Liquid Cooling - Yes or No? **Updated with Setup**

I'm currently in the process of saving up money to make a custom PC for the first time. I've done a lot of the research but I'm not 100% sure about Liquid Cooling. I know how it works but I just want to know if you guys would recommend Liquid Cooling, or not.

Thanks for the help.

------------------------------------------------------

EDIT: Whats in the setup at the moment. I'm open to any suggestions at the moment, because I won't be ordering it for at least a month.

CASE:NZXT Zero Aluminum Full Tower 420W Case (Black/Silver Color)

CPU:(Quad-Core)Intel® Core™ 2 Quad Q6700 @ 2.66GHz 1066FSB 8MB L2 Cache 64-bit

MOTHERBOARD:(3-Way SLI & QX9650/9770 Support) Asus P5N-T Deluxe nForce 780i SLI Mainboard FSB1333 DDR2 3 x PCIe x16 SATA RAID w/ USB2.0, IEEE1394, & 7.1Audio

MEMORY:(Req.DDR2 MainBoard)4GB (4x1GB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory (Kingston HyperX)

VIDEO CARD:NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 16X PCI Express (Major Brand Powered by NVIDIA)

VIDEO CARD 2:NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 16X PCI Express (Major Brand Powered by NVIDIA)

HARD DRIVE:Single Hard Drive (500GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD)

Optical Drive:(Special Price) LG 20X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER (BLACK COLOR)

Optical Drive 2:16X DVD ROM (BLACK COLOR)

SOUND:3D WAVE ON-BOARD 5.1 SOUND CARD

I use water and I like it. But in most cases it is just not worth it. The price to performance of high-end Air is just way better than the price to performance of water.

Now if you want to do extreme overclocking, or just want water, then it is worth it.

In theory you don't "have" to replace the water. But you will have to add some to it once in a while. Most people like to flush their loop and put new water in it every 6 months or so.

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts. Also you usually want to add additives that are are like antifreeze and help cool better, and prevent corrosion, and fungal growth.

You add the water through the reservoir.

If you are are serious about water cooling, I would look around this board and ask some questions there. Those guys make me look like a ignorant n00b, LOL.

Does the anti-freeze conduct electricity? I know water its self is non-conductive, its the particles mixed with it that conduct.

If the prupose of using distilled water is to save your PC parts.. whould that be... wasted if the anti-freeze conducts?

Like yoyo said, liquid cooling is unnccessary unless you plan on doing some serious overclocking.

Otherwise, you could purchase some quality Cooling fans for a large fraction of the price.

Does the anti-freeze conduct electricity? I know water its self is non-conductive, its the particles mixed with it that conduct.

If the prupose of using distilled water is to save your PC parts.. whould that be... wasted if the anti-freeze conducts?

SinfulPotato

I hope not, LOL.

I don't think it does. While I think there are some that use actual anti-freeze, what I was talking about, and should have been more specific, is I use HydrX, which is like anti-freeze. I have no idea how close or different it is from actual anti-freeze though.

Now, I would not like to try again and find out, but I did leak some on the back of my 8800GTX and just turned the PC off wiped it clean and was good to go.

Does the anti-freeze conduct electricity? I know water its self is non-conductive, its the particles mixed with it that conduct.

If the prupose of using distilled water is to save your PC parts.. whould that be... wasted if the anti-freeze conducts?

SinfulPotato

In theory you don't "have" to replace the water. But you will have to add some to it once in a while. Most people like to flush their loop and put new water in it every 6 months or so.

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts. Also you usually want to add additives that are are like antifreeze and help cool better, and prevent corrosion, and fungal growth.

You add the water through the reservoir.

If you are are serious about water cooling, I would look around this board and ask some questions there. Those guys make me look like a ignorant n00b, LOL.

ch5richards

You seem to have a thermaltake LCS setup... is that why they called you a noob?

Pure water will not conduct electricity. Water with who knows what's in it, will.

I wouldn't put straight water into a liquid cooling setup. It allows for the growth of bacteria, fungus, and will corrode your waterblocks. You wouldn't want to have to clean that up =]. However, ch5 is right though, this isn't the greatest board to come to for suggestions on liquid cooling.

Does the anti-freeze conduct electricity? I know water its self is non-conductive, its the particles mixed with it that conduct.

