Retail G4's coming soon....

C

CAD OC'er

Limp Gawd
Joined
Sep 2, 2004
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cathar2en.jpg

I rippped this off Cathar's thread: http://forums.overclockers.com.au/showthread.php?t=299417&page=156&pp=15 (might require registration)

He doesn't go into much detail, but I thought I would be cool if others posted sites that are selling it...

Addition: They're here...
stormpic1vj.gif


Read about it here: Storm

Where to buy so far:
http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/swstunhipebl.html

http://www.frozencpu.com/ex-blc-204.html
 
CAD OC'er said:
I rippped this off Cathar's thread: [url]http://forums.overclockers.com.au/showthread.php?t=299417&page=156&pp=15[/url] (might require registration)

He doesn't go into much detail, but I thought I would be cool if others posted sites that are selling it...[/QUOTE]


That was posted on the 17th. So they should be available in a week or so if you are correct. Hmm, I may just give up my diy block if the price is right, or turn it into a gpu block. :D
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I don't understand whats so great about them?? I haven't seen any benchmarks of any sorts. They are not as pretty as AC blocks so whats up???
 
GokuSSL said:
I don't understand whats so great about them?? I haven't seen any benchmarks of any sorts. They are not as pretty as AC blocks so whats up???
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go to www.procooling.com


Basically to summarize it for you, the G4 and G5 are the two single best waterblocks you can buy bar none.
 
Woo!...I think I just found the block I'm going to get.
Does cathar, or anyone familiar w/ his blocks, have a rec what pump to use w/ this, if I'm using a 3/8" system?

Thanks
-Ghent
 
Erasmus354 said:
go to www.procooling.com


Basically to summarize it for you, the G4 and G5 are the two single best waterblocks you can buy bar none.
Click to expand...

Depends on what you are intending to do with them and what also you have hooked up to it.
 
Well it all depends on the price asked for it, since you can get that type of performance with the Nexxos XP, as tested by Procooling.
I don't know how much a Nexxos XP block costs in the U.S.A, but in Europe the G4 will have a hard time competing with the Nexxos XP in terms of performance/price.
 
I wouldn't be surprised to see a retail price of 80-100 USD maybe even higher. The original G4 has a price of 123$ AUD not including shipping costs. (roughly 95 USD)

Hopefully the fact that it is going into a wider retail market means that mass production makes the blocks cheaper to make, although the block still has some of if not the most complex design to manufacture for any current waterblock.
 
Erasmus354 said:
I wouldn't be surprised to see a retail price of 80-100 USD maybe even higher. The original G4 has a price of 123$ AUD not including shipping costs. (roughly 95 USD)

Hopefully the fact that it is going into a wider retail market means that mass production makes the blocks cheaper to make, although the block still has some of if not the most complex design to manufacture for any current waterblock.
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So what is the hard part or do you have some pics stashed somewhere? The XT seems pretty difficult to machine and we are seeing retail prices of $110 here in the states. If the Euro keeps tumbling we will soon see a sub $100 Cuplex XT. :D

Also we may see prices go up a bit as well with the G4 G5. Even by ramping up production you may get additional costs added in to the distribution process.
 
Of some real concern is how the manufacturing of the G4's is going to be, or if Cathar will have some supervision upon it.
Remember that when Cathar sold the LRWW to D-Tek, they changed the block and altered its performance in order to make it cheaper.
 
I'll just sit here smiling at some of the comments.

With respect to NexXxoS XP performance, it has been stated a number of times following two important points, including within the Procooling review:

1) The Storm/G4 is a higher performing block at higher flows

2) The XP is an incredibly more restrictive block. Given a particular pump, if you see a flow rate of 1gpm with the Storm/G4, you may only see a flow rate of 0.75gpm with an XP. While on a flow-per-flow basis the XP appears superficially competitive, the reality is that one cannot achieve an equal flow per flow between the two blocks.

Lower flow rates caused by the block's resistance also feeds back as lower radiator performance, and lower performance from other blocks in the system.

The NexXxoS XP is a high performing block though, no doubt about it. It is one of the better performing blocks on the market, but its design forces a low-flow mentality. If the Storm/G4 does not compete well against the XP in Europe it would be because most European setups are designed around weak pumps.

The ironic thing in that instance is that the Swiftech MCW6000 would actually outperform both the G4 and the XP in European style setups, and it's a heck of a lot cheaper than either.

In terms of hydraulic (pumping) power vs performance with respect to the Procooling testing, this graph shows the way to interpret their results.

