Nice mod but isn't there a way to include the northbridge into you water cooling loop?
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Nice mod but isn't there a way to include the northbridge into you water cooling loop?
Not easily.
Outside of the fact that it would be tough to find a block that would physically fit, I don't think the added restriction in the loop would be good.
Ha, I knew that that crappy Northbridge heatsink was gonna come back to haunt you.
You did?
Why was I not informed?
I can't say I ever experienced a problem I could pin on high chipset temps...my major objections were mostly aesthetic and theoretical.
It always seemed to me that the board's designers had taken the easy way out and I could do better.
Then again, I tend to think that about a lot of things.
I remember LP mentioning that several times.
No, wait, I don't remember any such thing. Spooky, huh?
You probably just think too much.Quote:
Originally Posted by clocker
I wonder if board clutter is Abit's reason for using heatpipe cooling on some of their new boards.
Could very well be.Quote:
Originally Posted by lynx
I was semi impressed by those solutions till I realized that they would be less than useless in a pseudo-BTX case like (both) mine are.
I had spent some time going through our pile of laptop carcases looking for a suitable setup...some actually came pretty close and I wouldn't be surprised to see a variation of the typical laptop integrated base/heatpipe/fan/radiator show up on full sized boards.
Anyway, layout should improve with the removal of IDE ports- they consume a lot of valuable real estate.
Tubing finally arrived and assembly is nearly finished.
If ever I had doubts about the value of Tygon 3603 tubing, they have been dispelled now.
It is the gold standard by which I shall judge all others in the future.
Remarkably soft, almost sticky Tygon will bend to incredible radii without kinking.
If you are considering watercooling, this stuff is highly recommended.
Pics later.
Better late than never.
Although, given my craptacular photography skills, that is debatable too.
Anyway...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/back.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/bezel.jpg
Pretty standard stuff.
On the backplane there is now a 120mm fan at the bottom, pulling air past the newly mounted pump.
The front bezel is still a work in progress..not much to say about it right now.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/loop.jpg
Here is the whole enchilada.
Many changes in the upper bay area, mostly aimed at lowering HDD temps.
The radiator is obviously the biggest change of all, I'm very curious to see how it compares to the BIX I had mounted previously.
It just struck me that even though Sprocket is watercooled, she still sports six 120mm fans.
Wonder how quiet she'll be.
More changes coming,
New motherboard (DFI LanParty SLI),which I was saving for the Lian-li but decided to try now and the waterloop is being rearranged (decided to add the BIX to the loop...practicality be damned).
I'm not sure what will happen to the Lian-li project, so far, the Venice/San Diego releases don't seem like they are a quantum leap over my Winchester and the x2's are too expensive to contemplate.
I wanted to bump the performance AND the visuals on the next build, but the current version of Sprocket seems pretty acceptable, so maybe I just sit out for a while and wait to pick up a used 6800GT vid card and play with SLI for a while.
Oh boy.
Omg... Shoulda got a SLI in the first place.
We shall see aboot that, my half Canadian buddy.
I've been sitting on this board for a few weeks, now I wish I had looked it over more thoroughly before deciding to switch.
There are many changes that must be made.
The DFI requires two more power connections be made on the board- one Molex and one floppy connector.
Naturally, my harness does not have them, so I'll have to temporarily cobble them on.
Why temporarily?
Cause I have a new PSU on the way also...all the way from Merry Olde England.
Getting this bad boy...
http://www.frozencpu.com/images/prod...es/psu-163.jpg
FrozenCPU is taking their sweet time stocking this item, so we ordered three from a retailer in Britian.
ETA is two weeks.
Getting back to the DFI...this damn thing is going to require a floppy drive to flash BIOS ( the sheer magnitude of BIOS versions available, many from Oskar Wu, the board's designer, was a big attraction to me), and I have left no easy way to mount one.
There is also a front breakout box that I was completely unaware of...again, I have no place to fit it.
As far as SLI goes...yes, the price of my XFX 6800 GT has started to fall, but the DangerDen NV-68 waterblock that I'd also need has not.
The block is an extra $125 on top of the card's price, so my entry fee into the wonderful world of bleeding edge graphics will be another $450 or so.