If the prupose of using distilled water is to save your PC parts.. whould that be... wasted if the anti-freeze conducts?

SinfulPotato

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts.

ch5richards

While destilled water does not conduct electricity, it will still damage your computer if spilling it, because it will then dissolve tiny bits of metal from the computer which will then make the water able to condont electricity creating a short.

Nintendo-Nerd, this is my view based on many, many, MANY builds. Really good liquid cooling rigs are only worth it for slightly better better (by that I mean less than 20%) OC'ing compared to air. IMHO, top quality air coolers with the same effort put into lapping and place ment will net you similar results without the pain in the rear of water cooling. Fewer parts to buy, eaiser to move the system if/when needed, and on the whole a good bit cheaper. This is because you just shouldnt buy a water cooling kit. You should buy the best parts you can find and build your own water cooling rig. You will get WAY better results for the money spent. So again, for the performance gain I just dont think water cooling is worth it anymore. It used to be. But in the past 24-36 months air cooling as come a long way.

Now if you decide to really get into extreme cooling then there simply is nothing better than phase exchange cooling. Of course the best start up rig I've seen starts at about $1800 and some of the higher end units reach near $10K. But when you see a Q6600 running past the 5GHz barrier on one of these, you've seen something special. But that is for very serious enthusiasts. Often times for enthusiast groups that pitch in and share the cost. By the time they have finished building a rig on that scale it can be well over $15k. I saw one about have a year ago and it brought a tear to my eye. Truly a thing of pure beauty. But I think other here have already told you that this really isnt the best place to go for info on anything other than air cooling. GS's PC boards are mainly focused on the price/performance ratio of PC hardware and at the momment air is the way to go.

No matter what you do, you REALLY ( I just cant stress this enough) need to spend a couple of weeks reading everything you can on liquid cooling if your really going to do it. Learn about lapping the CPU, GPU, and chipsets and decide if it's worth it for you. If your going to pay the price and get quailty gear then it's rather a waste to impede thermal transfer by doing a half-ass job of it. Of course since you say you havent really looked into OCing your rig, you also need to spend a good deal of time checking up on that as well. Now I'm not saying you have to go through all the trouble of lapping and what not, but you need to really consider everyting if you want your liquid cooling rig to give it's all. Also keep in mind that liquid cooling is far from silent. Used to, you could get away with almost near silent LC rigs, but not today. Now we have larger radiators that need 120mm fans (soem times two of them) to get teh job done, plus it's costly to go with silent PSU that offer the wattage a modern game rig needs.

More or less, you will find that outside of air cooling you will have to learn, spend, and work a good deal more. But the benifits can be worth it. All to often somebody decides to get a LC rig and finds that a cheap $40-$70 CPU fansink would have done a much better job than what they ended up with. In fact, you will find countless horr stories about that. Most of them are from people that didnt know they should buy a LC kit. They see one for $100 to $200 and think that it was a deal. Then they find out about the subpar cooling, cheap metal (meaning flawed and will break at some point from normal use), hard and cheap hoses, leaky seals and poorly milled surfaces. So you have your work cut out for you on the reading department. Go forth, read, and learn. You'll come away with good knowledge that will help you with what ever you decide to go with. You may find that LC is right for you and you might find a whole new hobbie with thermal efficiency in computing. I quite enjoy dabbling in it. Not as much as some, but still a good bit of fun. Infact, my next project is a LC project. I'm putting a new "box" together out of some old parts to use as a folding@home box. No case and the whole thing will be sealed in a popcorn tin filled with mineral oil. Tucked away in a storage closet with a 5" LCD screen on the lid. Totaly self contained and a silent workhorse that doesnt collect dust.

I have a Thermalright 120 Extreme and I've overclocked my E4400 to 9x389=3.5GHz and runs no hotter than 42C under full load. I could overclock even higher if I want but my GPU artifacts if I do and my room gets hot, especially in summer time.

Based purely off of my experience with air cooling, the price you pay for it versus the price of water cooling is better, assuming that having a hot room is not an issue and you're not planning overclocking to 4.5GHz or higher. However, it's not like cooling systems go outdated every 2 years like GPU's, so it could be worth the investment, right?

