Yeah I feel you pain. I never did a water setup till I had one arrive at my front door.
There is a learning curve for sure. And I can honestly say it added about an extra 3-4 hours to a build.
But the number one rule, is do not buy a kit! I think you know that already, but I can't really stress that enough. Some people have no problems with the pre-made setups. Others it's just one thing after another. I've read all kinds of horror stories too. People frying their Mobo, all the way down to water leaking into the PSU!
After you get your parts setup, you ALWAYS want to do a leak test. Some people do it overnight, I myself was satisfied after a couple of hours.
But some more things to think about.
Usually, when your cooling a GPU and CPU, there are 2 ways to go about it.
You can do it all in one loop. But generally that requires a pretty good sized RAD to handle the heat load. (triple 120 rad at least IMO)
Or you can set up 2 loops. Obviously, this way is gonna cost more up front. But you'll get much lower temps across the board with 2 loops.
Space is a big limitation though with 2 loops.
Anywho, if you wanna add me to a IM, all my contact details are in my profile.
