyone,
I intend to build my first water cooling custom loop for which I'll use an Obsidian 900D and I have some questions to ask, I've been searching the web but a lot of my concerns found no clear answers so I hope I'm in the right place, after all, as a Corsair enthusiast this is the place to be.
1. My loop will include two EK-CoolStream PE 480(one up and the other bottom right) one EK-CoolStream PE 360(bottom left) and one EK-CoolStream PE 120(rear exhaust). Is this enough for cooling the southbridge the cpu and two gpus?
2. Knowing that these radiators are 38mm thick and that I'm going for push/pull, is there enough room to add one EK-CoolStream PE 240 in the front of the case juste between the two bottom radiators?
3. Which Corsair 120mm fans you recommend? Should I go for static pressure or airflow optimized fans?
I will be very greatful if some one would help me out. Thanks.

Separate the gpu's into a second loop. They run way hotter than your CPU and will drive its temp up needlessly.

thanks for your reply, that's a very smart thinking, but is it possible to do it with a single pump?

Well yes, but that much radiator and blocks will reduce your flow. You could divide up your rads and just add a pump. Trust me you'll be happier. The 360 and 120 rads would handle the CPU and south bridge. And the two 480s would shread the GPUs. Truly you probably have more than enough radiators.

Thanks that was helpful.

Have a read at our water cooling stickies, that includes Mudajama too, to not just get the basics if you already do but to also known what else is involved in maintaining a loop.

With that said, once you're done have a look at my build log in my signature of a 900D loop.

to OCFs btw.

Yeah. Thanks for the unsolicited referral to stickies. That wasn't d-bagish at all

I would advise to stay away from the corsair air series fans at least the QE versions. Mine rattle when mounted to blow upwards and the performance is not that good. They are quiet to a point but you would probably get same noise and airflow from Arctic F series for third of the price in push pull configuration.

mudajama said:

Well yes, but that much radiator and blocks will reduce your flow. You could divide up your rads and just add a pump. Trust me you'll be happier. The 360 and 120 rads would handle the CPU and south bridge. And the two 480s would shread the GPUs. Truly you probably have more than enough radiators.

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Dividing the flow from the same reservoir is pretty much the same as having just one loop. It's the same liquid that circulates both.

Honestly, unless you plan to overclock really really high you will be more than fine with just a single loop. I run single loop for my system with slow speed fans and can run my FX8350 at 5GHz if I want to. At those speeds I am really near the voltage limit for this CPU. Effectively I have less radiator surface area so you should be fine.

Thanks mates. Thanks mates. GTXJackBauer that's a wicked RIG you've got there. By the way, would you please tell me if a 240mm radiator could fit between the two bottom radiators?

Thanks Waza, I'm not an overclocking fan anyway, I've got an intel I7 4790k and that's more than enough, besides I do live in Belgium and it's a pretty cold weather that we have, three weeks summer at best so my loop's purpose is to handle my long gaming sessions and to extend the life span of my components.
What do you think about the Corsair SP120 HP or even the QE?

Essadqi said:

Thanks Waza, I'm not an overclocking fan anyway, I've got an intel I7 4790k and that's more than enough, besides I do live in Belgium and it's a pretty cold weather that we have, three weeks summer at best so my loop's purpose is to handle my long gaming sessions and to extend the life span of my components.
What do you think about the Corsair SP120 HP or even the QE?

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I have 8 of the SP120QE fans and I regret buying them. I have really bad airflow right now because they cannot be mounted blowing up.. I have 12 fans taking air in and only one 140mm exhausting.
That is until I find a good replacement for these corsair fans. EK Vardars are something I have kept my eye on but they have not convinced me yet.
Cannot really tell if the highspeed SP120's suffer from the same flaw since I don't have any of those.

Vardars are tickling my fancy too, Corsair SP fans are pretty loud at full speed which is the real problem, this rotation ratio is a requisite for a decent air flow.

Essadqi said:

Thanks mates. Thanks mates. GTXJackBauer that's a wicked RIG you've got there. By the way, would you please tell me if a 240mm radiator could fit between the two bottom radiators?

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I've planned a 900D build myself over the past 6 months and all of my parts have been ordered, but I won't be home until mid May so I can't start building yet. I might be able to help you out a bit here anyway. (no hands-on experience yet either, just from a boatload of reading)

Not quite sure what you mean there, do you intend to put 3 rads down in the bottom?

1) The 900D has around 220mm room in the bottom where you can put rads. Given your rads are 38mm thick and you are planning on going p/p on all of them (25mm / fan), you are looking at 88mm per rad you want to fit. This would give you enough room to fit a 480 rad in the bottom in p/p on one side and another 240 rad in p/p on the other side. I'm not sure if you could fit a 360 there instead of a 240 because you have to take into account the psu and cables coming off it.

