Water cooling

[Mr Whippy]

_dobbo_ said:

Any particular reason you are looking at 2 rads? It over complicates things where one larger rad would be simpler.

Can't really think where I could mount two. Surely you just pipe them in-out-in-out, with one taking a battering and then the next cooling it further? Also two small ones fit nicely over the rear port (to atmosphere) and the top port (to atmosphere) on the case I'm looking at (CM Stacker 830).

I guess a double one would do, but where to put it?

Do these rads mount on the standard fan mounts for 120mm fans? Ie, the CM830 case has a quad 120mm fan frame on the inside of the door, could I fit my 120x240mm rad straight onto that frame then the fans onto that?

Dave

[_dobbo_]

I think the rads are 120mm - mine's a triple and is exactly the same size as 3 120mm fans.

Packaging wise, I guess it depends on where your PC is going to be. Mine sits on the floor (less noise that way) and so I couldn't give a crap what it looks like, thus the radiator is just stuck on top of the case.

If you want it to look good then providing you had space could mount the rads internally and it would look much neater.

[tommundy]

Mr Whippy said:

Ah so your rad there is over the rear exit of the case with a 120mm fan, do they mount properly, as in the rads are tapped as if they were a fan for fitting, so a rad goes wherever a 120mm fan would? Would make sense but I don't actually know if thats right

Yeah, they mount straight onto 120mm spacings for fans, then the fans mount on the rads.

Mr Whippy said:

Looks pretty mental in there , are leaks ever an issue?

Quite mental, yeah, but cool to look at never the less. I dont have any experience with other connector types but mine are all 'push fit' 10mm with 'G1/4' connections. I had a few drips a month ago but this was a simple case of pushing the connectors in a bit more, or when I got my new pump, cut the ends off. Then its just a case of dipping in some boiling water for 10 seconds and re attaching them. As I said in my first post I moved my computer by car 40 miles and some of the roads werent the best but I didnt get any leaks and havent had any in the 2 weeks since then.

My 2 radiators sit half way around my loop, which I think is the most logical route rather than having them in serial next to each other. So mine goes Pump>CPU>RAD1>GFX1>GFX2>RAD2>Flow meter etc.>Reservoir>Pump.

My first rad is on the rear 120mm mountings and the other in a 5.25" bay.

Good luck on whatever you choose, I've been more than happy with my first 'dip' into watercooling.

Cheers
Tom

[Mr Whippy]

tommundy said:

Yeah, they mount straight onto 120mm spacings for fans, then the fans mount on the rads.

And other stuff

Ah cool, the CM 830 seems like a good bet for a two rad system then, one on the back, one on the roof...

I'll probably only have two blocks though, CPU and GFX. Now I'm wondering what the most efficient circuit would be

Tempted to cool after each block, seems logical, and then just have a reservoir with some passive cooling fins in the front of the case behind the main 120mm's...

Dave

[tommundy]

Mr Whippy said:

tommundy said:

Yeah, they mount straight onto 120mm spacings for fans, then the fans mount on the rads.

And other stuff

Ah cool, the CM 830 seems like a good bet for a two rad system then, one on the back, one on the roof...

I'll probably only have two blocks though, CPU and GFX. Now I'm wondering what the most efficient circuit would be

Tempted to cool after each block, seems logical, and then just have a reservoir with some passive cooling fins in the front of the case behind the main 120mm's...

Dave

If you put one of the rads on the roof (do you mean ceiling of the case?) then make sure when you're bleeding the air out of the system, that the reservoir is higher, rule of thumb is that it should be the highest point anyway, but once you've got all the air out its not so strict.

As for the loop you could go Pump>GFX>RAD1>CPU>RAD2>RES>Pump?

Cheers
Tom

[Plotloss]

Oh, I thought he meant roof.

I've been thinking for the last few days.

Old mini radiator, central heating pump, load of tube, I could silence my rack.

[Mr Whippy]

Hahaha, roof, ceiling, same thing, just two different sides of the same plane

So yes, I mean case ceiling. The Stacker 830 has a single 120mm vent hole on it's ceiling (top of case) and the usual 120mm back port, so perfect places for two discrete and to atmosphere fans/rad combo's...

