Cooling Want to water cool for the first time...

For a long time I have built my own gaming rigs but never have I considered water cooling. Since the last machine I built was almost 6 years ago the heat output of the majority of the components seems much higher than those I just bought for my current build.

Listed below are the components relevant to the situation. I can list the others if need be...

CASE: Antec P182
MOBO: Intel BOXD975XBX2KR LGA 775 Intel 975X
GPU: GeForce 8800GTX 768MB 384-bit GDDR3
CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield 2.4GHz

The gpu runs at 75c when under stress and the cpu at around 50c. The bleeding heat from these components is causing zone 1 and zone 2 to heat up to nearly the temp of the cpu at times (pictures below for reference). I don't know if I completely trust or should trust the temps from the the intel monitor because core temp shows each core of the cpu never going over 40c.



...and just so I can show off my paint skills here is how I have things set up...



I have read the forums here for many hours as well as the guides but I am still at a loss as to what's best for my situation. It may just be my inexperience and fear of doing something wrong which are causing me to hesitate.

Is cooling other things than just the cpu and gpu at all necessary? What components best fit this situation? My budget is something under the $400 range and I always want quality that will last me a long while. I plan to possibly get into overclocking for the first time soon so I want to leave that option open without having to redo the loop etc.

Also what online store do you get your parts from/trust? I have always gone with newgg.com(obvious from the links), but they have absolute garbage for watercooling.

 

70C on the vid card is the norm for an 8800GTX; probably the readings from CoreTemp are more accurate than the intel monitor, 40C isn't bad for a Quad.

Watercoolong the RAM and HDDs does not result in any performance gains. Watercooling the chipsets usually only becomes necessary when doing extreme overclocking (i.e. under TEC or Phase cooling).

The places I generally shop are DangerDen, Petra's Tech Shop, or Jab-Tech. The only brands I'll consider are: DangerDen, Swiftech, D-Tek, EK-Waterblocks, Thermochill, Hardware Labs, and LIANG.

 

www.sidewindercomputers.com is another good shop, always get great service from them.

 

Thanks for the replies.

 

Before you go and buy $400 of water cooling gear, does your pc have a side panel? if so a fan blowing from the side onto the mobo might make a difference on those zones. If you want to go with water cooling anyway, who wouldnt ? then as other people have already said. Cool the CPU and GPU, consider cooling the chipset. HD and RAM cooling, although it looks pretty, wont make a huge impact on your temps. Id recommend the same places/companies as radodrill

 

Overclockers, just started stocking up with water cooling parts. About time they followed the trend.

 

i recently bought a watercooling setup and i bought it from www.chilledpc.co.uk realy great service even with shipping to other countrys, i love the thing that you can select the barbsize and stuf with the product you buy so you dont have to buy them seperate just select them.

 

I dont know why you want to water cool with those temps here's my temps for ref
I am using Intel P35 board and running the same intel utilities as you
After 2 to 3 hours of COD4 my cores reach 81 to 85 (this is with core temp) thermal zone of around 18 (Q6600)
remember your utilities measure thermal zone not cpu temp when using a quad core thus your thermal zone reading drops as your cpu temp increases cpu fan only speeds up at around 83 plus (core temp) or when your thermal margin drops to about 18
My 8800Gt SSC hits 85
northbridge can hit 80 and southbridge 75 plus
board around 62 as measured with intel utilities

System is rock solid at these temps

If those are your temps I cant see much point in doing anything more than as theevilelephant says to stick a side fan to cool your board if it worries you

At least seeing my temps should make you feel alot better ;-)

I have thermaltake 120mm intake and exhaust fans and 92mm side fan to board (if i crank this fan up it does lower north and south bridge by 3 to 5 and board by 5)

Cheeers

Nigel

 

This originally started as me worrying about temps and that's the only real reason I posted them. However it has developed into me wanting to tinker and possibly get into overclocking. At this point I just can't resist .

 

Just don't skimp on bits. If you're going to do it, do it properly - get a decent set of components, research the bits you think you might want, look into flow rates and all the other fun stuff. If you get crappy bits you'll just end up replacing them down the line for even more cost.

