Quiet water cooling?

[Coherence]

My girlfriend has unfortunately got it stuck in her head that she must have a water cooling setup in the rig she wants me to put together for her. She has always hated the noise of her current rig. (In fact, adding extra fans never seemed to do much for her case temps, it just increased the noise.)

Here are the parts she is currently considering for cooling:
Asus P5N32-SLI Premium mobo
EVGA GeForce 8800GTX 768MB (see note below)
Intel E6400 Core 2 Duo

She plans on putting this into a Thermaltake Armor VA8000BWS case, which is supposedly one of the biggest cases out there, so it should fit any video card and cooling system one can think of. (Personally, I'm considering an Antec Nine Hundred for myself since the big fans it uses are fairly quiet and don't bother me, though I hear some video cards don't fit quite right. But I digress.)

She may go with a 8800GTS 640MB card (since she only has a 1240x1080 LCD), or even an ATi X1950 XTX (which is faster than the 8800 for DX9 games, and we'll still be using XP because Vista is still buggy and there are no DX10 games for it yet, anyway, and by the time there are, DX10 cards will probably be cheaper than they are now).

I figure there's no need for a Northbridge waterblock, since the mobo has passive heatpipe cooling for it, and since we're not OC'ing the existing coolers will be fine.

She just wants as silent a system as possible, without breaking the bank. She thinks watercooling is the only way to get a silent rig, so we ask your advice!

 

[aigomorla]

OMG where did you find your GF??

IF i even mention the words Water + computer i get the evil eye. And the words, Im your baby, not my computer.


anyhow... that case is a no, with that type of gear... look at the CM stacker.

Ummm im assuming she wants a GPU block as well, because you wouldnt of mentioned video card unless you had intent. Okey, 8800 class, thats gonna be a lot.

No northbridge is a the way to go if you not overclocking.


Ahhh silence.... Okey thats going to require a large radiator so you can add more fans to downclock it:



Tell your GF this is how it looks like:

1. She cant have the Armor. She needs a CM Stacker. This is actually more for you, because it will be EASIER to install in a stacker.
2. Tell her because she wants the video card watercooled, she is going to need a large class radiator. So its going to get a tad bit more expensive then you'll expect.
3. If your not overclocking, i dont recomend water at all. You can get away with something near silent, for a little less, with less maintence. You nor your GF knows anything about watercooling from the looks of it. I dont think your mentally ready for watercooling or its commitments. So i dont recomend it.


If your still insistant on getting it:

You need to buy a stacker. T01. Mount the PSU on top. And floor mount the radiator on the bottom. There is a hole stock on the stacker, you need to somehow cut a larger hole so it can fit a 120x3 radiator. Then all you need to do is floor mount it.

As for pumps, i would recomend a D5 since silence is the objective. D5's a naturally more quiet then DDC+'s

As for CPU block: your looking at D-Tek Fusion. It has less restrictions then a apogeeGT and will perform better with less flow. That is your ideal block.

Radiator: you require a 120x3 class. The best and also the most expensive is a thermochill PA120.3 However, seeing in yourcase that you seem theres a budget involved, you would want to drop in a swiftech 320 radiator.

Gpu block: i would recomend swiftech MCW60 with G80 adapter kit.

Finally a reservoir. Swiftech micro res is whats pictured below


This is about how your setup will look like if you do this correctly:


http://i125.photobucket.com/albums/p73/aigomorla/IMG_0406.jpg

Pump is mounted up front with the radators outlet.

I would honestly try to convince her on NOT watercooling unless she knows how to take care of it. Its not something very light and easy as a air cooler. Read my sig, and have your gf read it too. If she or you arent able to commit to it, then dont start it.

Thats my 2 cents.


If your still commited to this, drop me a pm, and i'll point you to stores where you can get started on aquiring parts for this setup.

Expect around 300-315. is my inital estimates.

70 for pump
65 for cpu block
70 for GPU block + adapter
70 for the radiator
15 in tubing - depends on tubing
10 dollar mis. eq, like DI water, and coolant additives.


the extra 15 would be your labor fee for making you do all this. Of course you can charge her in other ways

 

[Shadowknight]

Go to SPCR's recommended section for CPU cooling. The Zalman reserator is at the top of the list.

ETA: Pretty much the majority of SPCR-ers have super-quiet or effectively silent rigs based on air cooling, so you might want to get her to reconsider going water if she doesn't have to.

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: Shadowknight
Go to SPCR's recommended section for CPU cooling. The Zalman reserator is at the top of the list.

ETA: Pretty much the majority of SPCR-ers have super-quiet or effectively silent rigs based on air cooling, so you might want to get her to reconsider going water if she doesn't have to.

no, the reserator wont cut it for a c2d + G80 video card.

And also, i highly advice not to get that kit because it straight up sucks. It uses aluminum, which limits its upgradability, and your limited to zalman waterblocks for the gpu block.

