Here is my expereince with a Rio 1100 that I used in my setup.
It was using in an all 3/8" system pushing water from the bottom of my full height case all the way to the top. It was quiet, cool running, and other than the inital leak it had (used epoxy to solve that problem
it ran reliably for almost 2 years straight. The only reason why it was replaced was because it was starting to not always startup after I unpluged it and pluged it back in one-too-many-times in a row.
I have also heard that these pumps are reliable for 24/7 operation but NOT for on/off continuosly situations (ie. turn your computer on and off every day)
BTW check the web, I have seen the 1100 for as cheap as 15$ and shipping INCLUDING taxes and whatever cant be more than an extra $15.