Legit Reviews

Yes it is! Thanks to DMB2000uk, Bio-Hazard, Alathald, Skippman, and all the other watercooling guys on here, the urge to take the watercooling dive has been too much for me to take! With my tax return I purchased a new Phenom II x4 940BE, Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-UD4H motherboard, Swiftech Apex Ultima water cooling kit, and a MCW60-R block for my 8800GTS 512.

After my initial case mods for cable management and air flow*, I started assembling my watercooling setup. I got the CPU block on and started messing with the GPU block but needed to sand down the standoffs as they were about 2.5mm too tall for contact with the GPU core. I took my time getting the radiator flushed, mounting it, and then getting my tubing how I thought it would be best, but I definitely showed my noobishness with my inadequate T-line length as it was under the tallest point on the loop (the radiator i/o in the back of the case) so after realizing my error, I tipped the case on its side and started filling the loop for my distilled water leak test. So far so good, it's been pumping away for an hour now and I can't wait to wake up in the morning and drain/refill the loop with the coolant mix.

I've got a just these few pictures right now, but you know there will be more
(also, I know the GTZ is upside down logo-wise )

*Much credit going to Dan for the cable cleanup ideas.

Looking very sharp man!! Nice and clean

I see you've "Dan Modded" your case by removing that drive bay, nice idea. Looking real clean! Any concerns about having those two 120's blowing on each other? (The one in the case and the one on the RadBox)

Skippman wrote:I see you've "Dan Modded" your case by removing that drive bay, nice idea. Looking real clean! Any concerns about having those two 120's blowing on each other? (The one in the case and the one on the RadBox)

The fan setup shouldn't be a issue, I've had a system setup exactly the same way a while back and it performed great.

Leak testing throughout the night went without a drop spilled, so I drained the loop and started juggling my day between household stuff and cable management... I think it sort of shows, but I'm fairly happy with the end result. My midget T-line somehow grew exorbitantly larger, but I was so ready to get the project done I figured a tall line isn't something to spend 5 minutes extracting my fillport from when I can just happily chug along

At any rate, my weekend project is finished, and I think it could definitely look worse!
The final assembly:


Suspended pump:


A very holy-looking GTZ:


A very happy looking 8800GTS 512:


I've just installed the windows 7 beta on the machine, and I'm pretty impressed with how responsive it is with the 940BE inside. I've bumped the multiplier up just a bit for a nice boost to 3.4GHz for the moment, but I fully intend on pushing this chip as far as I can get it with the means I have now. I'm idling at about 31-32C right now, and I'm curious to see how high this will go under full load... More to come later!

Current CPU-Z shot:


Thanks for looking! And to anyone who's scratching their heads about watercooling - it's really not that difficult, and if I somehow sprung a leak I would be VERY surprised. Those tubes just barely fit over the barbs, and the clamps are quite secure! You'd have to have either faulty parts with a major malfunction or seriously jostling the tower to do any damage (at least from my perspective).

See brother! Told you it wasn't that hard! Welcome to the H2O cult.

What did you do to your pump? Secure it using bungie or 550 cord? Looks like you did a good job with cable managment. Your case doesn't have any windows so sleaving your cables wouldn't have really made all that big a diffrence to ya.