Advice for watercooling with a 120mm radiator inside a DAN A4-SFX case

Subsonic

Efficiency Noob
Original poster
Jan 23, 2020
7
0
Hy everyone,

i was planning to build a sff "workstation" for over 2 years now, and i recently had a job change and so i need a decent workhorse for my home office now. When i saw that the DAN A4 is available i bought one right away. Now i´m thinking about which hardware i should cram inside that case. It will be definitely a AMD Zen 2 based CPU like a Ryzen 7 3800X or Ryzen 9 3900X. As i´m not into gaming anymore and for my work i need CPU power more than GPU performance, i also ordered the bracket to mount a 120mm radiator next the the GPU. So now i'm searching for informations about how i should realize this. As there are so many 120mm AIO´s on the market i don´t which one to use, especially in combination with the small space i have inside the DAN A4. I personally would prefer a custom loop solution but the only pump i found which would fit is the "Alphacool Eisbaer LT (Solo)". Are their other solutions available besides the typical AIO´s from all the brands out there which would fit? Pricing is not a thing as i want the best performing solution money can buy. Maybe i get better informations directly from you guys than i found on the net.

Thanks in advance.

Georg
 

Subsonic

Efficiency Noob
Original poster
Jan 23, 2020
7
0
On the mainboard side i will go with the ASRock - X570 Phantom Gaming-ITX/TB3 because of ECC Support and Thunderbolt 3. It's not really cheap and also the active cooling on the chipset is a little bit of a downside but also all the other X570 have the use it so there's no alternative for it. The CPU will be chilled with the Alphacool Eisbaer LT120 CPU, i will see how good it performs. It's a all cooper AIO which will hopefully be enough for the Ryzen 9 - 3900x 12 core CPU.
 

Subsonic

Efficiency Noob
Original poster
Jan 23, 2020
7
0
I would drain the loop and use custom soft tubing to get the cleanest look. With the standard 1/4" fittings which are used on the Eisbär that shouldn't be problem. My main problem at the moment is the GPU. I would love to use a AMD - RX 5500 XT but there are no SFF models available today. I will wait 2 weeks or something if there are any changes to the market, otherwise it will be something like a GTX 1650 Super from NVIDIA. The DAN-A4 is already in my hands. I'm super excited to make this build.

 

rfarmer

Spatial Philosopher
Jul 7, 2017
2,588
2,702
I would drain the loop and use custom soft tubing to get the cleanest look. With the standard 1/4" fittings which are used on the Eisbär that shouldn't be problem. My main problem at the moment is the GPU. I would love to use a AMD - RX 5500 XT but there are no SFF models available today. I will wait 2 weeks or something if there are any changes to the market, otherwise it will be something like a GTX 1650 Super from NVIDIA. The DAN-A4 is already in my hands. I'm super excited to make this build.

Amazon Japan have the Powercolor RX5500 XT itx and they ship globally.
 
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Subsonic

Efficiency Noob
Original poster
Jan 23, 2020
7
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Thanks for the tip. I think sooner or later this card will also be available in europe. I don't have stress building the system.
 

Subsonic

Efficiency Noob
Original poster
Jan 23, 2020
7
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Would there be a massive difference between a 120mm AIO in comparison to a "Asetek 645LT 92 mm AIO" inside the DAN-A4? As there are no small amd-cards with the latest chips avaiable (and i don´t want a nvidia-card...), i can only switch cooling priorities from cpu to gpu. Will i be able to run a ryzen 9 - 3900x without any problems with the Asetek 645LT? Thanks for your advice!
 

bhk1004

Caliper Novice
Mar 2, 2020
31
10
You can also run eco + pbo. There was a 3950x review on reddit that ran this.

Showed over almost a 30 degree drop. And almost 60w less power usage. Almost no diff for gaming/single core performance and much more reasonable performance drop off vs just running eco for multi core.

Overall temps and power usage was below that of a 3700. I am assuming 3900 will see similar drops.

Linked below.

 

Subsonic

Efficiency Noob
Original poster
Jan 23, 2020
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@sancho I can´t understand why Powercolor releases those two cards (didn't know that they have also a RX 5700 ITX) only for the Japanese market. There´s definitely a demand for those cards globally. I don´t know what i should think about buying one of those on amazon japan. I would prefer buying one at least in the EU.

@dondan ECO mode would also be a possibility, maybe i´m doing this. Thanks for the tip! Also thought about the "OC Bracket AIO Mount" from der8auer to get better temps without delidding and so on.

@bhk1004 The R7-3700x with ECO-mode enabled has a temperature of 38 °C under full load? WTF?!?! Those are some impressive numbers. Once again i have to say that AMD has my full respect for what they have engineered with ZEN2.

Thanks everyone for your input!
 

nightshift

Airflow Optimizer
Jul 23, 2020
268
168
In games I do not see a problem but an heavy load (rendering) a 120mm AIO will be better than an 92mmAIO.
That is great to hear.

I only can recommend not use the Alphacool because of the very big quick release.
Sorry for the necro here, but what do you mean by the term "quick release"?

Also, I know most radiators that comes with the popular 120mm aio's have a thickness of 27mm, but standalone rads are almost always 30mm. Can a 30mm rad fit in as well on the gpu side together with a 15mm thin fan - and if so, is it okay to snug everything so completely full contact (fan + rad + psu) that they will all be completely pressed against each other? And when it comes to doing these in the shrinked form of 120mm in an sff case, will using a 20mm rad instead if a 27mm have any benefits because of the 7mm clearance or any relevant disadvantages due to being thinner by 1/4?
Thanks and all the best!
 

nightshift

Airflow Optimizer
Jul 23, 2020
268
168
Thanks, appreciated the reply. I managed to get my hands on an Eisbaer LT solo in the meantime (so only the block itself) couldn't resist:) Planned to make a custom aio, so not an actual loop (confused the phrases a bit there). Snatched the XSPC 120mm rad too. Fabio's work was really inspirational in the FormD1 thread two years ago when he tested a few 120mm rads. The problem with off the shelf aio's that they have tubes of 40cm long which are way too much in this case (also I don't prefer my components emitting ANY kind of light and now even Corsair aio's do that). Once I recieve my A4-SFX (caseking confirmed it after a bank transfer payment), I'll figure out an optimal length and most importantly the route for the tubes (definetly can't run above the psu right?). It'll be a nice side project.
 
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nightshift

Airflow Optimizer
Jul 23, 2020
268
168

Well, there's also this particular fan from Scythe with 12mm thinness. That would make us use those 30mm thick radiators. Question is, how worse would a 12mm fan be compared to a 15mm noctua. Would the bigger rads make up for that? Probably would produce the same result, but it could be worthful to try as most solo raidators that one can buy are all 30mm thick. Which basically limits the users who fancy some watercooling to buy off-the -shelf aio's and serverely limits custom building to either this option, or using a the very rare XSPC Ultrathin.