by Greg King on August 3, 2006 in Cooling
Are you looking to delve into the world of water cooling, but don’t know where to start? Danger Den has sent us a slew of products to get our rig up and running, including the new AMD TDX block. Since this is also my first high-end water cooling rig, I relay my experiences to you.
A wise man once said Its getting hot in her herre. Could he have been talking about computer hardware? Perhaps, but I wouldnt bet you on it.
One of the worst enemies your computer is heat. There are a few options you can choose when combating the ever increasing heat of your computer [especially with this extreme summer heat!]. Up until recently, air was the method of choice. With more time however, enthusiasts began cooling their computer with homemade water cooling kits. As this approach became more and more accepted, water cooling became mainstream.
There are many companies that offer their own unique hardware to keep your computers temperature in check and today, we are taking a look at Danger Den.
Danger Den has been around for quite some time now and with each revision, their water blocks get more refined and while they are most famous for their water blocks, they also product pumps, radiators and reservoirs. Directly from their web site, you can browse through their items and pick out your personal water cooling setup. While this is easy, DD has taken this a step further and created complete water kits that you can purchase. Dependant of your hardware, DD offers different kits that will suit your exact system cooling needs.
Today in the Techgage lab, we are taking an AMD/NVIDIA based water cooling kit for a test drive. With DD sending us their famous TDX water block, I will conveniently be using this to cool my AMD X2 4600+ (thank you for the price drop AMD!) Also included in this kit as DDs brand new MAG pump, the DD MAG II, a Maze 4 GPU water block, one black ice pro radiator, one clear 5 1/4 bay reservoir and seven feet of Tygon 1/2 ID tubing.
Now that we know what this kit includes, lets get into the review
The Goods
The first piece we have up is the CPU water block. This block, as mentioned earlier, is an AMD copper TDX. This block will support sockets 754, 939 and 940. The base is a solid piece of copper with the inside milled out. There are two barbs on the top of the cooler that screw into the clear top. There are 4 screws that hold the clear top and the cooper base together with a rubber o-ring in-between the two to prevent any leaks.
Here are the specs, provided by Danger Den themselves:
- Complete Block Assembled with Top and O-ring
- 100% Copper 110!
- #1 Accelerator Plate
- High Flow 1/2″ or 3/8″ OD Fittings
- Stainless Steel Hold Down
- Machined Lapped and polished beyond 1200 grit
- Pressure tested before shipment to 85psi
As you can see, you can get your TDX water block with either 1/2 or 3/8 OD fittings. You can also see that the base of the block has been polished past 1200 grit.