Jim's Going Watercooled! ;)
Ok Ladies & Germs,
I've got fed up of the racket from my machines & as the are in the lounge & I usually have at least one on permanently I've decided its time to go water cooled for one of them. With careful component selection I'm aiming to get the pc as close to silent as possible whilst keeping the cost reasonable.
So far these are the purchases I've made (yet to arrive though
)
Case = Aopen HX08 with 2x120mm blow holes on top (2nd hand)
CPU water block = Swiftech MCW 462B
VGA water block = DangerDen Radeon block (2nd hand)
Chipset water block = DangerDen Z Chip (2nd hand)
Still required are:
Shed load 120mm fans
Fan rheobus to control their speed (for speed read noise)
Reseviour of some description
Eheim 1250 pump
Basically I'm gonna be taking this build very slowly so I dont expect to have it finished for at least a month or two. I've never build a watercooled rig before and I've never modded a case before and I plan to mod this case further by adding 2 x 120mm at the front.
Let me know your thoughts & any suggestions, tips help etc would be most welcome. Hopefully I'll have some piccies to post soon.
Regards
Jim
I've got fed up of the racket from my machines & as the are in the lounge & I usually have at least one on permanently I've decided its time to go water cooled for one of them. With careful component selection I'm aiming to get the pc as close to silent as possible whilst keeping the cost reasonable.
So far these are the purchases I've made (yet to arrive though
)Case = Aopen HX08 with 2x120mm blow holes on top (2nd hand)
CPU water block = Swiftech MCW 462B
VGA water block = DangerDen Radeon block (2nd hand)
Chipset water block = DangerDen Z Chip (2nd hand)
Still required are:
Shed load 120mm fans
Fan rheobus to control their speed (for speed read noise)
Reseviour of some description
Eheim 1250 pump
Basically I'm gonna be taking this build very slowly so I dont expect to have it finished for at least a month or two. I've never build a watercooled rig before and I've never modded a case before and I plan to mod this case further by adding 2 x 120mm at the front.
Let me know your thoughts & any suggestions, tips help etc would be most welcome. Hopefully I'll have some piccies to post soon.
Regards
Jim
0
Comments
You seem to have forgotten the most mportant thing of all (or i am blind), and that is a radiator. Without it, the water can never get cooled down below the temperature (few degrees maybe) of the cpu-block and that would get very hot.
Ditch the reobus, mod the fans to run at 7 volt instead. Also, no reservoir is needed either nor will it get the temps down.
Get some good tubing, pref. Tygon of the right size. I can´t tell enough how important it is with good tubing so dont be cheap on that.
Apart from that, killer stuff!
Just ask away if there is anything, i have done this several times before.
Erm yeah I forgot to post that I'm still undecided about what rad to use. I can't afford a black ice so it'll probably be a heater core about the right size if I can find a suitable one from the local car breakers yard. As I said doing this on a tight budget, or is that i'm just tight!
When I finally build my watercooling setup in February.. Il be doing the same
Black ice stuff or the other crap is overrated junk at best. Well, it does it job but for that price, you should expect a lot more.
If you find a nice heatercore from the yard with good fittings and/or if you can hard-solder, thats much better. Remember though, the bigger the surface of the radiator and the longer the water can stay in the radiator, the cooler the water will get.
I would preferr 2X 120mm fans next to each other instead of one on each side for 3 reasons. 1, The rad doesn´t get that "thick" which can be hard to mod into a case, 2 it actually cools better,3 you can always put 2 other 120mm fans on the otherside (which is counter blah-blah to point no 1 i know) but sometimes i´s just fun to play. Get yourself a good set of wc acessories such as "Y", "T", adapters etc. You never know when you need it.
If you go for a BIG case, i would suggest 2 loops. You would need 2 rads and 2 pumps then but it´s VERY efficient to cool the cpu itself on its own loop.
Thanks Dan but i´m still a half-noob on this. I just happen to have SOME knowledge in this. Shorty is going WC??!!!11 Holy cow, i must go to the UK as well i think.
thanx for the reply.
There is enough room to run two 120's side by side, just gotta find a core with the right dimmensions.
The mod I'm gonna do is to mount the rad at the front and install 2 120mm blowholes for the fans.
I'll stick with the rheobus coz
(a.) I dont know how to run the fans at 7v
& (b). I think the rheobus will look quite cool and will allow me to run the 80mm fans at different speed (read noise) to the 120mm fans.
but about a month back i spent the money on my new monitor so i didn't have enough money for watercooling, and put it off for a while
now i finally want to get it again, since i moved my copm up from the basement to my room, and it's so damn hot in here and here is a list of stuff i will be buying
Pump: Via Aqua 1300( already have it)
CPU water block: White Water ( about 65 dollars )
Radiator: Dtek procore (about 32 dollars )
Tubing: 10 ft of tygon (about 15 to 20 )
Others: 2 fan shrouds and 2 120mm fans.
