Asus ROG G20 Liquid Cooling Project

[litania72]

-----------ASUS G20 LIQUID COOLING-----------is it possible?

Dear G20ers...(sounds ficking silly), I have since installing a gtx 1080ti, come to the conclusion that whatever we do, the limitation for the g20 will always be 'HEAT'.

The included internal fans are a joke and it took me 2 years to realise. For the past 6 months I have had issues with low fps when playing newer pc games; I realised that a gtx 980, the 'beast' had lost its balls....literally! When the gtc 1080 came out, I knew that months later, something bigger would come out....GTX 1080ti and since the purchase, I just got fed up with temps of around 80c for both CPU/GPU;

If you read my other thread, you realise that the power bricks will never power the gtx 1080ti..no way, and so I resorted to an extterna psu (corsair rm650x) which solved the power issue.

Now, I slowly realised 2 things: 1. nothing fits inside the case....nothing really; 2. I had to cut through teh metal case to get access to the gpu and plug it to the external psu, there is no other way, however one day I will try with flat cables.


To get backto the liquid cooling project, I wanted to get a good AIO....

CORSAIR HYDRO H45......this was the best choise at £38.....a bargain!

when it arrived I knew from principle that the connectors are no good, and asus had the nice idea to use laptop ones (!"£"$£"%£$%), so thanks to the other thread I started looking for alternatives, such as adapters....

I looked at molex to 3-pin, sata to 4-pin etc.....however I got to the right choice.....A FAN CONTROLLER....why?

there is no way I could cut and solder....I want to leave things pristine; then I knew that the external psu will give a good stable 12v + I needed full power for the pump (3-pin) and variable speed for the fan (which is a bit noisy I ahve to say); after a while I managed to find an AKASA fancontrol A91NL....I did not want to spend too much really and akasa is good (I will have to find a way to fit it inside the case);

The previous thread helped however I had to experiment as I have had to spend hours trying to find a way to fit the liquid cooling.

As said previously....

1. You need to remove the heatsinkfrom the cpu

2. wipe the cpu with alcohol prep wipes (find them on ebay); they are very good to get rid of dirt....and thermal compound.

3. luckily you do not need to use the provided backplate, the one on the mobo is more than perfect, however....

4. when you push the copper plate you will find a bit of resistance....those screws are though....but pushing a bit hard did not damage anything...at first I tohught that it needed the provided backplate, so started to unmount the mobo....and believe me it looks easy but its not...I stopped where I realised that the mobo backplate side where you get all the ports, seemed glued to the metal case....strange...so I stopped and glad I did then tried to puch those cpu screws again and this time it worked.

5. you are left with finding a way to close the case...and where does the radiator go to? this why we are here....oh...last thing. From the photos you will notice that I had not realised that the intel/amd adapter were together....silly me, however once noticed, I was stuck the the cooler orientation you see, you can turn it the way you want it...

have a look at the photos....sorry at present all are uploaded at once as obviously I could not use the g20 while doing all this....

is it worth it? well , after 4 hours on 30% load I get temps of max 35c....max 40c; before it was on constant 60c+...benchmark (cpu) gave max 55c....this is at 100% load with stress test.....still early days...

[chevy350]

My step-son's friend has one of the G20's and asked me what I could do to speed it up. So after a quick google to figure out how to open it up I told him better ram and maybe a video card. So off to the local comp store they went, came back with some Geil DDR4 ram and a asus strix B350 (Ryzen board) and asked if I could put them in for him after he opened everything up to show me what he got lol.

I had to break it to him that none of those would work and about all I could do was add a older AIO I had sitting possibly. Now that I see that it can be done I will let him check out the images and see if that's a route he wants to go.....or just pick up the rest of the parts to use what he already bought.

Looks pretty cool and hope it works like you wanted it too :cool:

[Kenan83]

hello its a very nice work what you did there i got a ROG G20CI with 1070 gtx but gpu and cpu are at over 80 celius and the computer is very loud i got over 4000 rpm from the fan is that normal or will someday the computer blow xDDD and i can not open it he gots 2 years guarantee

[litania72]

Kenan83 wrote:
hello its a very nice work what you did there i got a ROG G20CI with 1070 gtx but gpu and cpu are at over 80 celius and the computer is very loud i got over 4000 rpm from the fan is that normal or will someday the computer blow xDDD and i can not open it he gots 2 years guarantee

Hi, I can only say that once you install one of those AIO watercoolers, your problem will be resolved....completely, as with my corsair aio I was getting max 40c...however, while I am waiting to buy the gtx 1080ti watercooled hybrid, I thought to replace the thermal paste (mine is the old g20aj i74970) and this did the trick as now I have max 55c when on load (not too much).

