oh well if the INQUIRER says it it must be true

Well they didn't really say it per se, they reported a fact (the price differential).
Whether one wants to agree with any conclusions they form is an entirely seperate matter ;)

thats true. if theres a difference theres a difference.

it works this way for everything. for instance my friends are all JDM this and JDM that and one guy had to be physically restrained from paying $100 for a JDM cupholder. Something thats something like $10 US over there. its crazy.

The exact reasoning behind my opening gambit in this thread. :)

(I'm going to ignore the tax politics talk here but guys, pH asked nicely... :shrug: )

Again - not trying to argue why it costs more or whether it is fair, just stating that it IS a fact that when it comes to computer hardware the price in Europe is often 2/3rds more than the price in the US, and that its not really fair to compare a $350+ USD kit to a £200 UK kit, even if that is the current conversion rate.

You wouldn't say that an AMD A64 3200+ for $282 (US price) is a much better value than a P4 3.2C for £205/$370 (UK price) you'd compare it to the US price for the 3.2 C - $279

Out of curiosity...
 

Dell charges an arm and a leg for a LCD monitor, but they are OEM'ed by Samsung. Whats Samsung want for the same monitor (in a different shell) in the UK?

Conversely, what does Phillips want for one? They're a European company rebranding another Korean LCD panel, an LG I believe. If there is one thing Dell does well, it is waging price wars against the competition in a given market. I bet everyone, including European companies, rip Europeans off, assuming it isn't taxation. I mean, its not like Dell would be moving lots of monitors in Europe if they cost twice what say, Phillips was selling them for.

Perhaps we should find a single on-line store, a big one that carries the respective competing brands chosen for battle, and go with a budget figure for items from that store. That way one region's higher taxes-getting ripped on prices issues would be a universal constant, rather than different. Whether we bought from that store or not, we would price our "test budget" accordingly.

Thought we'd dismissed the budget category. This is just to see how things have evolved differently and to prove the point that ^^^ statements like this have little basis in fact.

Not sure i wanna get tangled up in this one (eeeek) but i'll throw a curved ball in for the sake of price wars this might assist a little.

I put together a few kits the latest being TDX Hi-Flow at £175.99

/..........or a TDX Hi-Flow Plus at £195.99

Hey Pug................BTW i'm sure something similar was mentioned in Bit a while ago, without this response i hasten to add ;)

Should be interesting though!

Hehe. Hi Paul.
Well, if we're going to do it, I thought we might as well do it properly.. ;)

Sorry nothing came of it back then but I guess you know some of the problems I went through for a while...

Yes, that's exactly the sort of thing I had in mind.

That's a pretty good idea, for getting the general parts (unless we decide to just do kits) but then obviously the water blocks would have to be seperate as I doubt any store has both types that we need to test.

So is this testing kits, water blocks or theories? Because originally it seemed the question was between small tubing and large tubing (1/4" or 3/8" and 1/2" respectively). If so, the fairest way would be to test the same water block designed at different sizes, and do the same for the rad and the pump. Whether actual design comes in to affect the cooling for different sized connections, I'm not sure, but I wouldn't have thought so.

Do ya get what I'm saying?

hey its a good call Pug...................you got hold of a tiger by the tail this time and can't let go :D

no worries about last time as it was more of a knee jerk post anyway!

at least this way it hopefully gets done with some kind of rules and regs (ish)


/........adds this one to Favorites

Well, I'm offering a kit. Obviously, the block could be tested independantly at the same time to get a better idea of how it holds up out of its element.
My hose choice would be 8/10mm (suits both pump & block) , my pump is molex powered out of the box.
I'm talking kit that people can go straight out and purchase and I'm keen to dispel the myth that Eu/German products are not performance oriented.

'nuff said?


[Edit] Thx Paul :)

I'm not going to turn this into a career meethoss. Not testing a bewildering variety pf pumps, hose size, rad, etc. These should be complete kits from mfgr in my opinion and NOT something that is assembled by a retailer.

I would suggest tests of all wbs as per normal Procooling methods, but not as part of this "competition". Let's face it, if I have the wb here I'll run it. That should address any questions about whether a system could benefit substantially from larger tubing or a difft pump.

Don't sweat it pHaestus - I assure you this will be a mfr backed kit. I'd just like to keep a level playing field, so I can choose which relevant kit.

I don't want to hamstring any other competitor - Last time we out-performed US offerings with Eu ones, it was discredited with comments such as "but you're using a twin fan rad".

