Liquid Flow Restriction

I use a Xylem D5 pump with a standalone reservoir, with the pump being powered through a direct SATA connection from a PSU used only for watercooling components and not part of the test system. The pump is controlled by an Aquacomputer Aquaero 6 XT in PWM mode. There is a calibrated in-line flow meter and Dwyer 490 Series 1 wet-wet manometer to measure the pressure drop of the component being tested. Every component is connected to the manometer by the way of soft tubing, compression fittings, and two T-fittings that have been accounted for when it comes to the liquid flow restriction in the loop.


There are a total of six blocks in this roundup, including a universal GPU block that I had tested at the last minute before the GPU had to be returned! Otherwise my plan was to get one entry each from five manufacturers who were able to provide units in time and so everything somehow worked out. All of these will get dedicated reviews over the course of the next few weeks. As it stands, the Alphacool Core block ends up the least restrictive in my testing. This is likely to do with the relatively narrow cold plate which also has wider microfins and channels compared to most others. This is a new generation of GPU blocks from Alphacool and we see the GPU block follows the trend of lower coolant flow restriction we saw with the Alphacool Core 1 CPU block before.