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On May 05 2014 11:19 Cyro wrote:
What do you mean by watercool? Are you buying pump, tubing+fittings, 1 or more rads, + blocks for your stuff, or do you mean some other liquid solution like clc's? What hardware do you have and what are your goals?
Well, since I posted that my dilemma has been solved. A mate of mine is going to buy all the stuff for my birthday :3
Anyways, might as well contribute more to the thread.
Current hardware;
i5 2500K (a little overclocked currently ~3.8GHz from memory, want to go higher to 4+)
16GB 1866MHz Corsair Vengeance RAM
AMD 7970 (want to overclock this too)
2x SSDs (one for windows, one for games)
3x HDDs (for music, TV shows and movies)
Antec 900 series 1
My gf bought me an NZXT Phantom 630 windowed edition case for my birthday and I was going to do either CPU or GPU but I've since been told I'm getting 2x Kraken x60's
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United Kingdom20328 Posts
Closed loop liquid coolers, particularly for CPU, are not really "better" than air cooling, they don't stand up to water loops and they have their positives and negatives over air (one negative is price, another noise while maintaining close to maximum performance)
Are you going to attach an x60 to your GPU?
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That was the plan, I'm told there's a bracket that's a bolt on for most GPUs
EDIT: Just looked up the compatibility charts, the bracket fits a 7970
What are your thoughts on case pressures? I've always been a fan of having positive pressure to eliminate dust buildup but now with the filters on the case I'm thinking neutral or negative pressure might be better?
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If you are going to CLC your GPU and CPU case pressure does not matter. Just set your radiator fans to intake and your done.
And how are you going to mount 2x 280 rads to a 630... I don't believe that it's possible.
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I was just looking into that;
One on top for the CPU, remove the bottom plate and a HDD bay for the second one to the GPU. I watched a video review where the guy states that this will work. Have measured anything up yet since I'm at work
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United Kingdom20328 Posts
On May 05 2014 14:12 KnT wrote:
That was the plan, I'm told there's a bracket that's a bolt on for most GPUs
EDIT: Just looked up the compatibility charts, the bracket fits a 7970
What are your thoughts on case pressures? I've always been a fan of having positive pressure to eliminate dust buildup but now with the filters on the case I'm thinking neutral or negative pressure might be better?
The whole point of having dust filters is to have positive pressure so that air can only come in through the intake fans and dust filters.
If you have negative pressure, it will flow into the case from every opening, mesh area etc.. and not through the dust filters
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On May 05 2014 14:12 KnT wrote:
That was the plan, I'm told there's a bracket that's a bolt on for most GPUs
EDIT: Just looked up the compatibility charts, the bracket fits a 7970
What are your thoughts on case pressures? I've always been a fan of having positive pressure to eliminate dust buildup but now with the filters on the case I'm thinking neutral or negative pressure might be better?
I have a Cooler Master Seidon 120mm CLC for my 7950 and it just bolts right on, no bracket needed (the screw holes for the original CPU mount bracket flanges matchup straight onto the GPU board). I believe the 7950 and 7970 have the same stock heatsink layout so that might work for you as well.
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On May 05 2014 10:11 KnT wrote:
I'm at a stage of starting to watercool my bits, but I'm faced with the question of CPU or GPU first?
If you're only going to do one, probably CPU. Put the added cooling to a bigger overclock. The only reason to water cool is if you're going to push your OCs.
But keep in mind that if you're planning to do the GPU later you'll need an appropriate amount of cooling. You'll likely need to add an additional radiator to sufficiently cool both CPU and GPU. If you get some quick release valves you can potentially avoid needing to drain the entire loop when you add the additional items, provided you've planned out where the later equipment will go.
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![[image loading]](http://img.videocardz.com/1/2014/05/PowerColor-R9-295X2-Devil13-3.jpg)
wow that is some hardcore high-end shit.
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Isn't that Powercolor's devil 13? Based off a 295x2?
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that is some hardcore stuff lawl.
i'd water cool this, think about the heat this thing would output :D
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It's what, 100W draw allowed from each 8pin plus 75 from the pci-e slot?