If I know our opponent's criteria in advance, I can be selective to avoid this. :)

... and who's to say that some mfrs don't look to some retailers for their opinions when configuring kits for release anyway? ;)

"... and who's to say that some mfrs don't look to some retailers for their opinions when configuring kits for release anyway?"

if they do not they're asleep (or an egomaniac)

Ok. Sounds good. Lets get this show on the road ;)

ok, pHaestus - I'll update that kit I sent you
I think a new wb is all
I'll add the MCW6002, but it is not part of THAT kit

Pug
pHaestus has our std kit, H2O-8600, with 1, or 2, 80mm fan rads, 3/8"ID tubing, MCP600, etc.
- here we get into what you were describing, we sell that kit for 'silent' running (~18dbA@7V, 2 fans @~22dbA) though we do not say so
so right off I know that I will 'lose' the performance title, ah well

if you wish to hold to the spirit of this endeavor, I would suggest your 'silent' kit

I aim for good performance from ~1.0mH2O PD and up. It's a design philosophy which is almost essential to facilitate the thin base-plate approach. 1.0mH2O is a trivial PD to expect from people's pumps. Running thin-bp blocks at low-flow rates is like buying a Ferrari to toodle around in peak-hour traffic.

Where do I see my design philosphies lie with respect to the German/US side of the fence? I don't know. I never really considered it in the quest for the performance. In-between I would guess, but with the option to benefit from US-style pumping power.

A comparison of kits is all fine and good..........so far as it goes.

The EU is most likly to win (I'll be very surprised if they don't) as the low number of offered US kits are all designed for modest cost + ease of use. Performance isn't that great when compared to a DIY kit of equal investment.

Much better to let Pug chose his set up within the $ limit he set (be it DIY or a kit) while the board members here reach a agreed upon set up of DIY parts. If a few other rules regarding the number of fans to have ect. are wanted that would also work. But a test limited to kits will prove nothing as far as which is really the best approach. None of the US kits I know of combine enough high end components to really show what the best DIY 1/2" set ups can do.

$380.00 is ample to build a good strong set up from DIY parts.

rad = heater core 2-342 = $30.00 at Napa
shroud = $10.00 in materials to make it.
120mm fans x 2 or 4 depending on agreed rules. $20 - $40
CPU block = Swiftech's new 6002 = $45.00
5 ft of clear flex = $10.00
fittings = $5.00

Total so far = $140.00 taking the most expensive route on fan costs.
This leaves out of Pug's $380.00 original budget $240.00 still remaining with which to buy a pump.

Iwaki MD20rlzt = $180.00

Still leaves $60.00 that I've no idea how to spend unless it were to add a GPU block.

Some on the board may disagree with one or more of the parts I've named, but not a bad starting point. And Pug there isn't one part named that isn't used by a number of water coolers. Although I'll grant the users of the MD20 are a minority. But then if you want to see which is the better route for water cooling one should use the best parts.

Pug,

Any pics of the inside of the block you depicted as your first choice? It's a nice shiny one for sure.

Best O/C would, along with temp. be another way of testing performance.

Edit: weeded out some overheated remarks.

lol.........Cather loves those car analogies :D (mint)

/...........anyway are we going for the silent approach now or is this a shoot out to see which gives best performance (temps) from a "Watercooling Kit" as i would imagine that this is what most folk would be wanting to know.

this is the Q i personally get asked most frequent

large bore or small bore.........which is better and why!

As a side note from this end of the world, Pug/Coolermeister are in the UK, which I personally perceive as being more on the US-side of the water-cooling market going by the content of the various forums over there.

After much heated debate above it seems that we're probably converging on a test set of kits that revolve around the same essential design philosophy.

The original debate was the "German" vs "US", which somehow mutated into "Europe" vs "US", but the UK stands quite a way out from the fairly hard-line "German" position when it comes to water-cooling.

A "classic German kit" in my mind is basically an Eheim 1046, the Innovatek (or whatever) radiator that is the basically an equivalent to a BI Pro, some 1/4" or 8mm ID tubing, an 80CFM Papst 12cm fan, and one of the German micro-stucture blocks (CF-1, etc).

A interesting perspective Cathar. I didn't know that the UK and German water coolers were that differant.

And what is a CF-1 block? Link?

A comparison between the above spec'd Swiftech kit vs a silent German kit will be of interest for the low noise approach & ease of use provisoins used by the two companys.

As I think was posted earlier in this thread, max performance is a goal that is hard to include with low noise, although it's still possible to have ease of use in such a set up.

CF-2 (enhanced CF-1) can be seen here

Supposedly the best performing block out of Germany according to a couple German tests, and supposedly spanks the Cascade and RBX/TDX by around 3C or so on an 80W testbed.

The CF-2 is the improved version of the CF-1.

Would love for Phaestus to test it.

I probably shipped about 2/3's as many Cascades to the UK as I shipped to the US, and the UK absorbed well over half of the total number of Cascade SS blocks I made - the strong value of the UK Pound in comparison to the Aussie dollar made the Cascade SS look like a relative bargain...