— Stren 12/10/2013
Bay reservoir naming can be tricky because while most bay reservoirs use two bays some do not and some others are just reservoirs while others can house single or multiple pumps too. This is the XSPC Dual Bay D5 Reservoir V2, which means it takes up two 5 1/4″ bays and can mount on D5 pump. It’s also the 2nd version which means it no longer suffers from the issue that caused a recall. There are also two versions even of this exact version because one uses the standard G 1/4 threaded ports for fittings, while the more expensive version uses the hard to find higher flow G 3/8 ports. It would be prudent to avoid the G 3/8 version as the flow difference will be negligible and the support for G 3/8 fittings is so rare that it is likely you may end up buying G 1/4 adapters at some point.
We’ll be tackling the similarly named but very different “XSPC Dual D5 Dual Bay Reservoir” later. So are you confused yet? Well the pictures should help explain what this thing is:
XSPC’s boxes are either classy like this one or plain brown cardboard. Either way it has a picture on the front which helps confirm that this is indeed what you wanted. Not only is it a pretty box but the instructions are on top and the reservoir is packaged with foam and wrapped in a bag:
The pump may or may not be included depending on which version you order. If it’s included then XSPC are nice enough to attach it for you. You also get mounting screws to mount the reservoir to the bay itself. It’s worth noting that these screws screw directly into the frame of the reservoir so any pump vibrations are directly coupled into the frame of the case.
The pump/reservoir combo itself is attractive and uses XSPC’s well known style. The cast nylon is machined into the chamber for the coolant, and is sealed with a plate and o-ring at the top. An oversized non g-14 fill port is located on this plate (an adapter is sold to convert this to the more standard g 1/4 fitting), while the pump mounts to the back of the unit with a standard Laing style lockring. The Laing lock rings while somewhat ugly and large are very easy to use and secure. They are my favorite lockring when they not to be seen.
The resultant volume of water is not very large, and like all bay reservoirs much of the water is below the pump inlet making it useless for filling the loop.
The pump volute itself is almost a carbon copy of the original Laing design. The Laing design is not optimized for flow at restrictions that are commonly seen in water cooling and so it’s suspected that performance would be improved with a more “cone” style volute that is used by EK, Alphacool and Koolance on their standalone D5 tops.
Here is the Laing top by comparison:
Check the next page for performance!