All I can say is WOW, you got anymore picces of that beauty. I'm really after lots of ideas for modding this case but I'm a bit restricted in what I can do as its already got top blowholes.
Regards
Jim
Mack is so right about buying premium tubing. Do not buy that cheap vinyl tubing, buy either silicone or tygon tubing. As far as the pump is concerned, the Eheim 1250 is a good choice; it's the same pump I'm using.
This is the rad/shroud combo that I got from dtek:
There's a couple of pics in the modding thread. Used to be 2 HUGE articles up on overclockersclubcanada before it went under. I don't have a host I use regularly but do have maybe ~100 pics of the building of that beast.
As it sits in that pic, it's cooling cpu only and running thru both rads. I have the DD nb and gpu blocks also but both don't fit on current mobo/vid card. Have since replaced the hoses (all) they did become discoloured over time. Also blew all the dust outta the system lol if you look closely (or not even) at the rads you can see it.
Do you know of any links to external watercooling systems. I was thinking of drilling through the wall of my studio and having an external cooling area where I could house the fans/rad/etc, thus making the PC totally silent in the studio.
Silence is the key here. I'd then be able to OC it without an increase in noise.
mikim
You can always build one mate.. but one of the watercooling gurus would probably have more of a clue than I.. (im not watercooling yet) .. but that is a cool idea for the studio though! Nice
If you want to take the easy option.. you can always use the external <a href="http://www.cpucitystore.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=127," target="_new">Corsair Hydrocool</a>
<a href="http://www.hexus.net/content/reviews/review.php?dXJsX3Jldmlld19JRD01OTI=" target="_new">Review @ Hexus</a>
.. I know the WC guys will scream but it's far from a bad unit
I was thinking of building it myself, as it makes the whole experience worth the £/$.
Just thought you may have seen something similar....
Cool.
Mikim
Its a sweet rad thats for sure but I havent seen them for sale on the UK and if they are for sale I think it'll be out of my price range for the time being. Maybe a future upgrade option but at present I'm trying to do this on the cheap. One thing I wont be scrimping on though is the tubing. It'll be tygon all the way.
The cpu block arrived today but unfortunately its got 3/8 barbs on it so I'll have to get some 1/2" ones to match the rest of the system.
Jim
Here is a rad you would like:
Lol , I dont think Mik's missus would appreciate that rad zip tied to the side of the house!!
Here is a more "normal" one, holds 15X120mm fans:
Like the big'n... should keep the rig cool on hot days!
Maybe something slightly smaller would do the trick.
Saw one of the other forums, some dude had a AMD up to 3.3GHz , it looked like he had some kind of liquid nitrogen setup... bit messy too?? Not sure what was going on there?
I'm just looking to build like a second PC to hold all the rads/pumps etc.... just in another room instead. Reckon it would work, just need the inspiration&cash to do it.
Jimbo... Picked up that clear system... looks nice! Shame I can't get the ASDL working properly, was looking forward to some speedy surfing tonight!
laters
mikim
Got bored today & thought why not slap it all together & see if leaks.
It doesn't, currently writing this at 2.3ghz on a XP1700@1.8v, on a 200fsb. Temps at 48.5C, a little bit high I know but this is with just a silent 120m papst fan running. No case fans no northbridge or vid card fan. Just silence ahh......
Take the block off the cpu and check that it had good contact and put it back on again. I learned that lesson a week and a half ago. Gave me 15c better temps. Long story though.
I got all that you see here in an Aopen HX08. Yeah there air in system & the water block is on right. I sure its just the fan it shifts hardley any air.
This is just a gash build cos I was bored
Getting so new fans next week but if you got any tips on how to get the air out they'd be welcome. There's a lot of air in system but its slowly working itself out.
Jim
Pump-blocks-rad-reservoir-pump?
Dont tell me you are using pvc tubing? If you do, i dont know you any more. j/k.
Pump, Rad, blocks res, pump.
Blocks or rad after the pump doesn't really matter as long as you have a pump that's worth it's name but i have always used blocks after the pump. But it looks like the tubing is kinked from the chipset to the radeon on that picture. You can use zip-ties to avoid kinks on the tubing by fastening them on the flat side of the tubing if you know what i mean. That will put more strength on it.