Zalman Reserator 2 - 2 years usage review
Monday, 21. September 2009, 23:03:36
Installation
In August 2007 I bought brand new PC. I have it in our living room, so I have decided to buy water cooling (WC) too to avoid noisy CPU and very noisy GPU (8800GTX) fans.
I have bought Zalman Reserator 2 with 8800GTX waterblock also from ZALMAN.
Installation was OK. I am "average" PC builder... I have built this PC by myself, so adding this WC to it was 4 hours work for me. I had to remove CPU and GPU passive and active cooling blocks and replace them with CPU waterblock (supplied with Reserator 2) and 8800GTX (bought separately).
See the pictures:
8800GTX fan removed and replaced by the waterblock
PC Case open with complete assembly
Mission accomplished
Initial lauch was also OK. Remaining air in the tubes was eliminated by lifting Reserator 2 above the PC. Flow indicator began to rotate and everything was so QUIET.
Usage
After 4 months of smooth operation the flow control began to beep accassionaly alerting me that the water flow stopped. Each time I had to push the RESET button on the Reserator or tilt it from side to side as described in the manual to force water to flow again - but you have to be near the PC during that time. Sometimes I let the PC turned on during the night and you can imagine how pleased I was in the morning returning to my PC with beeping Reserator for several hours already
.
This flow failings happened randomly, sometimes it was really lack of flow, but later I noticed that more and more often everything is going fine, flow was OK, indicator was rotating and SUDDENLY the Reserator STOPPED and began to beep. WTF?!?!?
See the movie:
I went through several forums and I have read many stories of this Reserator 2 where people indentified BROKEN FLOW CONTROL which STOPS the Reserator INSPITE OF THE FACT THE FLOW IS OK.
As I have mentioned these failings were random at first but few days ago it got worse and and the flow control failed to analyze real WATER flow at all and after few seconds of PC running flow control immediately began to beep. And after RESET AGAIN and AGAIN.... It was so annoying that I prepared myself for several weeks of PC outage and for calling my vendor to replace this Reserator under warranty conditions. I have ended up with adhesive tape over the RESET botton to force Reserator to RESET "automaticly" without my finger on it...
See the photo:
Reserator 2 with sticky tape
My last chance before claiming new Reserator was to replace the water inside, because I have also noticed few small blue object in the water tubes near "IN" sign of the Reserator.
I have bought new anti-corrosion liquid ZM-G200 and enough of the destilled water. When I opened the Reserator and poured out all the coolant I was very suprised to see the sediments and pieces of the agglutinated coolant inside on the walls.
See the photo:
Sediments of the coolant
So, I have tried to clean it all with destilled water and I have reassembled the Reserator agian with new coolant. But with no luck. The flow control was failing again on regular basis. So I have applied my sticky tape and played some game...
After aprox. 15 minutes of flow control failing and reseting IT STOPPED to fail and no beeping occured SINCE! Maybe the flow control was dirty and confused by sediments and replacing the coolant cleaned it after 15 minutes of forced operation with immediate RESET.
So now I am happy again looking forward next followin 6 months of operation till the collant´s sediments "damages" the flow control again...
JULY 2008 UPDATE
I had to clean the Reserator´s tubes again because sediments were blocking the coolant flow and the flow control was failing again. I will have to definitely find different coolant which does not agglutinate.
SEPTEMBER 2009 UPDATE and FINAL SOLUTION
As suggested by other users in January 2009 I have replaced ORIGINAL EXPENSIVE ZALMAN COOLAN with noname nonoriginal Alphacool AlphaCola coolant and suddenly ALL problems dissapeared and Ï have no problem since. It seams that ZM-G200 really sucks, it agglutinates and it is causing all the flow detector related problems.
In August 2007 I bought brand new PC. I have it in our living room, so I have decided to buy water cooling (WC) too to avoid noisy CPU and very noisy GPU (8800GTX) fans.
I have bought Zalman Reserator 2 with 8800GTX waterblock also from ZALMAN.
Installation was OK. I am "average" PC builder... I have built this PC by myself, so adding this WC to it was 4 hours work for me. I had to remove CPU and GPU passive and active cooling blocks and replace them with CPU waterblock (supplied with Reserator 2) and 8800GTX (bought separately).
See the pictures:
8800GTX fan removed and replaced by the waterblock
PC Case open with complete assembly
Mission accomplished
Initial lauch was also OK. Remaining air in the tubes was eliminated by lifting Reserator 2 above the PC. Flow indicator began to rotate and everything was so QUIET.
Usage
After 4 months of smooth operation the flow control began to beep accassionaly alerting me that the water flow stopped. Each time I had to push the RESET button on the Reserator or tilt it from side to side as described in the manual to force water to flow again - but you have to be near the PC during that time. Sometimes I let the PC turned on during the night and you can imagine how pleased I was in the morning returning to my PC with beeping Reserator for several hours already
. This flow failings happened randomly, sometimes it was really lack of flow, but later I noticed that more and more often everything is going fine, flow was OK, indicator was rotating and SUDDENLY the Reserator STOPPED and began to beep. WTF?!?!?
See the movie:
I went through several forums and I have read many stories of this Reserator 2 where people indentified BROKEN FLOW CONTROL which STOPS the Reserator INSPITE OF THE FACT THE FLOW IS OK.
As I have mentioned these failings were random at first but few days ago it got worse and and the flow control failed to analyze real WATER flow at all and after few seconds of PC running flow control immediately began to beep. And after RESET AGAIN and AGAIN.... It was so annoying that I prepared myself for several weeks of PC outage and for calling my vendor to replace this Reserator under warranty conditions. I have ended up with adhesive tape over the RESET botton to force Reserator to RESET "automaticly" without my finger on it...
See the photo:
Reserator 2 with sticky tape
My last chance before claiming new Reserator was to replace the water inside, because I have also noticed few small blue object in the water tubes near "IN" sign of the Reserator.
I have bought new anti-corrosion liquid ZM-G200 and enough of the destilled water. When I opened the Reserator and poured out all the coolant I was very suprised to see the sediments and pieces of the agglutinated coolant inside on the walls.
See the photo:
Sediments of the coolant
So, I have tried to clean it all with destilled water and I have reassembled the Reserator agian with new coolant. But with no luck. The flow control was failing again on regular basis. So I have applied my sticky tape and played some game...
After aprox. 15 minutes of flow control failing and reseting IT STOPPED to fail and no beeping occured SINCE! Maybe the flow control was dirty and confused by sediments and replacing the coolant cleaned it after 15 minutes of forced operation with immediate RESET.
So now I am happy again looking forward next followin 6 months of operation till the collant´s sediments "damages" the flow control again...
JULY 2008 UPDATE
I had to clean the Reserator´s tubes again because sediments were blocking the coolant flow and the flow control was failing again. I will have to definitely find different coolant which does not agglutinate.
SEPTEMBER 2009 UPDATE and FINAL SOLUTION
As suggested by other users in January 2009 I have replaced ORIGINAL EXPENSIVE ZALMAN COOLAN with noname nonoriginal Alphacool AlphaCola coolant and suddenly ALL problems dissapeared and Ï have no problem since. It seams that ZM-G200 really sucks, it agglutinates and it is causing all the flow detector related problems.
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