There are the doors, which can hold 4x120mm fans, but I'm not sure they can take the weight of rads too... hmmmm...

Or in the front, but they suck. I guess if I set the fans to blow then warm air exited the front of the case... but the back and top seem to be a logical route since the fronts suck as standard and hot air rises etc...

Dave

[tommundy]

With the aid of mspaint, something along the lines of:



Cheers
Tom

[wolves_wanderer]

SS HSV said:

Right guys, here's some James Bond technology for you



It's called a Titan Amanda and it's a real hybrid cooler. 'It uses the Pletier Heat Effect Transducer Technology' and it pumps heat from one side of the chip to the other (cpu to heatsink). It keeps X6700 Quad-core CPU's clocked at 3.2 Ghz to around 25 degrees c and I totally rate them. I have fitted about 20 of them now with no problems. I build high end and usually use Promethia or Vapo's phase-change cooling but these are the daddy's of cooling without going to the extreme of water of phase-change.

It does have some negatives but here's the good and bad - you decide..

Pro's
1) Cools to around 25 degrees on virtually anything
2) Very quiet - yes it has two 80mm fans which push and pull, but they are quiet.
3) Cost £65 compared with £100 plus for water cooling.

Con's
1) It's big! About 6"x3"x3" - needs a decent case (you should have a largish one if you want proper cooling)
2) It needs a PCI slot for the controller card.
3) Draws power from PCI slot AND four pin Molex connector - add 50watts total to your PSU requirements.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prod...

Water cooling is very good don't get me wrong but its messy with a lot of pipe-work and it clutters up your case. Please note that I am an extreme cooler kinda guy, and I do rate water-cooling highly, but this is a new product and I am very impressed with it.

Here's an explanaion of the technology behind it http://www.digit-life.com/articles/peltiercoolers/ we were using these for overclocking 15 years ago but they were really expensive then! If want to go extreme, then you can hybrid water cooling with peltier heat-blocks to get the best of both worlds.

Sorry for the necropost.

I just got one of these for my new build and am absolutely amazed with it. I have a Q6600 overclocked to 3.2GHz and it idles at 25-27 and under load (4x prime95 for a few hours) it peaks at 64-67. Incredible bit of kit.

[Mr Whippy]

Well, I've just started buying bits too.

Going air cooled just to save money for now as I want to save some money for some other things too...

Spec is

Coolermaster 830 black case
Asus P5KC mobo
Intel C2D 6750 processor
Big Zalman copper heatsink fan thing (120mm and chilly)
8800GTS 640mb gfx
2GB OCZ fast ram stuff
74gig Raptor
320gig normal hdd
DVD writer thing
Nice Hiper modular PSU 680W thing

Has come to about £950, but am selling my old bits for ~ £150 ish, so £800.

Hoping to get some overclockability from it, but not essential. Just looking forward to all the new games like Crysis, and playing some older ones like TDU and Stalker with all the DX9/10 gubbins turned on!

Dave

[cyberface]

Seem to be three reasons for water cooling.

1. Ultimate overclock performance, noise be damned, using phase-change refrigeration as well as normal water radiators - i.e. ultimate gamer's machine

2. Bling my rig. I guess the PC equivalent of Max Power

3. Maximum noise reduction whilst being able to contain large spikes in power consumption

My main box is of type 3. It's the swansong of the Apple G5 PPC chips - a dual-dualcore quad system, but the CPUs were originally IBM server-class high-workload chips with a very hot vector processing engine bolted on. You could go from idling the CPUs to spiking a very high temperature in one specific location on the die by hammering the Altivec engine. To enable the Quads to run consistent temperatures and really quiet (Steve Jobs *hates* noisy jet-engine fanned computers) they went water-cooled, and it's the neatest, tidiest and best-engineered solution I've seen.

I hear the PC enthusiasts saying 'first to water loses' and I know there are alternative low-noise cooling solutions from the likes of Zalman, etc. - but if you've got a workstation under your desk all day, it's nice for it to be quiet, or at least a consistent hum. Randomly varying noise under load is really distracting to many people - and some of the high-performance graphics cards with adaptive fans are *really* evil for this wide range of noise.