In terms of hydraulic power, various pumps are like so:

Eheim 1046 = ~0.5W
Eheim 1048 =~ 1.0W
Eheim 1250 =~ 2.0W
Laing D4/MCP-600/AQX 50z =~ 2.5W
Laing D5 =~ 3.0W

So one would use those figures to roughly correspond a particular pump to a point on the performance vs pumping power graph linked to above. Additional blocks and/or small tubing will take up some of the pump's available pumping power to deliver to the CPU block. The XP was tested at Procooling with 1/2" ID tubing attached. Smaller tubing sizes will push the XP's power vs performance line higher (worse).
 
Cathar said:
The ironic thing in that instance is that the Swiftech MCW6000 would actually outperform both the G5 and the XP in European style setups, and it's a heck of a lot cheaper than either.
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It's just too bad the MCW6000 looks like a brownie with a pair of fittings stuck in it. Awesome block, zero "bling".
 
BTW, all questions regarding price, availability, and quality, should be answered next week.
 
Cathar - glad to see you are getting these blocks out in mass quantity and hope you reap the rewards of all your hard work. Because of you we have the great selection of blocks to choose from today.

I will buy one of your blocks (second one) just because you are behind it!

A few questions:
1. Awhile ago you referred to the fact waterblocks have hit the wall in regards to performance -vs- cost to manufacture. Is the G5 the wall or will we continue to see you pioneer new methods?
2. Will we see a GPU veriant of the G4/G5?
3. How is the waterchilling project going? I thought you had talked about one on Overclocks.au
 
R1ckCa1n said:
A few questions:
1. Awhile ago you referred to the fact waterblocks have hit the wall in regards to performance -vs- cost to manufacture. Is the G5 the wall or will we continue to see you pioneer new methods?
Click to expand...

A little more to go, but getting pretty tight IMO. The reason why I point out the performance vs power perspective above is because that's how I view waterblock designs, and is the primary thought in my head whenever I'm designing a block.

We only have a limited amount of pumping power to play with, and it is also why I created the viable pumping power exploration threads over at Procooling, in order to explore the limits and put an upper bound on what is a viable pump, how much power it provides, and how much heat it dumps, and how much influence that has on a system.

IMO, the "ideal" all-round centrifugal water-cooling pump that is realistic in that it could be built today if a pump maker decided to do it, has about 20' of pressure head (6-7mH2O), about 3.5gpm or 13.5LPM of peak flow, is providing about 3.5-4mH2O of pressure at 2gpm flow, and internally is designed much like an Iwaki or an MCP600. It'd draw about 20W of power, and dump about 15W or so of heat into the loop. Such a pump would service "high flow" and "low flow" designs equally well to about as good as either approach can possibly work, and such a pump is optimised to work well with 1x to 4x 12cm fanned radiators.

Back to block designs though which hinge on what the pump is doing. Designs are starting to hit a wall based on available pumping power. There's only so many ways one can manipulate the water flow to best strip away the boundary layer and move heat into the water.

I still have one idea left that I'm presently working on that may or may not bear fruit. It's not what is coming next week though. Probably about a year away for that one if it even works.

Still some more work to go on improving the Storm design too. Can make it a touch better and that's my more immediate work plan, but this is not going to affect the Storm/G4's design. We're talking above G5 levels.

2. Will we see a GPU veriant of the G4/G5?
Click to expand...

No. I have a different design for GPU's/TEC's which is almost paper complete and will go into prototyping soon.

3. How is the waterchilling project going? I thought you had talked about one on Overclocks.au
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The water-chilling design is linked to the GPU design, and will be entering revised prototyping in the coming 2 months.
 
Well I dont want to steal procoolings bandwidth TN, but here is a link to the G5 review : linky

Look at the picture of all the little pins. Those are used for the impingement style, they are very close together and I believe (cathar correct me if I am wrong) are what makes it so hard to produce in quantity at a low price. As you can see in the review, Cathar stated that the manufacturing time required for each G5 made the cost of the silver a secondary concern. The G5 is basically (once again Cathar correct me if I am wrong) a more complex G4 with more of the "jets" spaced closer together.

The XT is basically a hunk of metal with a design cut into the middle, the Storm blocks are a completely different beast.


Back on topic : I cant wait to see these in retail Cathar, two days ago I was looking at Little Rivers web page because I was considering getting a G4 for my new computer build this summer. Hopefully this development means that I will be able to get one when I want one and wont have to wait on a long waiting list. (Still havent decided if I will watercool this computer or not, haven't even decided on my parts besides case and memory lol)
 
Erasmus354 said:
Well I dont want to steal procoolings bandwidth TN, but here is a link to the G5 review : linky

Look at the picture of all the little pins. Those are used for the impingement style, they are very close together and I believe (cathar correct me if I am wrong) are what makes it so hard to produce in quantity at a low price. As you can see in the review, Cathar stated that the manufacturing time required for each G5 made the cost of the silver a secondary concern. The G5 is basically (once again Cathar correct me if I am wrong) a more complex G4 with more of the "jets" spaced closer together.

