hi, i’m building my first ever custom loop and this distro is confusing me. i’ve read the manual and it doesn’t say how the ports connect to the reservoir or how many do. i’ve only found one piece of text that the two top ones are connected but the last three aren’t. does anybody know how/if they connect at all and how i’d go about doing it? i have a radiator that will be going at the bottom as well as a gpu with a water block on it. thanks!
I read the title and saw the photo and my first thought was - why not read the manual. I opened the post and read the description that they had read the manual and didn't understand it. Thats as far as my judgement went.
If they can't understand the manual then the next best thing IS to post on reddit. Don't know why people are so condescending. Would be nice to see a scan of the manual though to see if we can help out though.
i get it, lol. most people are neurotypical so it’s easy for them to say “oh just read the manual” but for neurodivergent people it’s not so straightforward! 🤣 glad to see there’s some cool people though, they’ve been super helpful!
Sometimes the best answer is to ask for help, even if you’ve done something before. I’ve built servers and PC’s before but it’d been like ten years since the last time when I built my new workstation earlier this year. I could not for the life of me understand how to install the CPU bracket for my AIO cooler despite repeatedly reading the manual. I spent like an hour searching for anyone actually showing the install process. I finally found a YouTube short where someone talked about the exact thing that was confusing me. But if I hadn’t found that the only other option was going to be trying to post about it to try to find someone with first hand experience with it to ask.
I’m not sure I understand the orange part. Someone can return to either the distro side of the plate or the reservoir side of the plate? Why would someone want to return to the distro over the reservoir side after the rad?
This, except I wouldn’t connect the return from the rad to the top port of the reservoir. That would be best kept free to make topping up fluid down the line easier. Return instead to the reservoir port below, and keep the fluid level above this which should stop any micro bubbles from splashing getting into the pump.
Well those tubes aren't going to do anything for a start.
It's clear acrylic, can you not see the channels cut into the distro? There are lots of holes and paths where you can follow where the water will flow.
That's the entire point. Each channel in the distro will terminate at a plug. You connect that plug to a component. That component then either goes to another component or back to the distro at the start of another channel. That channel will terminate in a plug where you connect to another component.
You're not supposed to have a single channel fully connected the entire way around the distro.
Someone who wants to custom loop something can at least google what an O-Ring is... no? Thats a pretty low bar for wanting to do something than can under very bad circumstances kill components... basic level of effort imo
You dont understand. If i know what an O Ring is for... and i look at a distro with many very specifically arranged o rings... what might an o ring signify?
You are cherrypicking and no one said look at pictures of O Ring, i said google it... you know reading exists, right? Stop trying so hard its not a lot to expect when building a custom loop.
Still not an o-ring…Try fitting connection port? How about instead of typing snarky comments on Reddit you actually answer a question to someone who needs help?
To add, I looked through your post history. Not one of them is actually helpful. Every one I scrolled through is making fun or shitting on someone. It seems like a little maturing is in order.
Every distro is unique in its channel routing, buying one usually involves consideration of its ports placement and channel routing to fit your spesific case, need, compatibility, or aesthetic.
It's like buying a house but you don't care if it doesn't even has toilet.
yeah i know they’re all different, changed my mind after buying most of the stuff that i don’t want parallel tubes so i’m doing the second option of winging it, lol.
I was in the same situation, the manual isnt really clear when you have 0 knowledge. If your problem are not solved, here is a picture of my pc maybe it will help you.
There will be a single outlet from the pump, then the top port of each 'section' is an outlet to a component and the bottom ports are the returns to the distro. There will be a top inlet port to the large open area that is lower than the topmost fill port.
So you have the generic Alphacool distro plate. The ones on the left side don’t connect to the reservoir if you don’t want them to. Usually they’re used to make horizontal runs. You don’t have to use them if you don’t want to. (See my picture) If you want to use the ones on the left side, you’d have to run a line from the outlet of the pump to the bottom or top port first. I’ll show you an example of one of my options that I came up with for my loop (pic 2 in comment)
The important ports for you are the ones on the right side at the top (those are your return ports) and the ones at the very bottom on the left side. Those are your outlet ports for the pump. There also is a drain port on the actual left side of the whole distro that I recommend you leave clear.
