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Phanteks Enthoo Elite Build Plans?

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Masher06

New Member
Joined
Feb 15, 2017
Hello all. Firstly, as this is my very first post here, I am excited to be here and hope to share my journey with all of you as I go. Quick background on me. I have always built my own PC's since my first one in 1998. And only in the past couple of years have I moved into games and flight simulators that require a hefty system. I remember how cool it seemed when I got my first AIO set up on a 4790K. Now to step to present day.

I have taken the plunge and will be doing my first custom loop PC. I am taking it slow, and trying to be smart about it. I originally wanted to do this build in a Phanteks Enthoo Elite, but it seemed they were not going to launch soon enough, so I went and bought a CaseLabs SMA8. Of course while the SMA8 was in transit, the Elite popped up for preorder.

Most other sites and forums are basically CaseLabs or nothing at all, so I figured I would test the waters here. Is anyone here anxiously awaiting the arrival of their Elite? I cant be alone in the preorder as they have been sold out since launch day. I am curious what others have planned for it. As I said before this is a whole new process to me, but I've always believed that if your going to do something, do it right. Hence the piles of water cooling parts piling up around the house. :)

Anyhow, I look forward to becoming more involved with the community, and learning everything I can. I look forward to your replies.
 
Welcome,

Yes IMO the Caselabs cases are the defacto water cooling case, however any case can be used for water cooling.
The Elite will be a great case for a water cooling project. It sounds like you have already decided on water cooling parts
"Hence the piles of water cooling parts piling up around the house"
What parts did you order ?
If new to water cooling you may want to read up
this site and others have a lot of information that could prove useful.
It can be found in the water cooling section of this and many forums
However that is getting the cart before the horse.
You will need to nail down what platform you are using as well as what type of video prowess will be required to run your games/software
this will give you some insight to what blocks you will need and the rad surface required to do it
Water cooling is pretty simple, the more rad surface you have the quieter the system can be.
Their is a point where you hit the wall, but most cases do not have the accommodations to experience that.
I look forward to seeing what you come up with.
 
Welcome,

Yes IMO the Caselabs cases are the defacto water cooling case, however any case can be used for water cooling.
The Elite will be a great case for a water cooling project. It sounds like you have already decided on water cooling parts
"Hence the piles of water cooling parts piling up around the house"
What parts did you order ?
If new to water cooling you may want to read up
this site and others have a lot of information that could prove useful.
It can be found in the water cooling section of this and many forums
However that is getting the cart before the horse.
You will need to nail down what platform you are using as well as what type of video prowess will be required to run your games/software
this will give you some insight to what blocks you will need and the rad surface required to do it
Water cooling is pretty simple, the more rad surface you have the quieter the system can be.
Their is a point where you hit the wall, but most cases do not have the accommodations to experience that.
I look forward to seeing what you come up with.

Thanks for the quick reply Witchdoctor. I reckon my original question got off track. I was basically asking should I used the CaseLabs SMA8 that I have, or wait for the Enthoo Elite?

I have been watching Jayztwocents for a while now and his Skunkworks build has been my inspiration to step into custom cooling. However, on his live stream last night someone brought up what case he would use for his office build. His response was that while CaseLabs makes great cases, they are more form than function. I can see this myself with the one I have. It's going to talk a lot of drilling and modifying to make it the case I need. And I have to say, of all the things I've built in my life, the instructions that came from CaseLabs were the most confusing, vague instructions. Not what I would expect from a company charging $600-$700 for a case. I see the potential in the SMA8, but since I was lucky enough to score a preorder on the overpriced Enthoo Elite, I think I am going to wait for it to arrive and make the decision once I have it in hand. It seems MUCH more WC friendly.

Lastly you asked what I have waiting to put in my first water cooled build, I will make a list below. I firmly believe that you get what you pay for, so the list may seem extreme. I am planning on a dual loop system so keep that in mind as well. Thanks all.

i7-7700K
MSI Z270 Gaming M7
32GB Gskill Trident 4200
2 Samsung 960 Pro 1TB
3 2TB Samsung EVO SSD

Water Cooling
EK Supremacy EVO
2 EK-RES 140 D5 Pump/Res (250ml replacement tanks)
EK Titan XP Block and Backplate
2 EK 480 Coolance XE Rads with Vardar Fans.

Both loops will be 12/16MM with EK fittings PETG hardline, the drain system will be soft line with Bitspower fittings. I think that about covers it. :) I am looking forward to more input.
 
I think you have it covered bro
While I personally would use a different combo of hardware, it will certainly work and I am sure you have done the research so it will provide the performance you require.

