After doing some reading on this site and other forums. I decided to water cool my xfx 7870 core edition after seeing my temps go to the middle 80's c mark. After looking at the AIO vga water coolers with their compatability, look, size, and cost I figured I could do better for less $$$. I went with the Corsair H50 ($50), Enzotech BCC9 ram sinks ($15), and my stock amd 6300 heatsink fan (free, surprised I didnt throw that thing away). Total cost $65.
First off here's my rig.
This is my setup to start with.
I took my card apart. I wanted to retain my xfx cover since it matched my computers internals.( I already had my fan mounted when I decided to take the pic)
Cleaned up my gpu with Arctic Clean remover and surface purifier. Partially put it back together to line things up.
After lining things up I realized the heat spreader was in the way of me actually mounting the block itself. My warranty is almost up so I decided to mod it a hair. I needed it to put the cover back on the card.
Before.
After.
Since I was cutting it was when i decided to put the ramsinks on. I was going to leave it alone and just add the fan, but oh well. Here's the fan mounted in the chassis. It has a 1/4 gap in between the shroud to draw air and blows directly onto the card. I have it hooked up to my fan controller.
I installed the ram sinks. These things are nice. Put direct pressure on for about 10 seconds. The thermal tape they use holds great.
Now I mounted the block with zip ties. I used a tiny little drop of Arctic Silver 5 on the gpu chip. I pulled them as tight as I could by hand diagonal from each other. Some advice. Use pliers and get that extra click. It hit 100c when i first tried it out.
Almost done.
The finished product. The fans are different. I hated those blue fans. They were left over from a previous computer. They look so tacky imo. Since I added that water cooler. It gave me chance to move some things around and get rid of those ugly blue fans.
My temps went up from upper 80's to upper 40's under load with the small overclock this card will do. Idle 32c. Stock clock temps are around 44c. With a single bios and no voltage control this card is very limited on overclocking. Stock 1000mhz chip/ 1200mhz ram. I can get it up to 1170/1350 stable.
First off here's my rig.
This is my setup to start with.
I took my card apart. I wanted to retain my xfx cover since it matched my computers internals.( I already had my fan mounted when I decided to take the pic)
Cleaned up my gpu with Arctic Clean remover and surface purifier. Partially put it back together to line things up.
After lining things up I realized the heat spreader was in the way of me actually mounting the block itself. My warranty is almost up so I decided to mod it a hair. I needed it to put the cover back on the card.
Before.
After.
Since I was cutting it was when i decided to put the ramsinks on. I was going to leave it alone and just add the fan, but oh well. Here's the fan mounted in the chassis. It has a 1/4 gap in between the shroud to draw air and blows directly onto the card. I have it hooked up to my fan controller.
I installed the ram sinks. These things are nice. Put direct pressure on for about 10 seconds. The thermal tape they use holds great.
Now I mounted the block with zip ties. I used a tiny little drop of Arctic Silver 5 on the gpu chip. I pulled them as tight as I could by hand diagonal from each other. Some advice. Use pliers and get that extra click. It hit 100c when i first tried it out.
Almost done.
The finished product. The fans are different. I hated those blue fans. They were left over from a previous computer. They look so tacky imo. Since I added that water cooler. It gave me chance to move some things around and get rid of those ugly blue fans.
My temps went up from upper 80's to upper 40's under load with the small overclock this card will do. Idle 32c. Stock clock temps are around 44c. With a single bios and no voltage control this card is very limited on overclocking. Stock 1000mhz chip/ 1200mhz ram. I can get it up to 1170/1350 stable.
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