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150w for each 8pin and 150w for the PCIe slot
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At times like this, I get really impressed over how hardcore some persons are when it comes to building. And this is also why I love the fact that PCs are modular
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United Kingdom20328 Posts
On May 06 2014 03:58 Craton wrote:
It's what, 100W draw allowed from each 8pin plus 75 from the pci-e slot?
But the 295x2 ignores pci-e spec and draws far more, ~500w @1000mhz from a pair of 8 pins and pci-e slot - at stock
I don't really see the point of these on air, triple slot anyway and won't function well without good airflow, plus a single cooler and pcb, you can hardly run both GPU's at full potential
i'd water cool this, think about the heat this thing would output :D
A guy on OCN was asking if he should use 360+240+240 rad or try to fit 360+360+240 for a pair of 295x2's and a CPU.. i told him it's generally a bad idea to try to run a loop connected to your CPU with 1000w++ (maybe >1250) going in - and only 8x 120mm of rad area to cool it. Your water temps would be ridiculous to the point of it being more cost, noise and even performance effective to just air cool the CPU instead of having it in the same loop
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So you'd want to run two seperate loops in theory. Or keep the CPU on air. Honestly though a high-end air cooler should perform comparably to a water loop, no? How many extra degrees does a custom water get you? 10°C?
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United Kingdom20328 Posts
On May 06 2014 05:19 Incognoto wrote:
So you'd want to run two seperate loops in theory. Or keep the CPU on air. Honestly though a high-end air cooler should perform comparably to a water loop, no? How many extra degrees does a custom water get you? 10°C?
If you're keeping your water like 2-5c hotter than air, it gets you quite a big boost. If your air temp is 20c and your water is heating to 30-40c (or even hotter) because of insufficient rad space and fan performance on your rads, then every degree added to your water temp over your case temp is added to your cpu temperatures. GPU's are cooled well with water, they don't really mind 30-40c water in a 20c room, but it destroys any performance gain you'd get in terms of CPU temps if your CPU is 10-20c hotter than "ideal".
A 4770k@1.4vcore range with HT on can add like 200w of heat in a loop. That's like 1/6'th of the rad area to maintain the same water temps as that same 4770k + a pair of 295x2's at stock. If you want same temps as having a 360 rad on just CPU.. you'll need like 18x 120mm of rad area instead of 3x 120mm
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A CLC should perform comparably to end end air. Custom loop should outperform it enough to get several steps better of OC.
As for two loops vs one, it doesn't really matter. The difference in water temperature between any two points in the loop should be a fraction of a degree -- 0.1 or 0.2C delta basically: the water moves quite quickly. Additionally, it's usually one component or the other that's being stretched to the limit, not both. Think of how some games are CPU-bound while others are GPU-bound, or how e.g. encoding cranks the CPU but doesn't touch the GPU much/at all.
If you split the loop then whichever side you're using more of is dealing with dissipating more heat, whereas sharing gives you the advantage of dissipating the sum heat more efficiently. I favor a single loop. The only concern is keeping the flow up, but provided you plan your loop and keep out unnecessary turns and limit your angles, this shouldn't be a big issue either. Each of the items introduces some amount of resistance that your pump has to overcome to keep the water moving. Radiators are usually the biggest impediment iirc.
There is a rule of thumb for how much wattage roughly equates to a 120mm surface worth of cooling, which I think is about 150-200W per 120mm of surface areas. Obviously a fin-dense radiator with push-pull will have greater dissipation per surface area. Fan speed also affects things, but if you're running WC then it's silly to be running loud fans.
The one mentioned was about 7 120s worth, so at the low end of the scale you'd be just hitting the mark. But given the price of that setup, I'd expect high performance radiators in push pull that would allow for more dissipation. I think he'd be fine.
Oh, and for anyone curious about what it takes to set up a loop from scratch to handle CPU + two big GPUs, it should run you around $750 give or take. Each of the blocks tend to be about $100 themselves, plus the cost of the radiators (another ~$100 a piece), pump, reservoir, and tidbits like the fittings and tubing. The bright side is that half of it is reusable (the blocks usually become paperweights and the tubing gets tossed since you cut it down to fit just right).
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EPT
