Case Mod Project Thief - Monster Water Cooled Build - March 9th

[leslie]

That's not a computer case, it's a heating system for your home.

Looks good, but wow is it big. It's pretty bad when those boards look lost in there.

[stren]

Originally Posted by leslie

That's not a computer case, it's a heating system for your home.

Looks good, but wow is it big. It's pretty bad when those boards look lost in there.

Yeah I realized early on I'd have difficulty filling the space, that's partly why I ended up running 4 loops!

[stren]

Alright so more photos taking the old rig apart - we left off by removing the pci cards and the power supply:



So now let's remove the cpu block and check the tim spread:



Not the best but not awful. Now time to take the motherboard out:



Out it comes:



Which leaves a sad empty and dusty case!



Now it's time to take apart the rad setup:



Remove the steel bars:



Then the fans:



I noticed one side of the rads now had white stains on them, these were the sides on the top:



Compared side by side to the underside (bottom rad):



Anyone know what that is?

[Big Elf]

Just a guess but possibly where the paint has come off to reveal the solder holding the fins on.

[Chanc3]

First time I've been on in ages, great project log to read! Will try and visit more often!

[stren]

Originally Posted by Chanc3

First time I've been on in ages, great project log to read! Will try and visit more often!

Thanks


Thanks also for the ideas guys. Here's a close up, you can scratch it off with a fingernail:

[avolla]

Amazing work so far on this. Have you considered renting space in that thing to a homeless person?? Can't wait to see the finished product.

[stren]

Originally Posted by avolla

Amazing work so far on this. Have you considered renting space in that thing to a homeless person?? Can't wait to see the finished product.

Lol thanks

[stren]

Well I haven't done any more on it yet. Still working through the photos from the last two weeks. So here's another update...

So we left off with the antec 300 emptied out, here's another shot of it next to the TX10 now that it's empty:



I was also now left with a big stack of fans. This is without the 15 fans that have already been used in the TX10:



Now I could start rebuilding the gaming rig into the TX10:



Adding the 120 rad for the motherboard loop:



Testing that it still fits in the case:



Soon it must be time to start tidying up before I get slapped!



However first I need to get my work computer up. The free 360 is being used for the workstation motherboard/ram/gpu loop and will sit approximately here:



So now to take apart the loop that was leak testing in order to add the rad:



I changed out the 45 degree bitspower compression on the GPU as it felt like it had a slight leak in in that position, so it has a temporary barb, I also removed the pump sticker. It's much cleaner now, and who needs an overpriced dress kit



That's all for now!

[leslie]

If your significant other/roommate hasn't left yet, you owe them something big for not finding a new home for those steak knives after that.

[stren]

Originally Posted by leslie

If your significant other/roommate hasn't left yet, you owe them something big for not finding a new home for those steak knives after that.

Haha yes she's been very understanding lol



So now I have a question about sleeving, I'm getting grey, titanium grey, black and red from mdpc and wondering the best pattern to do, what do you think?

[leslie]

I like option F the most.
Lighter colors on the ends will make the cable appear smaller, as it blends with the case. The black on each side of the red frames it. If you had a black case, G would do this better.

With red sata cables, it should sort of give the illusion of similar cabling throughout the case.

[stren]

Thanks Leslie - I'll be sleeving the sata cables too Anyone else have a preference?

Here's a quick update - time to start drilling!



Adding some fill ports:



2 done:



All done:



Not as messy now:



Time to get the workstation up and running so I can get back to work (once I've cleaned up of course). I'll be using the Koolance dual bay dual D5 reservoir for now. It's a real pain to use because it doesn't bleed well, however if you add on some tube from the fill ports on the res up to the fill ports on the case you can keep the water level above the reservoir and it really helps.



Now we've freed up a 360 rad for the workstation gpu/motherboard/ram loop, we can put the loop together:



I'm using AP15's temporarily until I'm done painting the low speed yates. Also that one barb is temporary too:



The wiring is temporary too. So for loop testing, I disconnected the QDC's pulled the motherboard tray out of the case and the 360 out seperately, then I reconnected and filled the loop and left it to bleed/leak test on the counter for a few hours.

[bulldogjeff]

I keep looking at this thing and I think it's brilliant, that case is awesome.
I thought I was bad running 17 fans in my mozart TX.

[stren]

Originally Posted by bulldogjeff

I keep looking at this thing and I think it's brilliant, that case is awesome.
I thought I was bad running 17 fans in my mozart TX.

Lol thanks Hehe yeah, I used to think 5 was a lot once upon a time


Alright time for another update. Here's the loop testing for the workstation. Bear in mind this is not the final loop - it will be tidier with nicer fittings, for now I need to get my workstation up and running, I can pretty it up later.



Some of the tube is the pink tube that I had mentioned before, that will be replaced. Bleeding of the annoying koolance reservoir was made easier by the dedicated fill ports and by the QDC's. The D5's struggle to push that much air out of the system, so it was much easier to bleed the cpu section and the radiator seperately and then connect them up as a whole:



Now that it had passed leak testing it was time to take it to the office:



It was now heavy (and bulky) and I didn't trust the BP crystal links not to loosen up if I didn't take it down the step smoothly, so I found a piece of plywood in the shed to help:



First boot! Yay! It wasn't just the kitchen that was covered in parts, so was the office, it's a real mess as I still had my old workstation running while I tweaked the clocks on this one.



I temporarily put the power supply in the top chamber while I did the overclocking tweaking:



Did a quick bench to see the limit of the chip, I couldn't get past 5.22GHz on water. I tried up to 1.66V, but nothing past 1.56 really helped. 5.22 means it's a pretty average 3930K, certainly no golden chip I tried to settle for a 24/7 clock of 4.95, but I didn't like the volts, so settled down for 4.9 instead, I'll see if I can tweak the memory faster than 2133 CL9 later, here's a SS of the 5.22:



Next I installed the power supplies properly, here you can see the optional PSU support bracket for long power supplies. It's probably not necessary, but why not? It comes with some rubber tape to damp any vibrations:



Here's the first PSU installed:

[leslie]

I'm not a Doctor Who fan, but seeing it being moved through the house, all I could think of is that it looks like Dalek is chasing you.

[Reg216uk]

mmm what a monster

[dream1]

Well your case looks huge and 5.2 Ghz is nice to but what are the cpu average temp ???

[Phyonics]

I think you should go with option F for the cabling.

The case is looking really excellent but it still seems kind of overkill at the moment. I can't wait to see it finished though

[daletur328]

Epic build, F option looks like a winner.