Just as an example, the setup I have to cool a QX6700 and 8800 Ultra (pretty much same heat output as your setup) is:
D-Tek Fuzion CPU / GPU Blocks
Laing DDC 18W Ultra + Alphacool Top
Thermochill PA120.3 (could probably get away with a 120.2)
Tube Res

Gives you the sort of idea of the amount of money you'd be looking at spending - most of the cheapo kits will not get you very far at all.

And another vote for chilledpc being awesome also.

 

Something with your temps just doesn't seem right. AFAIK the thermal threshold for the C2D/C2Qs is ~70-75C.
My Q6600 ran ~54C under stock cooling at stock speeds; dropped to ~40C when I put it underwater.

Further, my 8800GTX OC (one hot GFX card) ran ~73C under stock cooling at 600/1800; dropped to ~50C underwater, even with the clocks raised to 650/2000

The OP's temps are about the norm; but watercooling will drop them and also offer significantly more headroom for overclocking.

I really like having a water cooled rig and it really does make a difference. As I said before, when choosing components be sure to get quality parts rather than going cheap.

 

If i look now with just normal use I get a cpu temp of 55 to 58
GPU is running at 61
motherboard 48
North 67
South 63

 

water cooling is easier than u think i also use a q6600 and my temps stay at 32c with the stock cooler on 80% (not for long im moving to watercooling myself) as for the gpu the cooler it runs the longer it will last a cheap way to cool it down is by adding high cfm case fans somewere in the 100 to 130 cfm rating two or three of those shud move that hot air rite out. but if u do choose to water cool dont understate the value of some active cooled high proformance dual core rads chek out frozencpu.com they have tons of stuff for water cooling and air cooling i buy all my parts from there.

 

I personally don't buy from FrozenCPU since they are usually more expensive than other online stores, which is why I stick with DangerDen, Jab-Tech, and Petra's Tech Shop

 

eh i dont have the time to scour the net to save a few buks here and there and mostly u get wat u pay for they have great customer service and they carry wat i look for

 

Just wanted to run my selections for a once over by everyone. Thanks again for all the help so far.

All 1/2" barbs.

EK-FC8800GTX Full Cover Waterblock for nVidia 8800GTX
D-Tek FuZion Accelerator Nozzle Kit
D-tek FuZion CPU Water Block
Swiftech MCP655™ 12 VDC Pump
Black Ice GT stealth 360 - Cool Metal Blue
Tygon R-3603 7/16" ID 5/8" OD Chemical Tubing - AAC00033 x 20ft(just in case, not expensive)
Swiftech MCRES-Micro
YATE LOON 120mm Case Fan - D12SM-12 - Medium Speed
PrimoChill Anti-Kink Coils 1/2"- Gloss Blue (mostly because I think it will look nice)
Plastic Tubing Clamps - Blue (Should I get something sturdier? Ive used the plastic ones for years with aquariums just getting the jitters because its my pc I guess )

Also I want to get some Feser One after reading the review. Will I need more than one bottle? It comes in 1000ml bottles.

Any glaring mistakes? Any items with a bad rep I may have missed?

Thanks once again

EDIT: Changed to Tygon tubing thanks to Mankz.'s suggestion.

 

Looks fine.

I'd still rather get proper 1/2" Tygon and then some 1/2" Jubilee clamps. Much better tan hose clamps IMHO.

 

I remember reading somewhere else why Tygon was the best you could go with as well and it slipped my mind until you mentioned it here.

Going to switch the tubing to Tygon R-3603 7/16" ID 5/8" OD Chemical Tubing - AAC00033

I'm not familiar with Jubilee clamps. Is there another name for them? Where might I be able to get some?

 

Jubilee clips are just a metal loop with a screw attachment to tighten them up, most hardware stores sell them, or as you seem to be getting the gpu block from petras:

http://www.petrastechshop.com/ststwohoclwb1.html

 

Thanks, I definitely knew these clamps but not by name. Good to know the name .