First Water Cooled Build

[Archer3545]

Budget (including currency): $4,000 Flexible

Country: USA

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: This computer will be listed for sale as a gaming PC.

Other details (existing parts lists, whether any peripherals are needed, what you're upgrading from, when you're going to buy, what resolution and refresh rate you want to play at, etc): 

I work at a computer repair store. I was given the ok from my boss to price out a badass build and that means I get to try things that I have always wanted to do but never had the money. What I want is a fully custom water cooled pc. The CPU will be a Ryzen 9 5900x, 64GB Ram, and the GPU will be an RTX 3090, but we aren't paying inflated prices, meaning price it as it's msrp because we wont buy it until prices go down, although we may still build the system and tell the customer that they have to source the GPU on their own. Regardless that's more for us to decide later on. As mentioned before I have never done custom water cooling, I have done my research but learning is always done best hands on, at least for me. I want a lager case, Nothing that is open on the sides I would prefer a more traditional Full/Mid tower. If you want to include something different though that is fine, I am open to ideas. I want the CPU and GPU both water cooled. I would like to use distilled water for the system. The motherboard, PSU, and other accessories are up to you, make it look good. For the water cooling, I want one or two 360mm rads (if that seems like too much or not enough just show me how you would do it and then just kind of explain why). I want either a pump/res combo or separate I am not a fan of the pump/water-block combos. I want hardline tubing. Now that's everything for the computer. (If I missed anything let me know). I also need the tools to bend, cut, whatever you think I will need. Do not count tools or parts that I will keep at the shop for our use as part of the budget. Thanks, and I can't wait to see what you all come up with.

 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

dont bother with custom water unless you are serious about overclocking the cpu and gpu

 

Just stick a liquid freezer 360 or if you have a big enough case 420 and thatll be more than enough to cool your cpu, and even if you dont oc itll still be very quiet

 

 

And holy crap you absolutely do not need a 5900x  nor 64gb of ram unless you are running ram hungry productivity programs

 

5800x and 16gb of ram will suffice for most games

[OfficialTechSpace]

The only difference between a 3090 and a 3080 Ti is the extra VRAM and price-hike, the only time that VRAM is necessary is for creative applications. If this is a gaming build (like stated), a 3090 would be a silly purchase. That being said, you can also fit in a 5950X for the price. I get that list is supposed to be completely overkill, and that's why I haven't agreed with the other persons reply above. We could sit and argue about sufficiency and value all day, but that isn't the point of this build.

 

Here's what I'd recommend: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/mw4PCz

 

CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5950X  ($849.00 @ Adorama) 
Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 GAMING PLUS  ($139.66 @ Amazon) 
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 64 GB (4 x 16 GB) 3200Mhz CL16  ($329.99 @ Amazon) 
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB  ($104.99 @ Lenovo) 
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 Ti  ($1199.00) 
Case: Phanteks Eclipse P500A  ($114.99 @ Amazon) 
Power Supply: MSI A850GF 850W 80+ Gold  ($126.04 @ Adorama) 
Case Fans: 7x ARCTIC P12 PST A-RGB 0dB  ($15.99 each @ Amazon) 
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series XC7 CPU Water Block ($79.99)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series XG7 RGB 30-SERIES GPU Water Block ($159.99)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series XR5 360m Radiator ($79.99)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series XD5 Pump/Reservoir Combo ($154.99)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series XL5 Performance Coolant 1L — Clear ($17.99)
Custom:  3 x XF Compression 10/13mm (3/8” / 1/2”) ID/OD Fitting Four Pack - Black ($80.97)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series 90° Rotary Adapter Twin Pack — Black ($26.99)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series Filling Bottle ($2.99)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series XT Softline 10/13mm Tubing ($16.99)
Custom: Corsair Hydro X Series XR5 360m Radiator ($79.99)

 

Total: $3676.48

[SorryBella]

Just now, OfficialTechSpace said:

Here's what I'd recommend: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/mw4PCz

Honestly +1 to this, but i would substitute the Corsair GPU Block's for EK's due to their pretty shoddy QC.