If Apple sold OS X for generic build-your-own PCs and I was going to build myself a monster rig, I'd copy their case design straight away - all metal, with the entire front and rear perforated with large diameter fans to move lots of air with minimum noise. With modern CPUs (and assuming I'm not a hardcore gamer, which if I'm running OS X I'm unlikely to be ) it may be possible to use a large capacity case, a load of those big copper Zalman passive heatsinks, and an Apple-type case with large diameter fans and constant throughput of air for consistent low noise.

The trouble is that as CPU process tech improves, the transistor size decreases and the potential for hotspots in various locations on the CPU itself increases, passive cooling may not respond fast enough to prevent local overheating...

[Zod]

I've just moved to watercooling my games PC because it was simply too hot with air cooling. It is a Q6600 system with dual 8800GTXs. The graphics card were running in the 80s C and watercooling has got them down to the 60s.

[Mr Whippy]

Twin 8800GTX's!!!

I'd think they'd be noisy at full whack to warrant water cooling, and if you can afford £600+ in gfx cards (roughly) then water cooling is a small extra price to pay

I may still add it (water cooling) to my PC, the main worry was the gfx card as the rest is all 120mm fans where possible...

Main thing I'd want to do is make sure it was tidy and reliable. I don't want external tanks or pipes all over the shop, just something discrete and efficient

Have any pics of the setup Zod?

Dave

[chris watton]

Mr Whippy said:

Twin 8800GTX's!!!

I'd think they'd be noisy at full whack to warrant water cooling, and if you can afford £600+ in gfx cards (roughly) then water cooling is a small extra price to pay

I may still add it (water cooling) to my PC, the main worry was the gfx card as the rest is all 120mm fans where possible...

Main thing I'd want to do is make sure it was tidy and reliable. I don't want external tanks or pipes all over the shop, just something discrete and efficient

Have any pics of the setup Zod?

Dave

I have some great very silent fans in my PC, but the fan on the 8800GTX is the only noise I can hear from the PC, but, as it only goes full pelt when playing games, the noise is completely drowned out by the speakers anyway..

[Mr Whippy]

chris watton said:

Mr Whippy said:

Twin 8800GTX's!!!

I'd think they'd be noisy at full whack to warrant water cooling, and if you can afford £600+ in gfx cards (roughly) then water cooling is a small extra price to pay

I may still add it (water cooling) to my PC, the main worry was the gfx card as the rest is all 120mm fans where possible...

Main thing I'd want to do is make sure it was tidy and reliable. I don't want external tanks or pipes all over the shop, just something discrete and efficient

Have any pics of the setup Zod?

Dave

I have some great very silent fans in my PC, but the fan on the 8800GTX is the only noise I can hear from the PC, but, as it only goes full pelt when playing games, the noise is completely drowned out by the speakers anyway..

Yeah that was what made me think air cooling was ok for now. The gfx only get a workout when I've got speakers or headphones on anyway, and even then it's not silly loud.
The rest of the time it should be pretty silent. I'll see anyway, can always go water for the GFX/CPU with a small rad and a 120mm fan... but then the issue is pump noise

Dave

[Mr Whippy]

PS, anyone have any advice on a good mobo. Read a few issues on the Asus P5KC so not too keen on it now. Happy to pay more or go for a different brand etc, mobo imho is pretty important as I've had some real dogs before.

Just had the case and PSU delivered, off to buy the other bits at the weekend

Dave

[Zod]

Mr Whippy said:

Twin 8800GTX's!!!

I'd think they'd be noisy at full whack to warrant water cooling, and if you can afford £600+ in gfx cards (roughly) then water cooling is a small extra price to pay

I may still add it (water cooling) to my PC, the main worry was the gfx card as the rest is all 120mm fans where possible...

Main thing I'd want to do is make sure it was tidy and reliable. I don't want external tanks or pipes all over the shop, just something discrete and efficient

Have any pics of the setup Zod?

Dave

I'll take some later if I have time this evening.