This will bring my total investment in video cards to nearly a grand, almost double what most of my customers complete systems are worth.
Pong had better look pretty bloody SUPERIOR to justify this outlay....
Sigh.
Back to the drawing board.
That is a beautiful PSU
Damn.
Thought I had come up with a really cool way to have two radiators in the loop.
Even went so far as to mock everything into place to confirm the tubing runs.
Would have worked great except for DFI's use of the add-on sound module in the I/O panel area.
It's height makes adding the BIX back into the system impossible without more extensive casehacking than I'm willing to undertake right now.
Double damn.
On the plus side, Sprocket's bling factor has risen exponentially.
Internally at least.
Those with elephantine memories might recall that I purchased a sheet of polished aluminum diamond plate a few months ago.
The more I thought about it, the less suitable it seemed for use in the Lian-li and the more perfect it looked in the all black Silverstone.
Much of the interior is now clad in shiny plate and the effect is quite stunning.
Somewhat humorous because it is invisible till the sidepanel is removed.
It's very much like old pocketwatches...the movements were typically highly decorated even though no one saw them except the repairman.
Sprocket's dead black exterior gives no hint of the flashdance taking place inside.
It'll just be our little secret.
Ssssshhhhhh.....
Clocker, wtf, how you gonna sit there and tell us how cool this shit is, I know you have a camera, take some pictures!
Right. I guess that's why you advertise this thread as "Hardware pr0n".Quote:
Originally Posted by clocker
That'll keep em away! :dry:
That was the idea, yes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Virtualbody1234
I didn't realize pr0n was so popular...somebody should look into maybe offering it over the Interweb, perhaps a few dollars to be made catering to the prurient desires of the masses.
Nah.
It would never catch on.
@dawg,
Pics will follow when the rest of the tubing arrives...hopefully tomorrow.
Everything else is done.
http://www.thestylemachine.com/smileys/galletos.gif
Will this PC ever run?
To paraphrase Billy Crystal....
"It's more important to look good than to run well."
But yes, it will be up and running soon.
Fortunately, I have access to several PCs so I can try to get all the details right before Sprocket is needed again.
How's that?
At this rate, Sprocket's teeth will have worn away or dropped out.
Still, we can always call her "Gummy". :blink:
Oh ye of little faith.
Quote:
Originally Posted by clocker
Hey its a hobby ! The wifey is probably thinking thank god , as she leaves for bingo . :lol:
Hmmm.Quote:
Originally Posted by peat moss
Actually the wifey was thinking "Thank God" as she left me for a coworker.
20 years ago.
No telling what she's thinking today.
Sorry bad joke , but was it at least a female coworker ? :naughty:
No, but he was rich.
I'll bet that Sprocket could kick his PC's ass.
Just rolled home from work BTW, and the new roll of Tygon has arrived.
I had basically butchered the first 5" piece trying to improve my original layout.
I was able to achieve several different arrangements, but in the end, my first setup was the best.
Now I can go ahead and finish up.
Pics soon.
Speaking of taking there sweet time, they still havent got the Freezer64 in yet :angry: I havent ordered the stuff for my comp yet eaither, Dont even know if im still gonna get it, cuz my uncles in a jam now with the home reservations and stuff... :angry: :frusty: :dry:Quote:
Originally Posted by clocker
Finish up?Quote:
Originally Posted by clocker
Highly unlikely. :P
that boards the same as mine
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/TDX.jpgQuote:
Originally Posted by Virtualbody1234
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v7...uarterview.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/loop1.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v7...ker/bezel1.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/qv2.jpg
That is a very nice psu indeed.
The plugs look a bit like the ones that bloke used on Orac 3.
What model and make is it again?
It is a Hiper 600w.
Apparently well regarded in Europe, now coming to America.
Well, it looks very, very nice. Like I said, the plugs remind me of Orac3, which is only positive in my book. I wish I had wiring like that in my box.
Can you loosen any cables you don't need on that? It looks like it.
