Dual Opteron cooling

[shugg]

Folks

Hi all I'm a newb re watercooling and I would welcome any advice

basically I currently have a dual mp 2000 (modded XP's) and have decided to upgrade and build a dual opteron 244 rig. The gpu will be an 6800 gt oc, mobo is a MSI FAR2 and the case is a Xaser3.

after research and stumbling on loads of articles I'm still a bit confused re watercooling. I'm planning to get the Kooolance EXOS to cool the cpu's and then a seperate internal set-up for the northbridge and gpu. I know that my coice of waterblocks is limited (478 xeon prestonia/300-g made by Koolance or Dangerden TDX Xeon:huh: )

Would two seperate loops be the best way to go? or should I go with one loop and stick a largish rad 120.2 in between the cpu's and gpu/northbridge.
Any advice re choice of kit welcome.

cheers

[Risky]

Lots more choice than that.


Aquacomputer, Swiftech, Innovatek and a good many more.

[Da_Rude_Baboon]

I would ditch the koolance as well and go completly custom. Hopefully Nexxo will notice this thread as he has a dual opteron rig i beleive. See project mataversa in the chop shop forum.

Is cooling your NB with water completely nessecary? If not then a passive sink such as a Zalman would be a better (and cheaper) option. You would then be able to cool both CPU's and the GPU with a 120.2 rad. If you can squeeze a 120.3 then all the better and it would allow the NB block too. Low flow setups (which you seem to have been looking at) are better suited to this kind of multi block setup then high flow. If you were going for high flow (1/2") then you would be best to have two loops but if your going low flow (3/8") then you can have it all in one loop. Thats the beauty of low flow set-ups. :cool:

Dont stick a rad in the middle of your loop, i.e. between your CPU blocks as it not the optimal place for it to be. A more common order would be res>pump>cpu>cpu>gpu>rad>res. Its always best practice to have the reservoir before the pump so the pump can get a nice steady supply of water. After that the order of block placement isn't really that important.

Putting the GPU before the CPU blocks might at most raise the CPU temp by a degree or something but you probably wouldnt even notice a difference. Having a nice smooth layout with the minimal amount of tubing is ussually preferable to having pipes going back and forth all over the place just to make sure the CPU blocks are before the GPU.

[scopEDog]

I had my 244's on 2 loops and kept them at mid to high 30's. Using AC evo's..i'm with Da_Rude_Baboon and go with something a bit more custom.

[cools]

Currently running 2 x Opteron 246 and a 6800GT close to passive on an APE360 low flow loop. Very happy with it!

[Fibbles]

Keep in mind that if you plan on using the Koolance the Danger Den TDX will be a very bad choice. The TDX performs best at very high flow rates, which is not what the Koolance will do. If you're a complete and utter n00by/newb/begginer/whatever (^_^ ) you may want to try a kit. There's nothing wrong with Kits, but a lot of the readily available literature suggests that kits be skipped. Asetek's Waterchill is a great beginner system. It comes in plenty of configurations and includes a manual with photos. It's easy to set up and works pretty darn good. Swiftech makes some nice kits, they aren't pretty (that only a flaw to me, really), but they perform very good. You could also buy a great kit from Aqua Computer or Alphacool (Alphacool has a lot of choices) or even a big bore US based system if that's what suits your pallette.

Just as DRB suggested, using 2 loops isn't needed. If you're afraid that you won't have enough 'something' to cool everything, perhaps you should go for a dual radiator setup, but with a double 120, there's really no need for it. I use a double 120 and I've got a CPU (P4 3.0 @ 3.4 - blame it on my RAM), a 6800GT (@ 425/1250) and my chipset (why not?). I'm using Alphacool, Innovatek and, Aqua Computer parts.

[shugg]

Lots more choice than that.


Aquacomputer, Swiftech, Innovatek and a good many more.
Thought as much only looked at Koolance because they had the blocks that would fit my mobo/cpu setup plus EXOS (been lazy I guess.
I'm moving away from the kit idea anyway as it's seems best to just select better parts. I may still plump for the Koolance cpu/gpu blocks

[shugg]

Currently running 2 x Opteron 246 and a 6800GT close to passive on an APE360 low flow loop. Very happy with it!
What mobo are you using

[shugg]

I would ditch the koolance as well and go completly custom. Hopefully Nexxo will notice this thread as he has a dual opteron rig i beleive. See project mataversa in the chop shop forum.