Can you do 2x 480's in the elite ? it is one bad a$$ case for sure, either will serve you well.
Never did a hardline build other than I did a copper tubing build once.
I like these builds but think they are suited better to enthusiast that do not upgrade often.
If you do plan on upgrading a lot hard tubing I think would be difficult to deal with.

Do not see a power supply ? the eVGA G2 series is a nice compromise.

Like I said above the coolant is a concentrate, it work really well. I have used it in the past.
Just say no to dye ,

Post up some pics once you get rolling
 
I was considering soft tubing, but really prefer the look of hard line, so decided to make that part of the learning process. I have picked up the hard line bending kits from both Thermaltake and Monsoon so I will have a mandrel for pretty much any bend I want to make. And I already have about 3 times the projected tubing I will need in case of mistakes. :)

As far as coolant goes, I plan on using one of the premixed pastels. This should remove the need for biocides and such. I haven't picked a color yet, but for some reason I am leaning towards a bright green. Which is strange as I never really have liked green. But my two favorites, red and blue, are so overdone. :) I also like the look of a pastel white. It can look pretty elegant.

Just out of curiosity, what would you have done differently? Being new to all this, any constructive feedback is welcome.
 
Well being I work on mine a lot soft tubing would be my 1st choice. Like I said I did a copper piped build back in the day.
It was a monster, make no mistake, but became such a choir to swap out parts.
That being said if you plan on building this and not altering it for a few years hard tubing done nice is way awesome, especially in a case like the Elite.
I again cannot stress enough to simply go with a clear additive/biocide and distilled water.
Dye's may look cool, but do not work out well in the long term. It is regretted 100% of the time.
This is a lesson you do not have to learn the hard way, but you ill ultimantly have to weight the pros and cons yourself.

As far as parts, I love EK, they make great and innovative parts, they easily support the most GPU's

Meaning multiple PCB designs for each gen, speaking of that we are on the cusp of the 1080 Ti, you may wan't to see how that plays out unless you have already hit the buy button on the Titan

The Vardar fans have win written all over them, I love them

Hardware I have to say on a high dollar custom build like this I would have had to take a peak at the Formula

Probably would have ended up with the Code or the Apex

TBH there really is not much to be had using ambient cooling. The MSI board you have will do just as well

I am just partial to the Asus boards and the terrific customer service at Asus

Titans are Titans, all NV release PCB's , there are some BIOS's out there you can take advantage of with full water

Now the Ti's are going to have some higher end PCB designs ,

Hoping on a KPE / Lightning and Matrix, Safe bet EK will support these cards

Personally I would not spend the coin on 4200 mhz memory, and might drop back to 16 GB's

But not knowing everything you do it is hard to speculate what your needs will be

Looking forward to this, post lots of pics :thup:

As far as two loops, not really needed, but won't hurt anything either
 
It's kind of ironic that you mention the Asus boards. I currently have both the above mentioned MSI board, and the Asus Maximus IX Formula. I was not sure which I wanted to use, so I ordered both, and will return the one I don't want to use. I was leaning heavily towards the Asus board because of the built in water block, and better RGB options should I choose to include that in my build. Then I realized that the M.2 support leaves much to be desired. Only 1 M.2 slot, with a second one being a vertical mount? How could Asus get that wrong? I have 2 of the 1TB 960 Pros, and just can't wrap my head around that. I really wanted to give Asus a shot this time as I have been using MSI boards exclusively for years now.

I do have to ask about the use of dyes/pastels. Everywhere you look on the internet, you see dyes and pastels being used. In fact, that is one of the main reasons I decided to go this route instead of staying with AIO's. It's one more thing you can customize to make it the way you want it. I know early on in the water cooling days there were all kinds of horror stories, but has the technology not come far enough along yet that it's reasonably safe? I can't imagine all those people out there using custom loops with dyes having these nightmare scenarios that I read about on this forum? I may be wrong, I know I'm fairly new to the water cooling scene, but I just can't logically connect the two. If it was that bad, why do you see it almost everywhere?
 
I am not saying that the types of fluids they have today are not better than years past, as I do not know one way or the other

What I can tell you is they do stain everything so it is is difficult to change colors if you would choose too.

Also I have seen many pics of blocks clogged up with residue from the use of dye's.

In the end I my opinion is if you are going to use a dye in your system you need to break it down and clean it more offend

For me clear is the way to go, I do not recommend them under any circumstances

As far as boards go really any decent board will do, just get the feature set you want and make sure it has decent power delivery

Coming from a benching background I have a tendency to lean towards the higher end boards
 
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