The 8800s weren't noisy, just hot. I'm thinking of a second radiator at the moment because the water in my loop is in the 60s C.

[Mr Whippy]

Will have to keep an eye on the temps then.

I've only got the funds for one GTS, my friend was suggesting a GTX because it's not THAT much more for 30-40% gain... will the GTS be a fair bit cooler?

May still buy a GTX when I'm actually coming to the point of buying, look really impressive!

PS, what screen are you running? My 21" LCD is native 1600x1200 and apparently the FPS should be fine. Are you running a 24" screen for that much punch, or just went overkill for the sheer fun/max all settings and enjoy factor?

Dave

[[k]arl]

A few of you may remember that I posted some pics of my old watercooled PC, as well as a pile of bits that I was putting together into a new rig at the time. Well, its now finished so I though I would post some more geek porn.

[edit to add - just realised I deleted the pics of my old machine from my webspace. Sorry ]

This is the outside view of my new machine, built around the Silverstone TJ-07 case:


Here is a shot of the innards.


The spec is:

• EVGA 680i Rev D motherboard
• Intel Core 2 Quad QX6700
• 4Gb OCZ PC-8500 RAM
• dual BFG GeForce 8800GTX OC-WC in SLI
• dual WD Raptor 150Gb HDDs, 74Gb Raptor & 500Gb WD Caviar SE
• dual Samsung dual-layer DVD writers
• SoundBlaster X-Fi
• Dell 24" & 21" monitors
• Windows Vista Ultimate x64

The cooling loop is powered by two modified Laing pumps (bottom left, next to the HDD cages); they are hooked up to a combination of DangerDen and Swiftech waterblocks for the CPU, NB and SB chipsets, and the graphics cards. The coolant is distilled battery top-up water, which is chilled...



...by a heat exchanger in my garage, located directly underneath my study. The unit is an AquaMedic Titan 1500 water chiller, connected to the desktop by standard half-inch tubing passing up through the garage roof & study floorboards. You simply set the temperature you want the water to be maintained at, and let the unit do its thing automatically. You can "set & forget" any temperature between 4 and 30 degC - it's currently set at 25, and under full system load, the highest temperature I see for any of the waterblocks, including the QX6700 and the 8800GTX's is 28.

The machine is still pretty new and being 'run in' at the moment whilst I sort out some software compatibility problems, so I'm not overclocking yet. However, I'm hoping to see some good numbers when the time comes.

[k]

Edited by [k]arl on Wednesday 8th August 21:01

[cyberface]

Bloody hell, I admire your dedication, that is truly extreme.

I hope you have a big fat UPS for that beastie, it must draw some serious power at full tilt and it's not exactly portable with the heat exchanger in the garage!!!! We had 3 power cuts in one week a couple of months ago, and it killed the PSU on my Cube...

I'd love to know how fast that thing really is at scientific computation (unless it's not intended for that purpose) - I'd hope that it was orders of magnitude faster than my old Mac rig.

Where things are a real problem in the PPC Mac world are graphics cards - I've got two large screens but cards with the horsepower to run them well just don't exist. The PC world has the selection, but again the 'fastest' card is constantly being replaced... I'd hope you could keep your water-cool setup for the graphics cards and just swap out old GPUs for new - is this true? Or do you have to build a new system every time you upgrade?

FWIW - any PC folks considering water cooling because their systems get a 'bit hot' should consider the first revision of Power Mac G5 dual 2.5 GHz machines, with the IBM cores and (allegedly) hacked together northbridge... under load, my core temps were averaging 75-85 ˚C and the northbridge would run at around 100-105 ˚C. No, not kidding. Above 100 ˚C. It never failed, so absolute temperature is not the issue (though my G5 was out of spec, I'll admit) but rated temperature is. The Core 2 Duo parts used in Mac laptops are rated to 85 ˚C and this is where they max at under load in the laptops.

I presume that in the PC world you can just accept an 85 ˚C max rated temp, cool it so it never goes above 30 ˚C and then overclock until it hits 85 ˚C max under load?



At least you've gone for a subtle, reasonably tasteful case. It'd be a shame to see such extremes parodied with neon lights and LED-lit fans