Well after a 2 year hiatus from watercooling, I have come into an i7 980x that I don't even want to install until I get some decent watercooling pieces for it.

Last time I was watercooling was when the Athlong 64 Dual-Cores were the king of the hill in performance...haha...

Anyways, I'll only be cooling my CPU for now with water (although that might change down the road)

After some research I came up with a list of possible components:
1) Laing DDC w/ EK V2 top and X-100 Res
2) HWLabs GTX 260 Rad or XSPC360 Rad (Anyone have a preference?)
3) EK Supreme HF or KL360 (Which of these I choose will depend on how someone answers my questions below)

Questions:
1) I read on here that some people don't like bayreses because they are hard to fill/bleed. I really think a bay res would be much easier to install that the DDC with EK top, but can anyone tell me how easy it was for them to mount the DDC pump/EK res in their case? I modded the hell out of the last WC setup I did, trying to stay away from that this time (also because I'm inpatient.

2) I've also read that the EK HF block cannot use compression fittings. What are most people using instead? I assume regular barbs, and if they are, what size barbs are you using? I wanted to use 1/2" ID 3/4" OS tubing, but I'd like some feedback on what would go well with the above components. I like the slightly better performance of the EK block, but I think I'd like compression fittings all around (any confirmation that the KL360 can use these?)

3) Who can point me to some good fans? I'll be putting the rad in top of my ACTS 840 so I'll be replacing some rather large fans that are up there now. Not overly concerned about noise, but I want the best performance with a noise level at or below my current fans in the system.