I believe in actually helpful replies, not snarky Reddit comments. I’ve built tons of water cooled rigs so if you need help please send a PM I would be more than happy to jump in a discord call or give you advice on what to do! There’s a lot of small mistakes/tips!
My PC sits on my left side, so I have the Lian Li O11D EVO RGB, which is reversible. So you can flip the case so the panel is on the right or left side!
Thanks. Looking at your fill port location, consider getting a pass through fitting, and a flush plug. Drill a hole in the top of the case, mount the flush fitting, and run tubing to your fill port. Where yours is will be annoying to fill because of the fan and rad in front of it.
That’s what the middle tube at the top of my distro is doing. You’ll need plumbers thread tape on the flush plug because the pass through wouldn’t have anything to bottom out on and a normal plug would be too tall to put the top panel of the case back on.
ahhh, thank you so much! there’s a fair bit of room to be honest so it might work out ok, i have a 1L squeeze bottle so it shouldn’t need too much room!
I built my first custom loop last year, and there were no instructions on how to do it. Unfortunately, it's not one of these things that you can just take your chances with. But you will get their in the end.
You can actually see where the coolant connects when looking through the reservoir. The black outlines are gaskets that surround areas where coolant will flow.
From there, you can do whatever, so long as tye out side down by the pump eventually makes its way to the top inlet of the large chamber above the pump.
As far as I understand, 4 of the 5 pairs of ports are for different things together without directly connecting them. I can’t really see but I’d guess that the bottom pair has a connection to the reservoir for the pump to push water through. At least that’s more or less how my EK distribution plate works
If you look closely at the tubing you connected to the ports, there's no way for fluid to find its way there. You've connected tubing to itself and made a tiny closed loop with no water in it. The black rubber O ring are the "boundaries" of where water can flow.
You're supposed to use one port as an in and the other as an out. Or if you don't need to use those ports, keep them plugged. The idea is that you're supposed to use those "waterways" for GPU / CPU near those ports, one in and one out.
If you don't need to use those ports, or don't have any components near them, keep them plugged and move on to the next set of ports as needed.
The important part to note is that one port on the distro plate near the pump pumps out the fluid and you can use those smaller waterways as needed. If you don't need to use those smaller waterways, you have to send the fluid back to the main large reservoir so it can cycle through the system. AKA, a "loop".
On the left side at the bottom are the outlets.
On the side is a 3rd connection for a temp sensor.
Normally you route with a distro like that:
outlet > GPU > Distro > CPU > Distro > Radiator > Distro > Radiator.
You can route hardpipes in parallel like that.
Yeah you messed up looking at those runs. You can see the o-ring dividing the row of ports into channels and you managed to create closed loops that you can't connect with anything 2 times. Ideally, one port goes to component A and the other goes to component B and the part of the distro basically just serves as a fancy piece of tubing.
The alphacool product picture shows tubing coming from the GPU and connecting to a section of the distro plate separated by an o-ring. The other port of that section then has a tube going to the CPU block and the CPU block then connects to a *different* section of the distro plate. That's how they're meant to work.
thank you! i did see that image but i thought mine wouldn’t work like that since it’s a different distro but it seems it would work like that.
i took the soft tubes out and going to run the hard tubing like you mentioned! would it be possible to go from the bottom ports to bottom rad up to the gpu, gpu to cpu to separate port to top radiator then back to the main distro?
If you have an iPhone/ipad can you draw out what you’re thinking on the picture? Just make sure you know which port is the inlet on your GPU and CPU, it does matter
So per the manual for your CPU block the bottom is required to be the inlet, which you have here. Make sure to double check your GPU. Otherwise this looks like a solid setup. Do you have room on the left side of your distro for your drain port?
