Liquid Cooling PC build Help

dark5535 · August 6, 2019

Hi Everyone!

I am a somewhat inexperienced builder with 2 PC's under my belt. Through blind luck or some divine intervention they both booted first try. I am now looking to make my ideal build. I have used PC Part Picker to price most everything out, but am honestly too under experienced to find the answers to some of my questions. Namely surrounding liquid cooling. I am looking at the z390 waterforce, and mostly know how that is supposed to fit together and work, with an I9 9900K and a 2080 Ti liquid cooled. I picked out the Alphacool Eisbaer 240 63.85 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler but honestly have no idea how it fits into the liquid cooled situation. I am wanting a setup that is fairly reliable, and a moderate amount of tinkering is okay. I am mostly confused on the following:

Is the alphacool necessary with the waterblock on the Z390?

Furthermore what should i even buy surrounding liquid cooling? How many radiators? Which pump is the best? Am i missing anything important in my build?

Im including the parts list in the link below any feedback on it would be phenomenal!

https://pcpartpicker.com/user/dark5535/saved/gyyZf7

TL;DR: Need help with liquid cooling, can tinker pretty easily just inexperienced.

Lipe123 · August 6, 2019

Cpu block:

The z390 waterforce has the cpu block built into that big cooler for the bridges and vrm's etc so you don't need a cpu cooler block at all. If you already bought one you could just get a regular motherboard and use it there or return it if you are set on the z390 waterforce.

What to get for liquid cooling:

1 pump (if you want redundancy you can get more but its a waste of money, just connect the pump speed sensor to a fan header and set up alerts)

1 Reservoir (you dont need to hold 1gal of liquid, just enough to feed the pump so go for something that fits nicely)

(you can get pump/rad combos that makes it nice and easy to keep everything together and less tubing)

~~1 Gpu waterblock if you want to liquid cool your gpu (you should do this)~~ (nvmd you are buying the waterforce card, i feel those are overpriced but they take away lots of problems with bricking a gpu by installing your own)

2 radiators (long ago they saying was a 120mm rad for cpu and a 240 per gpu. That's still kinda true, I'd say with 2x 240 or larger you'll be set)

lots of tubes or pipes.

Lots of fittings, just draw it out on paper and count them but its normally 2 for each component and then some drain loop stuff

General tips:

I know hard lines are the sh!t now and everyone and their mom has them, I would not recommend it for your first time.

Flexible tubes can be made to look like hard lines if you use 90 degree bends/fittings and its SO much easier to work with.

Make sure you get the correct size of tube and fittings, everything is rated by OD and ID (outer and inner diameter) so just get stuff thats all the same.

Final thoughts:

Watch as many as these videos as you need how to liquid cool. They are pretty old but there is a lot of good basics.

*edit edit* I'm already not a fan of the gpu choice, apparently it has a pump built into it, why oh why would they do this?! also it just comes with barb fittings and no screw in terminals? Naa idk, your mileage may vary but I would get a different card with a more normal waterblock. Unless you must have the matching rgb vomit or something.

mobilewall · August 7, 2019

12 hours ago, dark5535 said:

Hi Everyone!

I am a somewhat inexperienced builder with 2 PC's under my belt. Through blind luck or some divine intervention they both booted first try. I am now looking to make my ideal build. I have used PC Part Picker to price most everything out, but am honestly too under experienced to find the answers to some of my questions. Namely surrounding liquid cooling. I am looking at the z390 waterforce, and mostly know how that is supposed to fit together and work, with an I9 9900K and a 2080 Ti liquid cooled. I picked out the Alphacool Eisbaer 240 63.85 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler but honestly have no idea how it fits into the liquid cooled situation. I am wanting a setup that is fairly reliable, and a moderate amount of tinkering is okay. I am mostly confused on the following:

Is the alphacool necessary with the waterblock on the Z390?

Furthermore what should i even buy surrounding liquid cooling? How many radiators? Which pump is the best? Am i missing anything important in my build?

Im including the parts list in the link below any feedback on it would be phenomenal!

https://pcpartpicker.com/user/dark5535/saved/gyyZf7

TL;DR: Need help with liquid cooling, can tinker pretty easily just inexperienced.

With the parts in your pcpartpicker link that is just standard AIO installation. The alphacool has the pump/block combo like most AIOs and the rad attached. It looks like it is expandable too, although I would just do a full custom loop than expanding one of those.

The gpu linked its the same thing, its a gpu with an AIO already attached, that one does not look expandable but they usually aren't meant to be either.

The "Waterforce z390" motherboard is meant for custom loops only, it comes with a monoblock(cpu+vrm+chipset) and you just hook it into your custom loop as you would a 3rd party cooling block.

If you don't want to do a full custom loop then you could keep the gpu, but I would go for a 3x120mm AIO for the cpu instead if that case can fit it with the 240 that the gpu has.

If you want to do a full custom loop then you will need a different gpu, pick one with a block you can buy at the same time.