The XT is basically a hunk of metal with a design cut into the middle, the Storm blocks are a completely different beast.
Click to expand...

How could you steal ProCooling's bandwidth by posting a link? Am I seeing a pin that sticks up into the nozzle plate hole?
 
Top Nurse said:
How could you steal ProCooling's bandwidth by posting a link? Am I seeing a pin that sticks up into the nozzle plate hole?
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Yes you are. The block is a three piece design which has "jets" thrusting water into the lower plate that has cups to help remove heat. This is an enginous design that not even the king of copy cats, Danger Den, has been able to reproduce. AC is very close with the XT block, but has a completely different bottom base.
 
R1ckCa1n said:
Yes you are. The block is a three piece design which has "jets" thrusting water into the lower plate that has cups to help remove heat. This is an enginous design that not even the king of copy cats, Danger Den, has been able to reproduce. AC is very close with the XT block, but has a completely different bottom base.
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Since when did DD become the king of copy cats?

And TN, I posted the link because I did not want to steal their bandwidth and link directly to the picture in question.

Edit : post 1024 ;)
 
Here's some nice pictures below of a G5 opened up.

One of the "problems" with trying to photograph a Storm G4/G5 is that there are actually structures that you can't see clearly within the structures that you can see. I'm not about to demystify its design though.

84b.jpg


291.jpg


952.jpg


ffa.jpg
 
ME WANT!


mmmm perrrty silver....my precioussssss


On Topic : Nice pictures Cathar, and you should just get a patent for the design and then "demystify" it to all of us! I would love to hear the subtleties of the design in the Storm Waterblocks. Also, I have always wondered what ever happened to storm g1/g2/g3 (or did you consider whitewater and cascade to be the earlier gXes)
 
Erasmus354 said:
Also, I have always wondered what ever happened to storm g1/g2/g3 (or did you consider whitewater and cascade to be the earlier gXes)
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G1 worked and I have one here. 3 years ago it would've been a top-performing design, but today it pretty much sits as something that would take mid-place between a DTek TC-4 and a White Water. Incredibly easy to make/machine though. In mass they could be pumped out for $15-20US/block retail price.

G2 is about a White Water performance equivalent. About the same cost to make though so no real point in doing it.

G3 is about Cascade level performance. Been done before.
 
hey cathar i got a cascade here and am just selling to go to a g4 that i bought off ocau forums...is it worth the change? wots the increase in performance?
 
R1ckCa1n said:
Does the G4/G5 now come only in a two barb design?
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All Storm design blocks have always been two-barbs, even the very earliest prototypes.

So were the Cascade blocks for that matter. There were a handful of 3-barbed Cascade blocks made to satisfy individual requests though, but these represented about 3% of all Cascade blocks made.

Only the White Water blocks that I stopped making myself about 2.5 years ago had the 3 barbs on them.
 
LoBeS OCAU said:
hey cathar i got a cascade here and am just selling to go to a g4 that i bought off ocau forums...is it worth the change? wots the increase in performance?
Click to expand...

Smallish gain from a Cascade, but the Storm design can allow for higher overclocks, but that's dependent upon the characteristics of each CPU and just what it is that's holding your overclock back. The Storm block is compatible with Socket 775 (new Intel CPU's) whereas the Cascade is not. Storm block is better at dealing with IHS capped CPU's than the Cascade is too.
 
Top Nurse said:
Are those tubes milled and bored or EDM'd?
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Well it's cut from Delrin/Acetal, so not EDM'd, which is a metal process.

They're all done on a CNC mill.
 
Cathar,

Many users in the States have adopted 10mm barbs with blocks like the Aquacomputer and other European manufacturers.
The point is, that they can also do it with the Nexxos and get a lot of performance benefits for the same money. Hence the G4 price factor.
Of course the Nexxos XP is more restrictive, needs a stronger pump, but anyone willing to commit to such endeavour will have to know that.
Even Alphacool uses a stronger pump with their kits (700/lph), so nothing new here.

As for pumping power and the impact on performance, you can see that with a more restrictive setup, the 1A-Cooling block achieves the same performance as the Swiftech MCW-6000 but with two very different flows.
fonctionnement.png

(pic. taken from the Swiftech mcw-6000 review done by Rosco from Cooling-Masters.com)

However i do agree with you that some European manufacturers are in a contradiction, when they manufacture blocks more suitable to use 3/8 fittings or at least 10/8mm and a Eheim 1048 or Laing DDC, (for example the AC Cuplex XT), but instead stick a Eheim 1046 with 6mm fittings.
 