2) As for the fans themselves, go with SP fans to mount against rads (Static Pressure fans) and AF fans as case fans like the front intake ones (Air Flow, where air can flow without restriction of a rad)

3) About the rads, I'll think you'll be more than safe. Perhaps if I could make a suggestion: a 60mm thick 480 rad in p/p on top (exhausting air out of the case), a 60mm thick 480 rad in the bottom in push (intake) and a 60mm thick 240 rad in the bottom in push or pull (as long as it is exhausting air out of the case). With a setup like this, there won't be any need to have another 120 rad in the back and a 240 rad in the front, giving you a cleaner look and less tubing runs going all over the place

Essadqi said:

Thanks mates. Thanks mates. GTXJackBauer that's a wicked RIG you've got there. By the way, would you please tell me if a 240mm radiator could fit between the two bottom radiators?

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Unfortunately, I don't think that is possible. Maybe with some modding or a certain rad might work but AFAIK, its not possible.

For a CPU and x2 GPU loop, you could get away with just the bottom compartment filled with rads. If you're looking for great Delta-Temps and a silent rig at full bore, you could fill her up with all rads. You don't need to go in P/P as I would rather focus on getting some nice thick rads @ low FPI with premium fans in Push as intake on all points of the case and have the unfiltered back as exhaust.

I have changed my rig and haven't taken pictures but what I have now for just a CPU and GPU loop is a 360mm up top, 240mm on the bottom on the PSU side and a 480mm on the non-PSU side on the bottom as well. Complete overkill for my setup but it lets me run my fans completely silent and have more than enough to throw another GPU or three total in SLI in there and keep my Delta-Temps relatively low with OCs on all main components.

Hope this helps but make sure you've done some reading so I know where your knowledge base stands before we continue to move on and get into specifics.

Essadqi said:

Hi everyone,
I intend to build my first water cooling custom loop for which I'll use an Obsidian 900D and I have some questions to ask, I've been searching the web but a lot of my concerns found no clear answers so I hope I'm in the right place, after all, as a Corsair enthusiast this is the place to be.
1. My loop will include two EK-CoolStream PE 480(one up and the other bottom right) one EK-CoolStream PE 360(bottom left) and one EK-CoolStream PE 120(rear exhaust). Is this enough for cooling the southbridge the cpu and two gpus?
2. Knowing that these radiators are 38mm thick and that I'm going for push/pull, is there enough room to add one EK-CoolStream PE 240 in the front of the case juste between the two bottom radiators?
3. Which Corsair 120mm fans you recommend? Should I go for static pressure or airflow optimized fans?
I will be very greatful if some one would help me out. Thanks.

Click to expand...

The two 480 rads are plenty for what you want to cool. If you want to add another front rad for looks that can't hurt but won't affect temps greatly. The rear 120 rad leave out, it just takes up space and will not improve cooling because it nearly has to be set up to use already warmed air from other rads. The same can be said for a second rad in the bottom compartment. More radiator is not always better in enclosed spaces like PC cases. They can just restrict overall airflow and actually lower cooling performance and diminishing returns for more and more rad space kicks in very rapidly. For example, with the two 480's adding another 360 rad would not lower temps by more than 2 or 3 degrees at best. It is far more effective to carefully set up the air flow so that each rad is fed with cool air.

For fans I found the SP120 quiets to be good high quality fans but not the absolute quietest, Noiseblocker Eloops are one of my faves but are not good to use in pull, EK Vardars are very good if you don't mind the industrial look of them.

Splitting loops up for better temps is in most cases not very effective. With a build this size and only dual GPU's the water temp will not be increasing very much so the CPU temps will not be noticeably effected at all. Its common when first looking at water cooling to expect that the coolant will be warm after the GPU's and cool again after the rads, so loop order could make a real difference. In reality it just doesn't work like that. The water after the GPU's will not be more than a couple degrees warmer and instead the whole water volume increases in temp til the rads are warm enough to dissipate the wattage being produced.

Thanks guys, things are getting quite clear, obviously the front and back radiators seems to be redundant, I think I'll go with the two 480 plus the 360 on the bottom(I'm using a standard length PSU with modified cables, I checked and there will be enough room). As for fans, I'll use Corsair SP HP and I'll keep them at low speed using Asus suite III. You've been great mates thanks a lot.

That's going to be tight.

Have you figured which rads are you going with and fans? If not, have a look at Black Ice SR-2s or the Alphacool UT60s for starters or stick with the EKs.

Also, if you go with a 480 up top, you're going to lose your top drive bay.

Yes I'll stick with the EK-CoolStream PE I've seen some reviews, also the review by JayzTwoCents on youtube and they're just neat and the performances are great too thanks to the double fins architecture. For the top drive bay it's no concern I'm using an external optique drive and since I'm no longer using the front radiator there will be space for my HDD and SSD.