This will not WORK. If you dont believe me, pm shunail. He was having massive problems with his zalman not cooling efficiently. And he ended up buying an entire new setup.


So the only advice you want from SPCR is that on silent AIR cooling. If you want water advice from people who know everything there is about water goto xtremesystems.org/forums under liquid cooling and ask over there. But just to let you know i also participate in that forum, and most of them will say the same thing i do.

reserator wont cut it for a G80 + C2D.

The G80 alone does 120-130TDP. The chip doing 65TDP. But knowing everyone whose on water, the op will most likely play with it to see if he can OC.

P5N32 + watercooling + E6400 = overclocking brewing somewhere... And i know your going to be awefully tempted if you did pull off a nice watercooling setup. Because you'll be shocked to see your load temps under 40C, on coretemp.

 

[Coherence]

Ok, we've convinced her, silent air cooling is the way to go! (Which is what I've been telling her all this time, but that should be no surprise.)

The Antec Nine Hundred case is getting good reviews for being very quiet (since all it's fans are large, slow-spinning fans, and have individual speed control as well), though I'm not sure her choice of video card will fit well (people are saying the 8800 line is very snug, and sometimes the video cable won't even connect properly). She's now leaning toward the EVGA 8800 GTS 320MB Superclocked card. I believe the GTS is a bit smaller than the GTX, so maybe the fit won't be an issue.

Now I just have to figure out where the "SPCR" people you've been talking about are. Do you mean www.silentpcreview.com?

 

[Smartazz]

The Zalman Reserator might be a good option for this kind of setup. I think that there are two kinds of Reserators now, one is $200 and one is $300 if I'm not mistaken. It's pretty much almost completely silent from what I've heard, only the faint whisper of a small pump. Definately take a look at that, but I think that there are air coolers that'll make your computer nearly silent. I've used the 8800GTS which is so quiet that I couldn't tell if the fan was broken or not and the Scythe Mine which is a really quiet cooler, look into the Scythe Ninja though. A combination of these two should do an excellent job of keeping noise down with minimal cost. I'm assuming that the 8800GTX is as quiet as the 8800GTS though, so I don't know this for sure.

 

[Smartazz]

Originally posted by: aigomorla

Originally posted by: Shadowknight
Go to SPCR's recommended section for CPU cooling. The Zalman reserator is at the top of the list.

ETA: Pretty much the majority of SPCR-ers have super-quiet or effectively silent rigs based on air cooling, so you might want to get her to reconsider going water if she doesn't have to.

no, the reserator wont cut it for a c2d + G80 video card.

And also, i highly advice not to get that kit because it straight up sucks. It uses aluminum, which limits its upgradability, and your limited to zalman waterblocks for the gpu block.

This will not WORK. If you dont believe me, pm shunail. He was having massive problems with his zalman not cooling efficiently. And he ended up buying an entire new setup.


So the only advice you want from SPCR is that on silent AIR cooling. If you want water advice from people who know everything there is about water goto xtremesystems.org/forums under liquid cooling and ask over there. But just to let you know i also participate in that forum, and most of them will say the same thing i do.

reserator wont cut it for a G80 + C2D.

The G80 alone does 120-130TDP. The chip doing 65TDP. But knowing everyone whose on water, the op will most likely play with it to see if he can OC.

P5N32 + watercooling + E6400 = overclocking brewing somewhere... And i know your going to be awefully tempted if you did pull off a nice watercooling setup. Because you'll be shocked to see your load temps under 40C, on coretemp.

Which Reserator did he use though? I'm not sure about the capablities of the new one, but the original wasn't quite built for modern video cards.

 

[Shadowknight]

Originally posted by: Coherence
Ok, we've convinced her, silent air cooling is the way to go! (Which is what I've been telling her all this time, but that should be no surprise.)
...
Now I just have to figure out where the "SPCR" people you've been talking about are. Do you mean www.silentpcreview.com?

It's a bit out of date, but here's something I wrote on SPCR(silentpcreview) that's a good starting point http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=21152

In a room with no noise (no fridge, no outside noise, nothing) my computer appears to be completely silent. Here's my thread in the gallery section http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=24308

And of course check individual forums on silentpcreview for component specific questions/recommendations. Some high end video cards are coming out that are passively cooled, so check out the VGA forum.

 

[aigomorla]

dude you guys IT WONT WORK.

Just trust me on it okey? I am tired of explaining the same thing over and over again. I have worked with tons of water setups. And i know enough to tell which design and capacity a typical setup would run.

The zalman WONT work. The G80 runs way too hot for the cheapo alu waterblock. And if you think you can get smart and drop an EK on it. Well, now you just got corrosion. Because copper + alu in the same loop = lots and lots of crying.


Thats just 1 reason why it WONT work. I have about 10 more. But as i said I DONT WANT TO GET INTO IT.



Anyhow good call op, which is what i originally recomended. If and when if you ever decide to watercool again, drop me a pm, and i can continue where i left off.