[Archer3545]

27 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

dont bother with custom water unless you are serious about overclocking the cpu and gpu

 

Just stick a liquid freezer 360 or if you have a big enough case 420 and thatll be more than enough to cool your cpu, and even if you dont oc itll still be very quiet

 

 

And holy crap you absolutely do not need a 5900x  nor 64gb of ram unless you are running ram hungry productivity programs

 

5800x and 16gb of ram will suffice for most games

It doesn't have to be practical or make sense to you, the point of it is I want people to walk in and see it and be like holy shit I have never seen a computer like that before, I need that. People who have money don't care. They want what is different and cool and they want the best of the best and that's what I want to do. I'm not building a number of these systems, I am building one and if it goes well I'll build another one in a few more months. I had this guy who had me build him a computer in this thermaltake case that is meant for two separate computers in the same case, he only has one computer in it. The reason he picked this $600 case is because he saw it could fit a lot of HDD's this guy has 7 14Tb and 3 10Tb HDD's the 14Tb drives were like $800 a piece and he has 4 SSD's for a total of around 136Tb of storage. This was not for a business or anything this was for one guy to store movies. He had a shitload of movies and tv shows.

 

 

[Freakwise]

24 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

dont bother with custom water unless you are serious about overclocking the cpu and gpu

 

Just stick a liquid freezer 360 or if you have a big enough case 420 and thatll be more than enough to cool your cpu, and even if you dont oc itll still be very quiet

 

 

And holy crap you absolutely do not need a 5900x  nor 64gb of ram unless you are running ram hungry productivity programs

 

5800x and 16gb of ram will suffice for most games

Please read op original post carefully first before giving him answer

 

Quote

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: This computer will be listed for sale as a gaming PC.

 

 

 

[Archer3545]

You are all awesome, thanks for the support and feed back I will consider any build that is sent my way. If anyone else still has a problem with my goal that is fine I have voiced my opinion and if you still think I am dumb, that is fine. I completely understand the point that it is overkill and obnoxious. If I am not here to respond to you directly do not think that I am not considering your ideas or anything, this will an on going project, I am still at stage one and I just want to make sure I get everything right on the water cooled side as I don't want to mess anything up. 

[Archer3545]

15 minutes ago, OfficialTechSpace said:

The only difference between a 3090 and a 3080 Ti is the extra VRAM and price-hike, the only time that VRAM is necessary is for creative applications. If this is a gaming build (like stated), a 3090 would be a silly purchase. That being said, you can also fit in a 5950X for the price.

Thanks for the input and I want anyone to feel free to change anything up, If you think 3080ti or a 3950 will be a better fit just let me know.

[SorryBella]

Just now, Archer3545 said:

If you think 3080ti or a 3950 will be a better fit just let me know

3950x would be pretty poor pick, especially considering that they are pretty much neck in neck against the now cheaper 10850k. 5900x and 3080 would be the "cheap alt" you should stare at.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

11 minutes ago, Archer3545 said:

It doesn't have to be practical or make sense to you, the point of it is I want people to walk in and see it and be like holy shit I have never seen a computer like that before, I need that.

In that case

 

Stick a 5950x and go for 32gb of ram instead of 64gb of ram

 

Both are pretty useless for gaming but i think its core counts that actually impress, not just a crap ton of ram unless you have like 1tb of ram

 

I guess if its actually a build just to impress then i guess watercooling and the overkill specs make abit more sense

 

 

Oh and to further impress, dynamic oc the cpu as far as you can go without reaching 90c or over 1.45v

 

So you can have a single or 2 core boost of maybe 5.3, 5.4ghz

Now that will also impress ppl

 

 

Youll also want max rainbow puke rgb as in this case its to make it look "impressive" i guess??? Cause most ppl associate rgb with speed for whatever reason, though you will want a mesh case for lower temps to help with dynamic oc or so the customer doesnt complain about high temps

[Archer3545]

Also if anyone has an idea of the tools I should buy to bend or cut anything I might need, because I don't know what all I need on that aspect.

