Scoob
New member
Hi all,
As part of my water cooled build I have the EK Supreme HF CPU block in Acetal. Nice looking block and quite highly regarded, at least in the reviews I read.
It's in my loop now, cooling a 2500k @ 4.5ghz. My 2500k isn't one of the better ones, needing 1.366 vCore under load to be fully stable at that speed. Still, far from "bad" so I'm happy.
I had an Antec Kuhler 620 before - you know, the closed loop WC kit with a thin 120mm rad. I ran it in push-pull with a proper cold air feed supplied by some corrugated hose like you have on older tumble driers - worked well.
Anyway, the issue I have is that the EK Supreme HF CPU block appears to perform no better than the 620 did! My loop is overkill, having a Phobya 1080 rad to cool the CPU and two 570's - well one at the moment, but that's another story.
The GPU's are both cooled VERY well, I don't see above 40c except on the hottest of days and that was with both cards clocked at 850 - up from stock 732. The CPU however will still hit 70c under load in IBT testing - a little down on the 620, but not much.
Like I said, my loop works well for the GPU's - I use parallel flow, so the coolant goes through the GPU's before going to the CPU. Still, the thermal capacity of the water should be more than enough for this not to be an issue. Indeed, dropping to just ONE GPU had no effect on the CPU temps what so ever. So, two overclocked 570's saw the same CPU temp as ONE 570 at stock.
So, I thought maybe I'd bodged mounting the CPU block or something, very unlike me as I'm pretty anal when it comes to that. Regardless, I drained the loop and popped the CPU block off so I could clean and re-seat it. On removal I saw a perfect spread pattern of TIM on the CPU and block - so no problems there - but I re-did everything anyway, just in case. For the record I fully cleaned and treated both the CPU and block with cleaning fluids, before re-applying TIM and re-seating the block. It made no difference at all.
Basically, despite being 100% sure my CPU block is properly mounted, there are no air locks, flow is excellent, loop cooling performance is total over-kill, my CPU runs hotter than I'd expect.
Everything works fine, rig is near-silent, but I cannot quite get over the CPU temps, especially as those GPU temps impressed me so very much.
I am wondering if I should lap the CPU, maybe the 2500k's aren't very flat vs. the block. I did so with my old Q6600 on air cooling to great effect years ago, but had assumed Sandy Bridge was made with finer tolerances so lapping was a thing of the past...maybe not.
Any advice welcome, happy to answer question regarding my loop, but it really is overkill for what I'm cooling - as was my intent. I've not posted my build log yet - my first rad was faulty and I wanted to wait - but it's basically an external water box (rad chassis) holding a Phobya 1080 (that's 360x360) rad with a D5 pump and res on the side and 4x 180mm Phobya fans in push.
F.Y.I. Tom and I actually had a little chat about my loop last year. Unfortunately, despite having a very comprehensive parts list, I couldn't start my build at the time due to injury. He later posted a great video using many of the bits we'd discussed, here it is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Am7ypdKUgfU&feature=plcp *
great minds and all that lol. Watching this caused me to change a couple of bits when I eventually came to order, but my external loop is basically the same as the one Tom created. As I used QDC's I can easily transfer the entire cooling assembly to another PC. The pump, fans etc. are all powered by a little external PSU, so it's all very neat, with no wires from the PC - just the two hoses
Cheers,
Scoob.
* the new forum doesn't like "nice" links does it?
As part of my water cooled build I have the EK Supreme HF CPU block in Acetal. Nice looking block and quite highly regarded, at least in the reviews I read.
It's in my loop now, cooling a 2500k @ 4.5ghz. My 2500k isn't one of the better ones, needing 1.366 vCore under load to be fully stable at that speed. Still, far from "bad" so I'm happy.
I had an Antec Kuhler 620 before - you know, the closed loop WC kit with a thin 120mm rad. I ran it in push-pull with a proper cold air feed supplied by some corrugated hose like you have on older tumble driers - worked well.
Anyway, the issue I have is that the EK Supreme HF CPU block appears to perform no better than the 620 did! My loop is overkill, having a Phobya 1080 rad to cool the CPU and two 570's - well one at the moment, but that's another story.
The GPU's are both cooled VERY well, I don't see above 40c except on the hottest of days and that was with both cards clocked at 850 - up from stock 732. The CPU however will still hit 70c under load in IBT testing - a little down on the 620, but not much.
Like I said, my loop works well for the GPU's - I use parallel flow, so the coolant goes through the GPU's before going to the CPU. Still, the thermal capacity of the water should be more than enough for this not to be an issue. Indeed, dropping to just ONE GPU had no effect on the CPU temps what so ever. So, two overclocked 570's saw the same CPU temp as ONE 570 at stock.
So, I thought maybe I'd bodged mounting the CPU block or something, very unlike me as I'm pretty anal when it comes to that. Regardless, I drained the loop and popped the CPU block off so I could clean and re-seat it. On removal I saw a perfect spread pattern of TIM on the CPU and block - so no problems there - but I re-did everything anyway, just in case. For the record I fully cleaned and treated both the CPU and block with cleaning fluids, before re-applying TIM and re-seating the block. It made no difference at all.
Basically, despite being 100% sure my CPU block is properly mounted, there are no air locks, flow is excellent, loop cooling performance is total over-kill, my CPU runs hotter than I'd expect.
Everything works fine, rig is near-silent, but I cannot quite get over the CPU temps, especially as those GPU temps impressed me so very much.
I am wondering if I should lap the CPU, maybe the 2500k's aren't very flat vs. the block. I did so with my old Q6600 on air cooling to great effect years ago, but had assumed Sandy Bridge was made with finer tolerances so lapping was a thing of the past...maybe not.
Any advice welcome, happy to answer question regarding my loop, but it really is overkill for what I'm cooling - as was my intent. I've not posted my build log yet - my first rad was faulty and I wanted to wait - but it's basically an external water box (rad chassis) holding a Phobya 1080 (that's 360x360) rad with a D5 pump and res on the side and 4x 180mm Phobya fans in push.
F.Y.I. Tom and I actually had a little chat about my loop last year. Unfortunately, despite having a very comprehensive parts list, I couldn't start my build at the time due to injury. He later posted a great video using many of the bits we'd discussed, here it is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Am7ypdKUgfU&feature=plcp *
great minds and all that lol. Watching this caused me to change a couple of bits when I eventually came to order, but my external loop is basically the same as the one Tom created. As I used QDC's I can easily transfer the entire cooling assembly to another PC. The pump, fans etc. are all powered by a little external PSU, so it's all very neat, with no wires from the PC - just the two hoses
Cheers,
Scoob.
* the new forum doesn't like "nice" links does it?
