The Hardware
Briefly let’s go over the hardware that we’ll be endeavoring to put under water and punish with massive overclocks.
CPU: Intel i7 3770K – While this part is starting to get older, it still packs quite the punch. Plus we know it runs hot which should give us a good chance to really put our cooling to good use.
Motherboard: Gigabyte G1.Sniper 3 – It’s an older board and chipset, but it checks out. It was also a pretty advanced board for it’s time and comes with a lot of features that are still quite relevant.
GPU: ASUS Strix GTX 970 – Asus was kind enough to provide us with one awesome GPU for our rig. I can’t wait to get that Alphacool block installed and the clocks cranked up on this guy!
Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport DDR3 8GB kit – Two 4GB dimms with stock speeds of 1600mhz @ 1.5V. Getting these to their performance peak should be good fun! And just in case they pop, we’ve got an extra set waiting in reserve.
PSU: Corsair RM750X – This 750W power supply should do the trick to keep our system stable and supplied with plenty of clean power. Installation should be fairly clean and simple as well thanks to the fully modular design.
SSD: OCZ Vertex 3 – 120GB version, should do the trick for this gaming rig.
Thanks for checking out our gear! Hopefully we’ve inspired you to take the dip and throw some water in your case as well. Keep following us as we continue on this grand journey of water cooling initiation. The next episode will be a big one as we begin the process to install the basic initial loop and really get this party started!
Check out Water Cooling 101 Episode 1 & Episode 2!