[QUOTE="ch5richards"]

In theory you don't "have" to replace the water. But you will have to add some to it once in a while. Most people like to flush their loop and put new water in it every 6 months or so.

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts. Also you usually want to add additives that are are like antifreeze and help cool better, and prevent corrosion, and fungal growth.

You add the water through the reservoir.

If you are are serious about water cooling, I would look around this board and ask some questions there. Those guys make me look like a ignorant n00b, LOL.

Bebi_vegeta

You seem to have a thermaltake LCS setup... is that why they called you a noob?

LOL, no. I went there before I got my setup and was warned away from thermaltake. I did get a "kit", but it's the Swiftech H20-220 Apogee GT. Which for the most part were the parts I was going to get, and about as good as kit can get.

They have been very nice to me and never called me a n00b, but my knowledge in that area compared to them is lacking to say the least.

[QUOTE="ch5richards"]

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts.

TheFreeloader

While destilled water does not conduct electricity, it will still damage your computer if spilling it, because it will then dissolve tiny bits of metal from the computer which will then make the water able to condont electricity creating a short.

I am not going to say that is untrue, cause I have limited knowledge in that area. But I think it is something that does not really need to be worried about.

In the famous Oil-cooled PC, that THG did, they talk about how at first they used distilled water only, but that after 5 minutes or so the PC would short out. From this THG article "The hardware was placed in a container in which five gallons of de-ionized water were poured. To everybody's amazement, the system ran solidly for a period of five minutes before crashing. We repeated the assembly numerous times after the hardware was dried. The expensive components had suffered no damage. Accordingly, this solution was deemed unviable."

Now if they could completely submerge an entire PC in distilled water, and have no negatives other than needing to completely dry it, then I would think that a little leak from a water-cooling loop will do basically no damage.

Heck, mine leaked on my 8800GTX and I have not had one issue.

[QUOTE="ch5richards"]

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts.

TheFreeloader

While destilled water does not conduct electricity, it will still damage your computer if spilling it, because it will then dissolve tiny bits of metal from the computer which will then make the water able to condont electricity creating a short.

[QUOTE="Bebi_vegeta"][QUOTE="ch5richards"]

In theory you don't "have" to replace the water. But you will have to add some to it once in a while. Most people like to flush their loop and put new water in it every 6 months or so.

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts. Also you usually want to add additives that are are like antifreeze and help cool better, and prevent corrosion, and fungal growth.

You add the water through the reservoir.

If you are are serious about water cooling, I would look around this board and ask some questions there. Those guys make me look like a ignorant n00b, LOL.

ch5richards

You seem to have a thermaltake LCS setup... is that why they called you a noob?

LOL, no. I went there before I got my setup and was warned away from thermaltake. I did get a "kit", but it's the Swiftech H20-220 Apogee GT. Which for the most part were the parts I was going to get, and about as good as kit can get.

They have been very nice to me and never called me a n00b, but my knowledge in that area compared to them is lacking to say the least.

That's a nice kit for the price... But i'm really in love with thermochill rad and Dtek Cpu block.

[QUOTE="ch5richards"][QUOTE="Bebi_vegeta"][QUOTE="ch5richards"]

In theory you don't "have" to replace the water. But you will have to add some to it once in a while. Most people like to flush their loop and put new water in it every 6 months or so.

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts. Also you usually want to add additives that are are like antifreeze and help cool better, and prevent corrosion, and fungal growth.

You add the water through the reservoir.

If you are are serious about water cooling, I would look around this board and ask some questions there. Those guys make me look like a ignorant n00b, LOL.

Bebi_vegeta

You seem to have a thermaltake LCS setup... is that why they called you a noob?

LOL, no. I went there before I got my setup and was warned away from thermaltake. I did get a "kit", but it's the Swiftech H20-220 Apogee GT. Which for the most part were the parts I was going to get, and about as good as kit can get.

They have been very nice to me and never called me a n00b, but my knowledge in that area compared to them is lacking to say the least.

That's a nice kit for the price... But i'm really in love with thermochill rad and Dtek Cpu block.

I bet, I have heard nothing but GOOD things about the thermochill, but man are the expensive :o :P. I still might add one or replace mine with a thermochill..........one day.