Jag said:
Cathar,

Many users in the States have adopted 10mm barbs with blocks like the Aquacomputer and other European manufacturers.
The point is, that they can also do it with the Nexxos and get a lot of performance benefits for the same money. Hence the G4 price factor.
Of course the Nexxos XP is more restrictive, needs a stronger pump, but anyone willing to commit to such endeavour will have to know that.
Even Alphacool uses a stronger pump with their kits (700/lph), so nothing new here.
Click to expand...

Oh, I agree. If you do look at the G4's flow/performance curve, you do see its peak performance tapering off at around the 2gpm mark. 10mm ID tubing is "useful" up to around the 1.7gpm mark. The G4 block was intended to be used with 3/8" (9.6mm) ID tubing and higher and was offered with either 3/8" or 1/2" barbs attached. About 5% of users asked for either 3/8" barbs, or no barbs so that they could install compression fittings. The rest asked for 1/2".

The G5 block was designed to be used with 8mm ID tubing and higher, and if you look at its flow/performance curve you can see that it easily accommodates such tubing. I offered 8mm, 3/8" and 1/2" fittings for it. Nobody asked for 8mm, 3% asked for 3/8", and 1% asked for no barbs so as to fit their own 10/12mm compression fittings, so again about a 4-5% ratio.

I would like to think that most people who bought the G5 were rather aware of its flow/performance capabilities and knew what they were doing when matching a tubing size for it.

As for pumping power and the impact on performance, you can see that with a more restrictive setup, the 1A-Cooling block achieves the same performance as the Swiftech MCW-6000 but with two very different flows.
fonctionnement.png

(pic. taken from the Swiftech mcw-6000 review done by Rosco from Cooling-Masters.com)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the review link - I'll check it out. Indeed, flow rates will be different at the same pumping power for two different blocks. That's somewhat the whole point I was trying to make. You can't look at two flow/performance curves and say block X will outperform block Y because block X's curve is a little lower. If block X is very restrictive then its flow rates may never be high enough such that it can outperform block Y. This is what Rosco's and my graphs show by plotting power vs performance. It provides a clearer indication of what's going on independent of the (in)ability to achieve whatever flow rate one might look at on a flow/performance graph.

i.e. Rosco is just plotting the same concept that I described above and described over at Procooling about 9 months ago. I see that Rosco makes mention of Phaestus, when really it was a combined effort of myself, lolito_fr, Phaestus, Les, and input from a few other members that proposed this efficiency measure, which Phaestus adopted in his NexXxoS XP review.

It is a very useful measure of efficiency in that it presents a very good unified measure of waterblock efficiency, and I am pleased to see that it is being used in more reviews now.

However i do agree with you that some European manufacturers are in a contradiction, when they manufacture blocks more suitable to use 3/8 fittings or at least 10/8mm and a Eheim 1048 or Laing DDC, (for example the AC Cuplex XT), but instead stick a Eheim 1046 with 6mm fittings.
Click to expand...

Agreed. That is my gripe at times. Sometimes these European blocks are actually middle-range flow blocks, but are instead saddled with excessively restrictive tubing. They are coming around now though to using larger tubing sizes (8mm, 10mm), just as "US" tubing sizes are now becoming more common at 9.6mm (3/8") and 11.1mm (7/16"). One can sense a very strong convergence occurring between the modern setups of what was once two diametrically opposed design philosophies.

There is now very little to differentiate a modern "German" setup from a modern "US" setup, except for the old die-hards who insist on 6mm ID tubing. I would like to think that people on both sides of the Atlantic could realise that and know that they can quite happily share components between the two continents with minimal fear of incompatibility.
 
Cathar said:
I would like to think that people on both sides of the Atlantic could realise that and know that they can quite happily share components between the two continents with minimal fear of incompatibility.
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There's still the fear off Customs and high prices. ;)
 
mmm that looks nice...

So you will start making them in mass production?

Does Cathar have any plans for GPU blocks?
 
Nice system, but $1k + is for 2xAsus 6800Us, which we all now are now obsolete for those buying a new system. With the cost of Asus' "Xtreme Ultras", it probably wouldn't be too much more to really create the ultimate rig with 7800GTX sli. Then again, X2s are right around the corner, and this cooling system would easily be able to cool one OC'd.

All you need to know about the Hydra GPU block:
Cathar said:
2. Will we see a GPU veriant of the G4/G5?
Click to expand...
No. I have a different design for GPU's/TEC's which is almost paper complete and will go into prototyping soon.
Click to expand...
For another summary of waterblock performance vs. flow rates from ProCooling:

 
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