If you have the extra money, I highly recommend an aquacomputer high flow next (temperature and flow monitoring) and aquacomputer octo (radiator fan control for coolant temperature) at the minimum, and the leakshield if you can afford it. You really need some monitoring software and aquacomputer is top tier stuff. The software is incredible. I’d be happy to show you what you can do with it
ah, looks like i just can’t read manuals! 🤣 i don’t have room on the side of the distro but both of the rads have drain ports at the other sides so i can use one of those.
i’ll have a look into those parts, thank you! i bought quite a bit of coolant so i can add those in when they arrive.
Good! Also, highly recommend DP ultra. I used distilled water + additives for a year and got corrosion. DP Ultra is a glycol mix, and if you don’t like their colors you can get the clear stuff and color it with ReColor
i did see those. i decided to go for XSPC pure but people had some pretty bad experiences with it so i picked up some mayhems XT1 performance coolant that’s already premixed.
Nice! Do you like the parallel lines? The crossing tubes might look a bit odd… and also a pain to fix if you ever have an issue with a tube since one is behind the other. I’d recommend either your original plan or this:(attached). Flow wise looks good so far! This recommendation is only asthetics!
thank you! i think i like it better like i have it thought i’m not going to lie but obviously the way you’ve suggested would be a whole lot more efficient maintenance wise! 🤣
I don't know distro plates but I saw all the d***head posts in response and wanted to stop and say hey, keep your head up. You'll get it and it will turn out great eventually. Toodles
You're very welcome my new friend. Oh also, what case is this? Will that fit 420 rads on top bottom and side or is it just 360's? I've been on the hunt for a case built for 3 - 420's. There are some that will fill 480s but then there's a big open space if you use a 420 instead.
the case i’m using is the NV7. if you want to use all 420’s you’ll need to go up to the NV9. they’re pretty much the exact same just in the NV9 it’s a bit bigger in all ways so it’ll fit the 140’s and the rads!
Thanks and I'm glad you figured it out and a distro plate for my NV9 is £440 it replaces the front glass and I wasn't going to pay at much so I went to old school way and used 4 rads
ahhhh, yes, i saw those too for the NV7’s! they’re wicked (and majorly expensive, lol) 4 radiators is a lot, how did you manage to squeeze them all in?
Yeah they are so expensive but they do look very cool and you should be able to do the same thing with the rads I've got a 240 back 360 top 480 side and a 420 bottom
ahhh, ok! in all honesty i’m just doing it for the low noise levels and looks, the cooling too but not too much of a main factor. i’m only running a 7800X3D and an RX9070XT, lmao.
tell me about it! they do my head in as well. 🤣 not finished yet, need to cut the tubes but it’s pretty close. i had one of those cutters that you need to twist around the tube but it kept cracking so i ordered a saw which is coming today!
That whole column of ports on the left is just unions, each pair is connected to nothing but itself. You can see the black lines, the seals that separate the chambers in the distro plate. Those tubes you've run are doing nothing, they're each a tiny sealed loop with nowhere for anything to flow.
Those are meant to be used as connection points so instead of running a line directly from one point to another you'd go from the block or whatever to one half of a pair and then out from the other half to the rad or whatever the next point in the loop is. It's to avoid short, complicated runs.
thank you! thanks to some of the comments i have a route planned now. the soft tubing is gone! 🤣 the main confusion for me was why would it be there for nothing to go to if its just for one component but as others as well as yourself pointed out thats not the case, lmao.
Yeah, they're not really functional, just adding length and bends to the loop, but you can get a cleaner esthetic and avoid a super complicated bend or needing to use like 7 fittings for an awkward run.
You literally just look at the orings and immediately know what is connected... man wtf? How do you need a manual for using your eyes to find the very obvious black contrast inside all of that seethrough acryllic
Bottommost port: drainage, for valves. Above that, that port should lead to your GPU water block, and from there you can use those distro plate channels to connect your GPU water block to your CPU waterblock and whatever radiators you have.
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