The X-Aqua GF4 block is a fairly straightforward design. A copper slab, which has grooves machined into it to make an elongated “monad” style “S” is topped by a beefy piece of clear plexi. Threaded Nylon elbows are set into the plexi to connect the block to 3/8 or 5/16 I.D. tubing. The plexi and copper sandwich is held together with Allen head screws and a sealant. Spring loaded nylon “push pins” are provided and go through the plexi into the existing holes on your GF4. As you can see from photos, the bottom of the block has been lapped flat and finished to about a “600 grit” finish. All in all, the workmanship of the block is first rate.

Since my GF4 could never get past 306MHz core with one of my own “ghettoblocks” providing the cooling, I was most anxious to see if the X-Aqua performed as well as it looks. Although it does not come with any instructions, installing the X-Aqua was pretty much a breeze. As long as you make sure that the fingers or spreaders on the push pins have popped free and spread out on the backside of your vid card, you shouldn’t have any problem. I installed the block – which only blocks one PCI slot below the AGP - and then let my pump run overnight to check for leaks.

The next morning showed that the X-Aqua had not shed a drop. So it was clear that it was time for a little video card torture. Since seeing what your card will do is much more fun than actual testing, I set my gpu clock to 310MHz and fired up 3Dmark. Whatever excitement involved was short lived. 3Dmark crashed harder than a college sophmore on the tail end of 3 day final exam speed binge. One of two things seemed obvious. Either my GPU hit a wall that could only be overcome by a peltier or liquid nitrogen, or the X-Aqua was no better than my own ghettoblock. Looks like time to collect some data.