I was about ready to replace my block with the Dtek fuzion, until I read one review that said that the Apogee GT with the bowed base is almost just as good. Now I don't know if they meant the Dtek with or without the nozzle kit.

[QUOTE="Bebi_vegeta"][QUOTE="ch5richards"][QUOTE="Bebi_vegeta"][QUOTE="ch5richards"]

In theory you don't "have" to replace the water. But you will have to add some to it once in a while. Most people like to flush their loop and put new water in it every 6 months or so.

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts. Also you usually want to add additives that are are like antifreeze and help cool better, and prevent corrosion, and fungal growth.

You add the water through the reservoir.

If you are are serious about water cooling, I would look around this board and ask some questions there. Those guys make me look like a ignorant n00b, LOL.

ch5richards

You seem to have a thermaltake LCS setup... is that why they called you a noob?

LOL, no. I went there before I got my setup and was warned away from thermaltake. I did get a "kit", but it's the Swiftech H20-220 Apogee GT. Which for the most part were the parts I was going to get, and about as good as kit can get.

They have been very nice to me and never called me a n00b, but my knowledge in that area compared to them is lacking to say the least.

That's a nice kit for the price... But i'm really in love with thermochill rad and Dtek Cpu block.

I bet, I have heard nothing but GOOD things about the thermochill, but man are the expensive :o :P. I still might add one or replace mine with a thermochill..........one day.

I was about ready to replace my block with the Dtek fuzion, until I read one review that said that the Apogee GT with the bowed base is almost just as good. Now I don't know if they meant the Dtek with or without the nozzle kit.

With Dtek fuzion v2 with nozzle kit is the best.

Nintendo-Nerd, this is my view based on many, many, MANY builds. Really good liquid cooling rigs are only worth it for slightly better better (by that I mean less than 20%) OC'ing compared to air. IMHO, top quality air coolers with the same effort put into lapping and place ment will net you similar results without the pain in the rear of water cooling. Fewer parts to buy, eaiser to move the system if/when needed, and on the whole a good bit cheaper. This is because you just shouldnt buy a water cooling kit. You should buy the best parts you can find and build your own water cooling rig. You will get WAY better results for the money spent. So again, for the performance gain I just dont think water cooling is worth it anymore. It used to be. But in the past 24-36 months air cooling as come a long way.

Now if you decide to really get into extreme cooling then there simply is nothing better than phase exchange cooling. Of course the best start up rig I've seen starts at about $1800 and some of the higher end units reach near $10K. But when you see a Q6600 running past the 5GHz barrier on one of these, you've seen something special. But that is for very serious enthusiasts. Often times for enthusiast groups that pitch in and share the cost. By the time they have finished building a rig on that scale it can be well over $15k. I saw one about have a year ago and it brought a tear to my eye. Truly a thing of pure beauty. But I think other here have already told you that this really isnt the best place to go for info on anything other than air cooling. GS's PC boards are mainly focused on the price/performance ratio of PC hardware and at the momment air is the way to go.

No matter what you do, you REALLY ( I just cant stress this enough) need to spend a couple of weeks reading everything you can on liquid cooling if your really going to do it. Learn about lapping the CPU, GPU, and chipsets and decide if it's worth it for you. If your going to pay the price and get quailty gear then it's rather a waste to impede thermal transfer by doing a half-ass job of it. Of course since you say you havent really looked into OCing your rig, you also need to spend a good deal of time checking up on that as well. Now I'm not saying you have to go through all the trouble of lapping and what not, but you need to really consider everyting if you want your liquid cooling rig to give it's all. Also keep in mind that liquid cooling is far from silent. Used to, you could get away with almost near silent LC rigs, but not today. Now we have larger radiators that need 120mm fans (soem times two of them) to get teh job done, plus it's costly to go with silent PSU that offer the wattage a modern game rig needs.