Btw- The old Hipers had problems with the cabling, according to a review I read when I was looking for a psu for my brother, apparently it'd get hot when you put strain on the psu. (one such review)
That wastheir first rangean earlier range of psus though, and apart from that they were very good performers from what I've heard, and they have to have sorted out any child diseases by now :)
It looks like the cables are connected differently on this one, at least on the outside, if I remember the pics of the old ones correctly.
I was very tempted to get the Hiper myself, but finally decided on the Akasa PaxPower Ultra Quiet, which I believe is a rebadged SeaSonic S12. It really is virtually silent.
Clocker is right however, Hiper do seem to have a good reputation now.
Finally got Windows installed (my hardware has changed so drastically that I've had to activate over the phone lately...imagine that :P ) and got the chance to tweak my settings some.
Flashed to a newer BIOS ( they seem to come out almost weekly) and used settings from a thread at OCForums (which was quite helpful as I haven't a clue what half these options are).
Holy crap!
This board is a monster.
Within 30 minutes I had reached my previous best numbers from the Gigabyte board and I'm still running the RAM 1:1 (PC 3700 so far, @2.5,3.3.10) and 1T.
Was able to break the 32 sec. barrier in SuperPi...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v7...er/superpi.jpg
Now for 2.7GHz...
Oh, it's almost too easy...
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v7...r/superpi3.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/write.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v78/clocker/read1.jpg
Hmmm, how about WinRAR?
I like your cpu temp.
That baby is going to last forever.
So do I.Quote:
Originally Posted by SnnY
Oh yes, very much.
Sprocket will be Priming all day as I work to support her.
Temps had skyrocketed all the way up to 28C after about 1/2 hour (BTW, all temps seen are with the PC buttoned up, I'm prolly going to remove the Silverstone mesh in the front bezel to improve airflow).
I'm pretty sure that the new radiator is more than capable of handling anything I can throw at it, so now I'm thinking of rerouting the loop a bit.
The vid card is still nearly as hot as it was before (with the BIX), so maybe if I run the output from the rad to the GPU first I can drop a few more degrees.
CPU temp should rise by a bit, but I feel I can afford it, especially as my next step is to begin ratcheting down the CPU vCore.
I did try to break 2.8GHz already, but my RAM settings are going to need relaxing to make it.
I can POST just fine, but Windows loses the "ntoskrnl.dll" and won't play nice.
So far, this has been my first/only blue screen.
This board seems like it will live up to it's reputation if my beginning results are any indication.
It's also worth remembering that I am running a Winchester and thus, do not benefit from the new, improved memory controllers found in the Venice/San Diego/Toledo chips.
The Winnie is proving quite competitive against the Venice/San Diegos- I certainly see no reason to upgrade to either of them...we'll see what the x2's can bring to the table.
28 degrees :ohmy:
What kind of ambient are we talking about here, btw?
Seeing as it's summer the surrounding temps can't be much lower, can they?
That water-cooling thing is brilliant :ohtheenvy:
Do you reckon it'd be possible to add some low-powered (and thus not too noisy) refrigeration to the loop as well? just hypothetically, like, 'cos you certainly don't seem to need it.
Room ambient (measured with a somewhat suspect thermometer) is @ 24-25C.
This makes my motherboard sensors also suspect, too.
It's hard to do any comparisons with my old setup due to the number of changes I've made, but the new database is starting.
Low-powered refridgeration (such as watercooler chillers) are really not capable of doing much for a waterloop.
Maybe a degree or two at most.
Basically, not worth the added complexity/cost.
Thanks for answering that, I've been wondering why no one added refrigeration to the loops I've seen, but if it doesn't work better than that, that explains it.
Maybe the mobo sensors and the thermometer are good, which would make the heat transferring capabilities of your loop brilliant (and maybe it isn't too incredible a difference in temps anyway :blink: I dunno'), btw :unsure: Be positive :D
That would make my loop more than brilliant, it would be miraculous.Quote:
Originally Posted by SnnY
The absolute best a waterloop can ever be would be room ambient and that assumes 100% transfer between the CPU and the block, the block and the water, then the water and the radiator.
Obviously, this cannot happen.
It's moot however.
Whatever the temp really is, it's pretty bloody low. :P