My Coolit Domino ALC blew up

[jloehr]

On Friday my Coolit Domino ALC liquid cpu cooler went bad. I'd just bought Majesty 2 on steam, after playing for an hour or so I heard a load popping noise and the screen went purple. I turned off the machine as fast as I could and when I opened it up I found the Domino leaked all its coolant on my two gtx 285s and my x-fi (barely visible) and my psu.

After cleaning it up, airing it out with BIG fans for a day, and replacing the cooler with the intel stock fan, my system can now sometimes boot to windows (with video corruption). I've tried swapping out as many components as possible, but that doesn't help.

Anyway it you have one of these in your box I suggest turning it off right now, taking it out and shooting it. Then go get an air cooler.

[werewolfdaddy]

Woah, man. I am truly sorry. Was it a hose or a hole in the radiator?

[jloehr]

Best I can tell the leak was coming from the pump itself. I should mention it worked fine for about 8 months, and I hadn't been messing around inside the case recently.

[Apoptosis]

Very interesting... It doesn't look like the tubes were twisted beyond a typical install either.

I'd be curious to see if you can track down that leak. A sudden leak of that much fluid should be the result of a crack...

[KnightRid]

HOLY ****!

I sure hope mine doesnt do that! I wonder if you got a hold of Collit, if they would replace the parts taht got damaged under warranty service or if they only worry about the water cooler? If the cooler damaged other items, they should replace them also. I would call and talk to someone!!

Mike

[werewolfdaddy]

I''m not going to link to another site, but I went to Coolit's forums to find out what I could for him. It appears he went there too looking for help. Read his post and the replies from Coolit and it doesn't look like they're going to do much more than RMA the cooler.

[jloehr]

KnightRid,

I'd strongly advise you to turn your system off right now then replace the domino before turning it back on.

I'm currently working on getting some attention from the press. I've been contacting anyone who did a review on it, especially those who gave it an award or recommendation. So far I've had some very positive responses from journalist reviewers.

Indeed Coolit has offered to replace or refund the part, but I want them to consider doing a recall. I'm more concerned that they are continuing to sell this potentially dangerous product, although I'd be happy if they offered to replace my system.

You can read a bunch of consumer review from people who had similar problems:
(27 of 77 reviews I've seen indicated failure, and most of those resulted in damage to other components)

Amazon user reviews:
http://www.amazon.com/CoolIT-DM-1000-Domino-L-C-Cooler/product-reviews/B001LKMU56/ref=cm_cr_dp_hist_1?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&filterBy=addOneStar


NewEgg user reviews:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835227005

[skier]

hmm, newegg no longer carries it, 'Deactivated Item'

[KnightRid]

KnightRid,

I'd strongly advise you to turn your system off right now then replace the domino before turning it back on.

I'm currently working on getting some attention from the press. I've been contacting anyone who did a review on it, especially those who gave it an award or recommendation. So far I've had some very positive responses from journalist reviewers.

Indeed Coolit has offered to replace or refund the part, but I want them to consider doing a recall. I'm more concerned that they are continuing to sell this potentially dangerous product, although I'd be happy if they offered to replace my system.

You can read a bunch of consumer review from people who had similar problems:
(27 of 77 reviews I've seen indicated failure, and most of those resulted in damage to other components)

Amazon user reviews:
http://www.amazon.com/CoolIT-DM-1000-Domino-L-C-Cooler/product-reviews/B001LKMU56/ref=cm_cr_dp_hist_1?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&filterBy=addOneStar


NewEgg user reviews:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835227005

DAMN - it works so damn good too

I might take a chance and see what happens. Id ont have the money to buy a high end water cooling kit for the i7-920 and I like seeing it run at 4.3ghz and 4.51ghz turbo If it breaks I will get a hold of them and if they wont replace everything that was damaged, I would probably talk to a lawyer for them to either replace my damaged parts or file a class action lawsuit. If enough people have had this problem, then a lawsuit would solve it, hopefully.

Mike

[jloehr]

Hey all, I've been in contact with Coolit. Without going into details I will say they are treating me fairly and to my satisfaction.

There is indication that my case involved isolated circumstances, but as always use your own best judgment.

[werewolfdaddy]

I'm glad this had a happy ending. Congrats, man.

[jloehr]

Following up on my problem. Coolit systems did a great job resolving my problem. My machine is back up and running just like it was before the incident. I was playing the game “Risen” with it much of the weekend and had no problems at all.

The problem with the Domino in my machine was rare and the responsibility for explaining it rests with Coolit. The damage to my machine was significantly lighter than I feared.

My advice to anyone considering any sort of water cooling is to minimize where leaks could potentially go, provide an escape path for the fluid and put as few things under the reservoir as possible. The ideal setup for a water cooled CPU would be a case that mounts the motherboard inverted and top mounts the power supply.

[stev]

My advice to anyone considering any sort of water cooling is to minimize where leaks could potentially go, provide an escape path for the fluid and put as few things under the reservoir as possible.

That is why I'm a strong advocate for external liquid-cooling units like the Nautilus 500 and the rear mounted Swiftech kits that can actually be mounted onto another frame to prevent leaking disasters.

Why in the world would a person put reservoirs and rads INSIDE a case knowing that there is limited room inside and the tubing has to make these stressful bends? It's a recipe for leakers. The OUTSIDE approach lends itself to keep leaks to a minimum and keeps those costly dual GPU cards , MB, HDD and other hardware far and clear of any pending issues.

Purging the cooling loop and swapping out components is by far easier with an external unit too. Plus the external unit can be as big as you want it to be. Having inlet and outlet liquid dis-connects is a major plus as well.

The old saying is, It's not ever your system would have a leak, but when it will.

The CoolIT system is a nice, novel and compact unit all in one. Got to love that too.

[vicaphit]

This is the reason I am too afraid to watercool. I'm glad Coolit decided to help you out.

[y eye]

.
Good day,
Barry Reicker, aka Barrolde, http://twitter.com/barrolde is the sales manager for CoolIt in Calgary.
He will help all he can... He is in sales but the lab is next door and I have ordered custom
built gear. I've had problems and he straightened them out overnight and put me in comtact with
the lab lead hand.

It sounds to me like you are not sure what happened and not sure what to do. My advice is stop
worrying. Call Barry and tell him what happened as best you can and ask him what to do...
That's all let him take it from there... betcha things work out real soon.

y