More or less, you will find that outside of air cooling you will have to learn, spend, and work a good deal more. But the benifits can be worth it. All to often somebody decides to get a LC rig and finds that a cheap $40-$70 CPU fansink would have done a much better job than what they ended up with. In fact, you will find countless horr stories about that. Most of them are from people that didnt know they should buy a LC kit. They see one for $100 to $200 and think that it was a deal. Then they find out about the subpar cooling, cheap metal (meaning flawed and will break at some point from normal use), hard and cheap hoses, leaky seals and poorly milled surfaces. So you have your work cut out for you on the reading department. Go forth, read, and learn. You'll come away with good knowledge that will help you with what ever you decide to go with. You may find that LC is right for you and you might find a whole new hobbie with thermal efficiency in computing. I quite enjoy dabbling in it. Not as much as some, but still a good bit of fun. Infact, my next project is a LC project. I'm putting a new "box" together out of some old parts to use as a folding@home box. No case and the whole thing will be sealed in a popcorn tin filled with mineral oil. Tucked away in a storage closet with a 5" LCD screen on the lid. Totaly self contained and a silent workhorse that doesnt collect dust.

kodai

[QUOTE="Bebi_vegeta"][QUOTE="ch5richards"][QUOTE="Bebi_vegeta"][QUOTE="ch5richards"]

In theory you don't "have" to replace the water. But you will have to add some to it once in a while. Most people like to flush their loop and put new water in it every 6 months or so.

You use distilled water, cause distilled water should not cause any damage if spilled on parts. Also you usually want to add additives that are are like antifreeze and help cool better, and prevent corrosion, and fungal growth.

You add the water through the reservoir.

If you are are serious about water cooling, I would look around this board and ask some questions there. Those guys make me look like a ignorant n00b, LOL.

ch5richards

You seem to have a thermaltake LCS setup... is that why they called you a noob?

LOL, no. I went there before I got my setup and was warned away from thermaltake. I did get a "kit", but it's the Swiftech H20-220 Apogee GT. Which for the most part were the parts I was going to get, and about as good as kit can get.

They have been very nice to me and never called me a n00b, but my knowledge in that area compared to them is lacking to say the least.

That's a nice kit for the price... But i'm really in love with thermochill rad and Dtek Cpu block.

I bet, I have heard nothing but GOOD things about the thermochill, but man are the expensive :o :P. I still might add one or replace mine with a thermochill..........one day.

I was about ready to replace my block with the Dtek fuzion, until I read one review that said that the Apogee GT with the bowed base is almost just as good. Now I don't know if they meant the Dtek with or without the nozzle kit.

How much did your kit cost?

How much did your kit cost?

death1505921

I think I paid around $240 or close to there. Newegg now has the kit for $199.:x But thats OK, I feel it was well worth it, for me at least, as I reall wanted water cooling.

[QUOTE="death1505921"]

How much did your kit cost?

ch5richards

I think I paid around $240 or close to there. Newegg now has the kit for $199.:x But thats OK, I feel it was well worth it, for me at least, as I reall wanted water cooling.

That's only your CPU block though, I thought you had your northbridge cooled too. I might look into that since it's only £100 if I can find I over here. Could you easily add a GPU block too? Or would it strain the pump too hard? How quiet would you say it is, I assume it came with a bowed base in that kit and you didn't buy two blocks right?

I'm currently in the process of saving up money to make a custom PC for the first time. I've done a lot of the research but I'm not 100% sure about Liquid Cooling. I know how it works but I just want to know if you guys would recommend Liquid Cooling, or not.

Thanks for the help.

------------------------------------------------------

EDIT: Whats in the setup at the moment. I'm open to any suggestions at the moment, because I won't be ordering it for at least a month.

CASE:NZXT Zero Aluminum Full Tower 420W Case (Black/Silver Color)

CPU:(Quad-Core)Intel® Core™ 2 Quad Q6700 @ 2.66GHz 1066FSB 8MB L2 Cache 64-bit

MOTHERBOARD:(3-Way SLI & QX9650/9770 Support) Asus P5N-T Deluxe nForce 780i SLI Mainboard FSB1333 DDR2 3 x PCIe x16 SATA RAID w/ USB2.0, IEEE1394, & 7.1Audio

MEMORY:(Req.DDR2 MainBoard)4GB (4x1GB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory (Kingston HyperX)

VIDEO CARD:NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 16X PCI Express (Major Brand Powered by NVIDIA)

VIDEO CARD 2:NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB 16X PCI Express (Major Brand Powered by NVIDIA)

HARD DRIVE:Single Hard Drive (500GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 16MB Cache 7200RPM HDD)

Optical Drive:(Special Price) LG 20X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER (BLACK COLOR)

Optical Drive 2:16X DVD ROM (BLACK COLOR)

SOUND:3D WAVE ON-BOARD 5.1 SOUND CARD

Nintendo-Nerd

Just to give my own opinion..