[Archer3545]

4 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Youll also want max rainbow puke rgb as in this case its to make it look "impressive" i guess??? Cause most ppl associate rgb with speed for whatever reason, though you will want a mesh case for lower temps to help with dynamic oc or so the customer doesnt complain about high temps

Lol yeah I am not a big fan of rgb either but you are right people associate the lighting directly with performance. 

[Archer3545]

The lowest GPU I will go is maybe a 3080ti I understand in practicality for gaming the 3080ti and 3090 aren't much different. Also I may go with a 3080 just depending on the shortage and everything. 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

Just now, Archer3545 said:

Lol yeah I am not a big fan of rgb either but you are right people associate the lighting directly with performance. 

I can tell you that is 100% true since some of the ppl on the new builds and planning subforum tend to overspend on rgb, sometimes even so bad to the point that they have to downgrade the cpu and gpu for a stupid asthetic xD

 

Go for the cheapest rgb fans you can get that have decent airflow like phanteks fsk

 

Rgb ram

 

Rgb case

 

Rgb everything

[RONOTHAN##]

Just saying, $4000 is a very tight budget if you're gonna be doing a full custom loop system with a 5900X, 3090 and 64GB of RAM. It's gonna be about $3000 in just those three components, let alone the case, motherboard, power supply, and the other $1000 for a custom loop. Basically, you either want to lower some of those components slightly, or raise your budget up a bit.

 

As for why you're gonna be water cooling the system, you either want to do it for ultimate silence, ultimate overclocking, or ultimate looks. It sounds like you're trying to make this a showcase type build, in which case the looks category is where you want to focus your attention. Plus, people who know how to water cool do it themselves, and people who don't buy the flashiest systems possible (it's very rare to see someone walk into a store and buy a soft tubing based water cooled system) .This means that not only are you gonna have to get all the custom water cooling gear, you're gonna have have to deck it out with a ton of RGB fans and stuff like that, adding even more to the cost. Plus, you're gonna have to do hard line tubing, which if you haven't built a water cooled system before, the added complexity of hardline can make it even more difficult since you basically want the bends to be perfect before you sell it. The people who are willing to spend the $5000 on a system want it to be near perfect. I'm not trying to diss custom loops or your abilities, I'm more saying you might want to make a slightly lower end system to water cool just for practice and see if you can figure out how to bend tubing (or just buy a crap ton of 90 degree fittings). 

 

If you decide to go through with it and think you can figure it out, The Lian Li O11 Dynamic is basically the default case for doing a custom loop in for it's pretty dead simple loop design (though if you want to have your system stand out, you might want to go with something else). The motherboard, while it doesn't really need to be high end, this system is gonna be overkill, so might as well make it overkill. The X570 Taichi is a great board for $300, or if you want the absolute top-of-the-line, get the Crosshair VIII Dark Hero or upcoming EVGA X570 Dark. Both are great boards and will look really nice in a water cooled system. The PSU should be picked in a similar fashion, get a 1000w+ unit. The RM1000X from Corsair is a great unit.

 

Now time for the water cooling equipment. Pick a pump/reservoir combo (either tube or distro style) with a Lang D5 pump (basically the most reliable on the market). I like the ones EK makes, and for most of these parts I'd suggest going with them so you know you're getting a reliable product. For the radiators, two 360mm rads should fit in that case, and would be what I recommend at the minimum (my system is water cooled with a 5900X and a 3080 and temps are right where I want them). For the blocks, EK makes some of the best GPU blocks, they may cost a bit extra but they are definitely worth it. As for CPU, you want to pick a really good block, as the 5900X runs real hot. The Heatkiller IV is a great block for the price (if you can find one in stock). As for fittings, make sure they fit with whatever tubing you decide to go with (for hardline, only the outer diameter (OD) matters, just make sure all the ODs are the same among fittings and tubing). Be sure to get extra tubing so you can practice bends. I'd say get twice the amount you'll think you need, that way you give yourself some room to make mistakes. PETG tubing is probably the easiest to deal with, so I'd recommend going with that. For fluid, distilled water is the best, and get some PT nuke to make sure bacteria doesn't grow in the loop

 

As for how to bend tubes, find a tutorial online. There are a lot of different methods, but most of them are pretty similar. Put the mandrill in the tube past where you want the bend to be, get a heat gun to warm up the area you want to bend, keep turning the tube, and bend it once it's malleable and you don't have to force it, set it in the angle you want (either with a tool or by eye), and cut it to size with a saw and use a deburring tool to clean up the end. 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

1 minute ago, Archer3545 said:

The lowest GPU I will go is maybe a 3080ti I understand in practicality for gaming the 3080ti and 3090 aren't much different. Also I may go with a 3080 just depending on the shortage and everything. 

