performance in the eye of the beholder?
 

Hello all,

Im very new to watercooling and even to overclocking in general. The idea of squeezing as much juice out of my system and at the same time eliminating all the annoying fan noise is more than just appealing. Its downright amazing!

In any case, I find the more I read about waterblocks, the more confused I get as to what is the ideal commercial made waterblock. Dangerden, innovatek, OCPC, D-tek, Swiftek all seem to have their fanclubs. Does it boil down to that you can get good performance out of any decently made waterblock as long as you are willing to work with the water pressure till you maximize results?

Also, for the Canadians, has anyone tried out the waterkits from Computuning.com? Their sets look phenominal, ESPECIALLY the reservoice and the P4 adaptor, but I cant seem to find any reviews on their performance in comparison to the big guns out there. Any input would be quite helpful, or what I should look/ask to make sure it is a good product.

This kit was reviewed by overclockers. As I recall it leaked! and the performance was middle of road.

http://www.overclockers.com/articles568/

well, to put it boldly, any WB i use, that has no design flaws to obvious (like the ones u mentioned) will all perform +/- the same in comparative setups. using 1 rad with one WB, and using 2 rads with another, will almost always get u better temps with the second setup. so in watercooling it is always upto you to juggle with your setup enough. crack open a car on a junkyard , add a second rad (providing your pump allows the added pressure) and u will get better temps than anyone using whatever kit. that is my opinion, some will prolly not agree, it is what worked miracles for me anyway. i can cool at 1650MHz 1.8V pasively running seti @ about 45°C, cranking up the fans gets me +/- 32°C at 20°C ambient.

Thanks everyone for their help. Read the review and along with all the disclaimers on the site, I wouldnt touch that system if it was free! (Well maybe if it was free:P)

Does anyone know of any decent Innovatek Canadian resellers?

I heard that Innovatek was affected by the floods in Germany and that it may be a bit of a pain to get parts in the short term. :(

Highspeedpc ships to Canada and I highly recommend their store.

Other than them, I probably have the largest stock of Innovatek gear here (a rev3 and a GPU block) :)

I've had my heart set on the innovatek or Maze3 waterblock until I ran across these two... I respect everyones opinions here so if you could tell me what you think of them Id be much obliged. They appealed to me due to the fact that they double as a heatsink as well as a wb, so if my setup should fail, my cpu wont fry seconds later:P

http://www.2fastcpu.com/infinipno5b/page1.html

http://www.cputweak.com/rev/archives/00000004.shtml

Thanks again for all your help.

The latter block (CPUfx) has been reported to have mediocre performance...

But since you live in Canada, have a look at Paul Vodrazka's waterblocks (see the "My new waterblocks" thread) and see what you think.

In any case, you can't go wrong with D-Tek Customs or DangerDen blocks either, it appears...

Swiftech blocks are available in Canada

Seems to me like you haven't set your goals yet. Are you shooting for a quiet PC, or a massive overclock, or somewhere in between?

If you're considering the (linked) blocks above, you're not an overclocker, but if you're seriously considering a Maze3 or Innovatech, then you're headed for some performance improvement.

Bigbens right I wouldn't touch either one of those blocks, not for O/Cing anyway. If the swiftys are readily available in Canada I would go with that. Just my .2¢

Goals always been extreme performance with extra care not to go overboard with noise... (Hense watercooling). I liked the safety factor the heatsink/waterblock for those two blocks, but didnt know how well they performed since I just saw one review on each. Everyones response is answer enough though so scrap'em.

What Im looking at then is the Maze3 (since the innovatek wb eliminates the possibility of ever going the peltier route) as long as they perform at a par. And once that is a given, Ill just have to make sure I match the water throughput of the pump to a proper radiator and hopefully Ill be ok.

swiftech
 

I thought swiftechs blocks didnt perform as well as the Maze3/Innovateks???

Look around for some of the test data from unregistered (BillA)

At very low flow rates, the Innovatek is the best block available. For higher flow rate systems (2GPM and up) its performance is somewhat behind the pack. At intermediate to high flow rates, the Swiftech is the best. The TC-4 also performs quite well at higher flow rates, with spiral type blocks lagging somewhat behind these two.

The Maze3 is an outstanding block I had for a for awhile and loved it. If you can get one then yes go with it.

Ok. So on a performance level and assuming high flow rates, the best wbs are the Cyclone 5 followed by TC4-Swiftech-Spiral. Not sure anymore where Maze3 fits in all this now. Probably close enough not to matter. Cyclone 5 comes up to $100 USD which is close to twice the price of any of the other waterblock.. Worth it? :P

Also does anyone know where in heavens name they sell hydrothruster pumps? Its as if filtronics stopped producing them. That seems to be the best pump for high flow systems but every store Im going to is telling me they stopped selling them.

I haven't heard of to many people using the Cyclone 5, But you won't go wrong with a maze3 or swiftech. Both blocks are high flow blocks. I haven't used the Cyclone 5, but it looks restrictive with all those channels maybe someone here can give you more info on it. The hydothruster used to be available at petwarehouse.com, but it's no longer listed you may have a hard time finding that one. There are smaller and better pumps to be had as far as flow is concerned.

<EDIT> Petwarehouse still has this one.BIG PUMP

Awesome! I just spoke to them and their prices are extremely competitive as well:) They have the Q2 which has a dual head and selling it at the same price of the MSRP for the single head.

pump, check!:)

before you commit to that pump you may want to check with hmale. He has one and will tell you the pros and cons. Like I said you can get smaller pumps with excellent flow for a much cheaper price that Q2 is HUGE

Here's a handy little thread from the AMDMB forum, it's a Canadian and international retailer/e-tailer list...tons and tons of listings. You'll find more Canadian sites listed through the thread...seems like there's lots of places around Montreal, so you should be in good shape.

LINK

Would someone correct me if Im completely off?
My watercooling setup is using 0.5'' tubes. That means I need 0.5 " fittings on everything. On the radiator end Im going with one of two options :

A 2 pass heatercore 2inches thick with 5/8 and 3/4 fittings reduced to 0.5". Thats really good since the increase in tube size from fitting will decrease the pressure of the water even more making it stay even longer in the Rad and cool down more.

A transmission cooler coil thats the same size and 3/8 tube with a soldered 0.5" fitting. If it wasnt for the tube size Id try it simply because the Anodized Aluminum fins look sharp and its supposed to cool down just as well as a heatercoil. But the fact that the tube is smaller than the fitting Im worried the water will just go through the rad too fast to cool down. My idea was to use a Y , with a 0.5 to 2X 3/8 outlets to run two of them in parallel. That should slow down water even more than the heatercore and then slap 2 High speed Panaflos behind them to cool them down.

What do you think? Just return the cooler coil and get the heatercore or is it with the shot?

Heater cores are better performers than oil coolers. Yes the increased flow velocity in the cooler tubes is not what you want.
Besides running 2 rads in parallel is a good idea, but think that 2 fans are exactly twice noisier than 1 fan...
Get the heater core. Make sure you get / make a shroud for it. You won't regret it.

Personally I like to combine 1/2"ID tubing with 5/8"OD barbs, since then the barbs have an ID of 1/2" as well... course, this makes no difference if your fittings are less than 1/2" NPT.

gmat,
it's been said before that 2 identical fans are only 3 decibals louder than 1 fan...if memory serves me here. You're not adding the decibals from fan #2, your combining them.

Partly correct... since the dB scale is logarithmic, a 3 dB increase is twice the sound level... so gmat is still right!

My apologies gmat. :)

I took it as 28 db + 28 db, for example.