About your warranty, unfortuantely, I am sure that in 2 yrs your precious g20 will be ready to retire....I opened mine just a few days later, I remember it had a sticker at the bottom which I carefully detached with the use of steam...;-)

Remember that if you want to keep the rog g20 and add AIO watercoolers, you need to mod the case and mine has now a big hole I cut at the bottom...

[litania72]

chevy350 wrote:
My step-son's friend has one of the G20's and asked me what I could do to speed it up. So after a quick google to figure out how to open it up I told him better ram and maybe a video card. So off to the local comp store they went, came back with some Geil DDR4 ram and a asus strix B350 (Ryzen board) and asked if I could put them in for him after he opened everything up to show me what he got lol.

I had to break it to him that none of those would work and about all I could do was add a older AIO I had sitting possibly. Now that I see that it can be done I will let him check out the images and see if that's a route he wants to go.....or just pick up the rest of the parts to use what he already bought.

Looks pretty cool and hope it works like you wanted it too :cool:

Kids eh....the mobo cannot be replaced really, I am happy with 16gb ram, then you really need a SSD drive (better if you have a m.2 one, mine doesn't as it's a g20aj). I hope that his cpu is a I7...

go on with the AIO, but remember you need to cut a hole on the case (i did it at the bottom and it worked nice).

Good luck.

[Kenan83]

yeah but if i buy somethig and it was 1900 euro i am awaiting that i dont need to buy a extra cooling system this is just ridiculous i think asus is making it this intent they build so that you must buy extra something or its borken after 1 or 2 years cause its to loud and to hot i am playing games from 2008 and he is crying like a b...
and the support is **** i asked so much many times for help very freindly no one cars so never buy a RoG its the Choice of Losers if you wanna see what i wirtte here the link i think you wirttet there something too i try to sell this **** to someone better get a alienware. this is a big joke and ridiculous what they are building i think they dont now anything about computers and this is like a laptop when it gets hot so loud like my dads old car

https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?93695-Celcius-high-on-ASUS-ROG-G20CI&p=653884#post653884

[chilinmichael]

Just my 2 cents here but, all these postings with adding liquid cooling and temps when you add a different vid card, etc...this PC wasn't built to be modified, and I work in IT. It was built for people who wants a completely compact footprint with the sum of the components being worth slightly less than you pay (go price out a likewise Alienware, etc).

If you are looking to modify or upgrade, you've bought the wrong PC, period. You can look at mini-itx or the like if you want compact that you can play with (I did before buying this, and made my informed decision based on all the research and reviews beforehand).

That being said, the BIOS bricking and replacement motherboard failing were not cool, not to mention the horrendous service center that scratched my PC. In the end, I came out with a mint PC (after sending it back and forth for a month) with a replaced case, and extended 6 month warranty.

[litania72]

and what happened to the g31 edition 10? case is bigger and has an external gpu case if needed, more of a modular pc....anyway, i personally bough the g20 because of the look and the gtx 980 (which is now antique); i paid £1500...at the time did not seem too expensive..

this was 2 yrs ago...but there seem that even in 2017 asus has failed to add any watercooling....look at those tiny cpu fans....ridiculous. I know the idea was of a compact pc, however lets not forget the g20 is part of the ROG series....that is gaming 24hrs no issues....sure they could have improved hardware.

1900 euros at present will allow you to build a i7x + gtx1080ti both watercooled.all rgb with 64gb ddr4 and 500gb m.2 ssd...so i accept that both rog and alienware are hugely overpriced machines.... with the latter being the worse.

tech moves on really and its increasingly more expensive, however at times the claims over what they offer is exaggerated....but.....still think those who created the g20 design were spot on....though it was just about its look...sure they must have tested it with a big gpu and noticed the 90c and helicopter style fan noises....uhhh

[Kenan83]

i am just disappointed to hot to much money to loud.