Now you have an understanding of all
these different components, it’s time to
decide what kind of loop you want to build,
how you’re going to build it, what case
you’re going to use, and more.
You might already have a chassis in
mind, or maybe you’re keen to reuse
your own—regardless, whatever you
pick, we recommend it has good radiator
support and strong intake air access. For
a beginner, a big mid-tower case will help
significantly when it comes to crafting
your loop.
Something such as Fractal Design’s
Define R6 or the Phanteks Enthoo Evolv
X are great options for
rookies because they
provide solid airflow
and plenty of support
for liquid cooling right
off the bat.
The best thing you
can do before you begin
is research the chassis
you have in mind. Strike
up its name on Google,
add “liquid cooled
build” to the end of it,
and see what results
you get. When we plan
our systems here at
Maximum PC, we do
that first, then head
to http://pcpartpicker.
com and http://builds.
gg to check out the
build logs there.
Once your case is
selected, you’ll want
Preparation
Planning Your Perfect Loop
Manufacturer Choices
THINGS TO CONSIDER
When it comes to planning your
loop, you should keep a few key
rules in mind:1
Make sure your pump is gravity
fed. There’s nothing worse than
running a pump dry—you’ll damage
it in the short term, and kill it in the
long run.2
Think about loop maintenance.
Eventually, you’re going to have
to change the coolant. It could be
six months, it could be three years,
but it’s coming. Think about where
your drain port is going to be and
where your fill port is going to be.
Typically, your drain port should be
located at the lowest point of your
loop, and the fill port above the res.3
Aesthetics or performance?
This next one is pivotal. By
far the most effective liquid-
cooling loop for pure performance
is a serial one, connecting one
component to another, and so on.
However, you’ll often find folk
(ourselves included) running
parallel loops. This is because
they look better, but performance
tends to be worse, especially with
low pump speeds.4
Compatibility. Always think
about what happens if
something goes wrong. This is less
of an issue with soft tubing, but if
you have to reseat your memory,
and there’s a hard tube running
across the top of it, you’ll have to
disassemble the entire system.to grab a pencil and paper next, and start
drafting your loop design. You could do
this in Paint or Photoshop, too, but either
way, you want to roughly sketch out your
chassis and start planning your runs. This
is also a good opportunity to figure out how
many fittings you’ll need. It does require
a fair bit of brain power to visualize your
internal layout and what angled fittings
you’ll need, but it’s a quick and effective
method to figure it all out. It’s worth noting
that, inevitably, your finished system won’t
look like your plan—you’ll likely have to
adapt to problems on the fly—but it gives
you a good basis to work from.There are numerous manufacturers that
provide liquid-cooling hardware, from the
sharp crisp waterblocks of EKWB to
the glamorous fittings of Bitspower
and the potent performance-heavy
radiators of Alphacool. You can generally
mix and match as you please, because
most liquid-cooling hardware abides by
the same standards.
However, one thing to be aware of is
copper versus aluminum cooling. There
are plenty of aluminum liquid-cooling
products, which are usually cheaper
than copper parts, but they cannot be
used with copper components. If you’re
going aluminum, everything has to be
aluminum, no exceptions. Reason being,
the two metals (copper and aluminum)
react with one another in the coolant
(the coolant acts as an electrolyte, and
galvanic corrosion occurs), leading to
potential gunk build-up in the loop, and
damage to the aluminum parts over time.
This can also happen depending on the
type of coolant you use, because many
coolants take advantage of biocides and
other chemical procedures, some of
which react poorly with nickel plating,
so we always recommend you go with
trusted coolant manufacturers.maximumpc.com MAY 2020 MAXIMUM PC 27