Date: Friday, March 16, 2007
Author: Joe Di Figlia
Provided By: Thermaltake
Manufacturer: Thermaltake
Model: Big Water 735
Purchase: C.O.D. Shopping
Page: 3 of 4

In the provided guide for installation, Thermaltake recommends installing the system so that the pump pushes water through the water block to the radiator and finally into the reservoir. This layout is subscribed to by many of the manufacturers that produce water cooling kits. This is true of my custom water cooled rig as well.

With the size of the radiator, most people will have a problem getting this thing to fit into their cases. I am not one of those people that can sit idly next to my computer knowing that my radiator is sitting outside my chassis or jerry rigged in some manner. My Lian Li PC70 doesn't have any 120mm fans in it, they are all 80's and is where one of our previously reviewed products comes into play in great fashion, the Scythe Kama Bay. The beauty of the Kama bay is that it installs into your 5.25 inch bays and doesn't require modifying your case. I simply modified the Kama Bay by installing motherboard risers before the fan to give me enough clearance for the radiator, then mounted the fan against the radiator blowing in the same direction as the fan originally installed by Thermaltake. This configuration allows me to mount this radiator up front taking advantage of proper chassis airflow.

After the initial fiasco of modifying my Kama bay to install the Big Water 735, I am happy to say the rest of the installation is easy enough for a caveman to do (Watch out Geico). My favorite part of the review process is seeing if a product is actually worth the effort and the money.

This system is installed in the same rig I conduct all my heatsink reviews on to give continuity between reviews.

• Case: Lian Li PC-70
• Motherboard: ECS KN1-Extreme
• CPU: Athlon 64 3000
• Video Card: Albatron GFX 5750
• HDD's: A Bunch
• RAM: PQI Turbo 3200 2x512MB
• PSU: Antec TruePower 550