Had a look but he's using different cpu's and mobo, great thread though did notice the Paul Vodrazka's home made blocks vnice

Is cooling your NB with water completely nessecary? If not then a passive sink such as a Zalman would be a better (and cheaper) option. You would then be able to cool both CPU's and the GPU with a 120.2 rad. If you can squeeze a 120.3 then all the better and it would allow the NB block too. Low flow setups (which you seem to have been looking at) are better suited to this kind of multi block setup then high flow. If you were going for high flow (1/2") then you would be best to have two loops but if your going low flow (3/8") then you can have it all in one loop. Thats the beauty of low flow set-ups. :cool:

Ended up looking at low flow (1/4") due to barb size on blocks

Dont stick a rad in the middle of your loop, i.e. between your CPU blocks as it not the optimal place for it to be. A more common order would be res>pump>cpu>cpu>gpu>rad>res. Its always best practice to have the reservoir before the pump so the pump can get a nice steady supply of water. After that the order of block placement isn't really that important.

Putting the GPU before the CPU blocks might at most raise the CPU temp by a degree or something but you probably wouldnt even notice a difference. Having a nice smooth layout with the minimal amount of tubing is ussually preferable to having pipes going back and forth all over the place just to make sure the CPU blocks are before the GPU.
Thanks wondered about the best way to set out

[Nexxo]

Had a look but he's using different cpu's and mobo...
Nope I'm not: same mobo (MSI Master 2 Far) and Opteron 250s rate at the same wattage as your Opteron 244s, really. The only thing that is different is that you are using a slightly hotter GPU.

Having said that, the blocks I use are scarily efficient and probably come close to Cathar's "White Water" blocks. Nevertheless the DangerDen TDX isn't bad either.

OK, here's the setup: single loop, 3/8" ID tubing, connecting the two CPUs (Phase II blocks) and a Radeon 9800Pro (Maze4GPU) with a Davies-Craig EBP pump (comparable in performance to the MCP600 from Swiftech) in a sequence of GPU --> CPU2 -->CPU1 (it was the shortest, cleanest path). The res is an Aquatube, with holes drilled out to accommodate 3/8" ID barbs. The radiator is a single BIX(!) with a low-flow Panaflo fan (69.7CFM) and one inch shroud. Coolant is PF-5080 Fluorinert and flow is 1.5 litre per minute (the setup has an accurate flow sensor).

I get temps of 40C and 43C respectively, with system temp 25C at a room temperature of 16-17C, even when it works flat out. Not too shabby for a single-fan radiator (which hardly even get luke-warm).

Somewhere in the net I found a guy who did a dual Opteron on a single 1/2" ID loop with two Maze4 blocks, an MCP600 pump and a single BIX with a 44CFM fan in push(!) configuration without a shroud, pushing warm air from inside the case out through the radiator. He still got 60C under load.

The moral of the story? Single-loop works nicely. Do not obsess about flow. Do not obsess about big-ass radiators or powerful fans. Do not worry about which sequence to put the blocks in --go for the shortest, straightest path. Make sure your barb ID is the same as the tube ID (in German Push-fit systems it always is).

[zer0]

what about quad opteron

/me dreams


ok ok i guess ill quit with all the i wish posts lol

[Fibbles]

Thought as much only looked at Koolance because they had the blocks that would fit my mobo/cpu setup plus EXOS (been lazy I guess.
I'm moving away from the kit idea anyway as it's seems best to just select better parts. I may still plump for the Koolance cpu/gpu blocksBetter parts than what? Kits aren't merely collections of crappy pieces thrown together to give sub par performance. They're just like anything else, but packaged together so a user doesn't have to buy everything individually. Practically any decent company who makes a kit - think Danger Den, Swiftech, AlphaCool, Aqua Computer, Asetek, Innovatek etc. They bundle different performing parts together for their different kits. So called 'bad' kits would be from places like Evercool, Kingwin, Global Win (the Jeffi and the Silent Stream being examples) and, the Poseidon all in one style - These cool terribly, and give other kits a bad name, while they have nothing in common.

Asetek has a 'kit' with a dual 120mm Black Ice Pro radiator, the Hydor L30/35 pump with reservoir plus the Antartica CPU block and their GPU and Chipset blocks. That's one kit that's got better parts already and is going to perform just as good (and maybe even better) than the Koolance. A while ago Pug was mentioning the Alphacool Xtreme Pro set. One of those offers awesome performance and is a kit.

Koolance isn't bad though, if it's external usage that appeals to you the most. Maybe some one with more 'expertise' in it will be able to help. If you check the case gallery, any setup can be made external with some work B)

Sorry for the rant.

[fivecheebs]

A while ago Pug was mentioning the Alphacool Xtreme Pro set. One of those offers awesome performance and is a kit.
Indeed :D I love mine. And i have learned a heap load of stuff since having it and installing it. The thing is, if i were to go and choose the blocks etc again now but not as a kit i would choose the same, except maybe not with the cape NB/GPU block (which isnt part of the kit anyway!)