Cheap out on everything whilst still being decent, but keep the 5950x, 32gb ram, rgb, and pref rtx 3090 since the better the card the more impressed ppl will br

[Archer3545]

1 minute ago, RONOTHAN## said:

Just saying, $4000 is a very tight budget if you're gonna be doing a full custom loop system with a 5900X, 3090 and 64GB of RAM. It's gonna be about $3000 in just those three components, let alone the case, motherboard, power supply, and the other $1000 for a custom loop. Basically, you either want to lower some of those components slightly, or raise your budget up a bit.

he end. 

Yeah the budget was kind of just spit balled, if you want to go way over that's fine I really don't have a budget I just don't know if I can justify spending a fortune out of pocket

[Archer3545]

4 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

I'm not trying to diss custom loops or your abilities, I'm more saying you might want to make a slightly lower end system to water cool just for practice and see if you can figure out how to bend tubing (or just buy a crap ton of 90 degree fittings). 

I completely agree, I actually plan on doing exactly what you said and first trying cheaper components and everything before I risk damaging anything expensive.

[SorryBella]

21 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Now that will also impress ppl

...until you realized that layman dont read specs. If they judge only in looks, theyll think the one with sense of style is the one thats faster. Look at how Alienware Aurora sales pops up, whether we as enthusiast liked it or not, it appeases the eye candy factor and the general population would have more interest in it.

12 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

I can tell you that is 100% true since some of the ppl on the new builds and planning subforum tend to overspend on rgb, sometimes even so bad to the point that they have to downgrade the cpu and gpu for a stupid asthetic xD

Or perhaps because they dont know crap about computers? Again, aesthetic sells. Guiding them beyond "get rid of the rgb lol" would be way more helpful. I know youve tried to help once or twice with a listed out build but i know for a fact that this is recent. I know ya for awhile.

 

Just, go look at the corner and think. Seriously. Youve attacked a lot of people's purchase decision for 1 name of raw value without considering context nor their taste and it can set a bad precedent towards yourself and the forum.

 

 

With that bursted out of my chest:

2 minutes ago, Archer3545 said:

I completely agree, I actually plan on doing exactly what you said and first trying cheaper components and everything before I risk damaging anything expensive.

Yep, you should. While custom watercooled PCs are cool, they are pretty advanced stuff. Ive seen a lot of watercooling nightmare story where it basically takes OP days before finally giving up and admitting lax of experience in building PCs in general. While building usual air cooled/AIO cooled PCs wont 100% save you from said nightmares atleast theyll give you a rough idea where things might have gone wrong because well... Youve dry run (no pun intended) building a PC.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

7 hours ago, SorryClaire said:

Ive seen a lot of watercooling nightmare story where it basically takes OP days before finally giving up and admitting lax of experience in building PCs in general. While building usual air cooled/AIO cooled PCs wont 100% save you from said nightmares atleast theyll give you a rough idea where things might have gone wrong because well... Youve dry run (no pun intended) building a PC.

This is basically why i bash custom water builds, esp when they are low budget like a 2000$ custom water build

 

Plus the other stuff like watercooling being a pain in the ass to setup, esp hardline and also the risk of a leak

 

 

Yea i agree my bashing is excessive, ill fix that eventually but maybe not who knows ¯\_ (ツ) _/¯ 

 

If you already know me for awhile then you know im the type of person to go maximum value builds and throwing away uneccesary stuff, though i have already started incorperating rgb if it isnt expensive, maybe ill be able to incorperate watercooling at some point, who knows ¯\_ (ツ) _/¯