If you need to save money to build your first rig, as in it is a planned and not fly by night thing, then you should avoid overclocking and at the least liquid cooling for now. First time you build your system with no spare high end parts is an adventure in itself. Build it, see if it works, let it burn in and play around, and enjoy the entire process.

Learn from it. Understand what went wrong and why from expected and actual results. Upgrade it alittle. Mess with case mods and fan setup to try and get optimal airflow. Find what you have to have as far as temps and then make a goal and get to it using air.

Liquid cooling isnt brain surgery but it is very risky if you do not understand what all needs to be done and what brands you SHOULDNT buy. Lap the cpu+HSF base, void your warranty on your gpu when you setup a water block on it, and other things.

Liquid cooling has a purpose. If you havent overclocked on the boundries of air then you wont know "why" your needs require a water system in your pc. With all of the risks involved..I do not suggest going that route just for the thrill.

[QUOTE="ch5richards"][QUOTE="death1505921"]

How much did your kit cost?

death1505921

I think I paid around $240 or close to there. Newegg now has the kit for $199.:x But thats OK, I feel it was well worth it, for me at least, as I reall wanted water cooling.

That's only your CPU block though, I thought you had your northbridge cooled too. I might look into that since it's only £100 if I can find I over here. Could you easily add a GPU block too? Or would it strain the pump too hard? How quiet would you say it is, I assume it came with a bowed base in that kit and you didn't buy two blocks right?

Ah ha! yes, that is why (well one among other reasons) I got the Maximus Formula SE for my motherboard. It has a built in water block on the NB, that is attached via a heat pipe to the SB HS like a lot of boards nowadays.

But when I originally got this kit, I was using the EVGA 680i, and I had to buy this for my NB, and a little separate HSF for the SB since the stock HS was all connected.

Using a board with it built in made it a lot easier, and after re-seating the blocks with better thermal paste I am very pleased, and surprised, with how it works.

I have heard people having their CPU and GPU on this in one loop just fine, but when I was looking into it, the fellas at Xtreme Systems advised me to add a second loop and have the CPU and NB on one and the GPU on a seperate one. I think the pump would handle it just fine, I just think that the CPU and GPU together would just put a lot of heat on that one loop.

The kit comes with an extra, bigger o-rig to replace the one that comes in th apogee GT to give it the bowed base.

[QUOTE="death1505921"][QUOTE="ch5richards"][QUOTE="death1505921"]

How much did your kit cost?

ch5richards

I think I paid around $240 or close to there. Newegg now has the kit for $199.:x But thats OK, I feel it was well worth it, for me at least, as I reall wanted water cooling.

That's only your CPU block though, I thought you had your northbridge cooled too. I might look into that since it's only £100 if I can find I over here. Could you easily add a GPU block too? Or would it strain the pump too hard? How quiet would you say it is, I assume it came with a bowed base in that kit and you didn't buy two blocks right?

Ah ha! yes, that is why (well one among other reasons) I got the Maximus Formula SE for my motherboard. It has a built in water block on the NB, that is attached via a heat pipe to the SB HS like a lot of boards nowadays.

But when I originally got this kit, I was using the EVGA 680i, and I had to buy this for my NB, and a little separate HSF for the SB since the stock HS was all connected.

Using a board with it built in made it a lot easier, and after re-seating the blocks with better thermal paste I am very pleased, and surprised, with how it works.

I have heard people having their CPU and GPU on this in one loop just fine, but when I was looking into it, the fellas at Xtreme Systems advised me to add a second loop and have the CPU and NB on one and the GPU on a seperate one. I think the pump would handle it just fine, I just think that the CPU and GPU together would just put a lot of heat on that one loop.

The kit comes with an extra, bigger o-rig to replace the one that comes in th apogee GT to give it the bowed base.

Maybe if you had the GTX480 black ice rad, you'd be able to put everthing in single loop with some high CFM fans. But the heat load would be too big on only a 360rad.

If it was just me, I would put the chipset with GPU and leave CPU alone. My OCed 8800 GTX idles around 40 and loads about 55 and i have low CFM fans with swiftect 360 rad.