Watercooling my 4870X2...part 2.

[Waco]

After going back and forth with Gabe from Swiftech (the CEO) it became apparent that despite his own testing that showed 135 C temps on the VRMs of the card that he was adamant that "no load you ever place on the card will get it as hot as Furmark or Kombustor". That miffed me a bit especially considering the STOCK cooler can hold the card stable running Direct3D10 Kombuster indefinitely while the supposedly good water block from Swiftech combined with their full coverage heatsink will completely lock up my machine within 5 minutes of running Kombuster with the VRM temps shooting over 150 C. The warning lights on the back of the card even light up...

 

So now I'm in the process of trying to return this POS water block and heatsink combo that cost me $115 that can't even match the stock cooler in cooling ability. The company I bought it from tried to arrange a return with Swiftech but now Swiftech is being a pain because "there's no problem with the block". bull crap - when the card doesn't run stable at stock speeds there's a damn problem!

 

Here's what it looks like - the black heatsink is passively cooling the VRMs and memory on the board. It's completely inadequate and gets WAY too hot to touch within a minute or two of running anything stressful...and that's with a 230 mm fan blowing right at it!

 

So anyway - completely aside from that - I ordered a DangerDen 4870X2 full coverage block and it got here earlier today.

 

This thing looked pretty ugly at first though when I got it on the card it grew on me instantly.

 

 

Load temps are in the low 40s, VRM temps after 10+ minutes of Kombuster stabilize at...get this...80 C. The VRMs idle at 40 C or so with the water heated up. CPU temps don't look to be changed too much...for some reason they seem a bit lower so perhaps this block flows better than the Swiftech did even though the VRMs and memory are adding extra heat to the loop. I really like the Swiftech MCR-320 radiator - for the price there's NOTHING even close to this in terms of heat dissipation.

 

Here's a shot of something the Swiftech cooler couldn't do while remaining stable - a full 30+ minute run of Furmark with VRM temps well below the maximum limit at ~75 C. Suck it Gabe.

 

 

Here are some other shots of the build - the radiator from Swiftech I love by the way. With 6 of the Nidec Beta V fans running @ 4-5 volts my load temps are AWESOME even with Furmark and Linpack running. The naked card looks a little puny but luckily the DangerDen block makes it look pretty badass (and it weighs a ton as well...there's at least 10 times as much copper in the DangerDen block).

[IVIYTH0S]

Sweet! You gotta overclock that thing and see what kind of craziness that block will bring

[Waco]

Sweet! You gotta overclock that thing and see what kind of craziness that block will bring

Already at 800/900. I don't think my memory will handle much OC'ing - it artifacts pretty quickly under a Kombustor load at anything over 925. I'm bringing the core speeds up slowly but I won't accept and OC that can't run Kombustor for at least 30 minutes (yeah, it's overkill and overly paranoid but I don't want some random glitch screwing up a game session).

 

800/900 on the stock cooler would crash the driver inside of a few minutes in Kombustor. 800/900 on the POS Swiftech cooler would hard-lock my machine within a few minutes with no hope of recovery (. that cooler). 800/900 on this DangerDen block is a piece of cake.

[IVIYTH0S]

Already at 800/900. I don't think my memory will handle much OC'ing - it artifacts pretty quickly under a Kombustor load at anything over 925. I'm bringing the core speeds up slowly but I won't accept and OC that can't run Kombustor for at least 30 minutes (yeah, it's overkill and overly paranoid but I don't want some random glitch screwing up a game session).

 

800/900 on the stock cooler would crash the driver inside of a few minutes in Kombustor. 800/900 on the POS Swiftech cooler would hard-lock my machine within a few minutes with no hope of recovery (. that cooler). 800/900 on this DangerDen block is a piece of cake.

Nah I'm the same way (stability freak) sadly my x2 wont overclock at all. I was about to say if you didnt already spend the money, you shoulda picked up the 5870 in the marketplace for $280. That's been tempting me but, I may actually try two 260s in SLI (aka ghetto 295) but its probably not worth the trouble

[Drdeath]

I will say this, Danger Den makes nice waterblocks. I used EK in the past and bought a Danger Den Summit for my 5870. Idle temps low 30's and load 62 with 1.29V. Schweeet blocks and not restrictive at all.

[Locutus]

And that's why I'll never buy from swiftech.

[Waco]

And that's why I'll never buy from swiftech.

I wouldn't buy a block from them that wasn't full coverage. Their radiators are pretty much the best bang for buck you can get though.

 

I am pretty pissed at the owner for not admitting to the problem even after he saw it in his own testing.

 

 

I am *really* impressed with this DangerDen block. The quality of it is obvious as soon as you take it out of the box. The tolerances are impressive as well - most of the components don't even use thermal pads and use TIM instead.

Edited September 25, 2010 by Waco

[GabrielT]

Hey my name is Gabe too Don't tell me to suck it \

 

Glad to see the new water block is working out for you, do you really need six fans on that radiator?

Edited September 26, 2010 by gabrieltessin

[Waco]

Glad to see the new water block is working out for you, do you really need six fans on that radiator?

I probably don't *need* six fans but running them in push/pull allows me to dial them down to the point where they are barely spinning (maybe 3-400 RPM) but they still move a decent amount of air pretty much silently.

 

That, and it looks cool as hell.

[GabrielT]

I probably don't *need* six fans but running them in push/pull allows me to dial them down to the point where they are barely spinning (maybe 3-400 RPM) but they still move a decent amount of air pretty much silently.

 

That, and it looks cool as hell.

Those Beta V came stock on Dell e510, e520, and e521 btx cases and I know those things can move huge amounts of air if one was so inclined to adjust the fan speed to full. I am honestly surprised you got a hold of that many Nidec fans. They aren't cheap.

Looks nice, hope it keeps working nice.

[Waco]

Those Beta V came stock on Dell e510, e520, and e521 btx cases and I know those things can move huge amounts of air if one was so inclined to adjust the fan speed to full. I am honestly surprised you got a hold of that many Nidec fans. They aren't cheap.

Looks nice, hope it keeps working nice.

I had 3 of them at one point from something I tore apart...I honestly have no clue what it was (this was easily 6+ years ago). One of those is still in a friend's rig running as his CPU fan.

 

I headed over to eBay to get four more - ended up being ~30 shipped for them. The motors in the ones from eBay are a fair bit quieter than the 2 older ones I have but when undervolted to the extent I have them it's not noticeable at all.

 

 

Also - thanks! It's my first full watercooling build and aside from the snag with the Swiftech waterblock everything went amazingly smoothly.

Edited September 27, 2010 by Waco