Five years ago I built my first PC after owning a prebuilt. For the time being it was as high-end as I could afford with the stereotypical red and black color mix and it got a few performance, as well as aesthetics, upgrades over the years. Now it is time for an all-new built with all the fancy things I have dreamt about for years and seen in so many custom builds. It will be a project of firsts for me. The first custom cables, the first open loop water cooling, the first case modifications, which all required a lot of research, and yet I feel like I know nothing. The title Aeratus is Latin and means "covered/decorated with brass/copper". This title of the build is especially fitting since I live near loads of ancient roman ruins. The Tubing: My decision to use copper pipe for the tubing fell early on in the planning process but brought a few restrictions with it, the most noticeable being that only 12mm and 15mm OD copper pipe is available in my country, which kind of forces me to use 12mm or import 1/2" OD pipe. The wish to use copper pipe was reinforced when LTT made their copper tubing video for the O11 Dynamic. That same video also made it clear that I wouldn't be bending the tubes but rather use angles. Another idea for the tubing I had was mimicking some distinct patterns of the case on the tubes by painting them black but masking off some parts to remain as brushed copper, creating a nice contrast. An alternative to painting the tubes and masking off the copper parts would be using a matte black vinyl wrap, but I haven't decided on that yet. The Case: Finding a fitting case took me about half a year since I wanted it to be large, open, and have tempered glass on both side panels to show off the water cooling and custom cables. For my current PC, I simply ordered some cables off cablemod, but this time I will make them myself. And in my opinion, well sleeved and placed cables shouldn't be hidden behind some sheet metal panel. Ultimately I decided on the In Win 925 for its open design, continuous metal frame, and unique layout. At this point, denying an influence by the 925 build of GGF Events would be a lie. With the 925 as the case of choice, the aforementioned pattern from the case I want to replicate on the tubes as the trapezoid cutouts of the PSU shroud. Custom Cables: In order to support local businesses and get high-quality cable supplies, I chose to go with MDPC-X sleeving, cables, etc. The difficult part is choosing the color. My current choice is a mix of Blackest-Black and Titanium-Grey Small-XTC sleeving over black 15-AWG wire. In order to spice up the build a little more and have another first, I have decided to forego the usual cable combs and use cable lacing/stitching to get tighter cable groups and bring in an accent color with some sort of copper or white string, depending on which will look better. Parts: Case - In Win 925 CPU - AMD Ryzen 9 5900X Motherboard - ROG Crosshair VIII Dark Hero GPU - ROG STRIX RTX3080 10G RAM - Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB 4x16GB 3200 CL16 black Storage - 2x Western Digital SN750 2TB, Samsung QVO 860 2TB PSU - Phanteks Revolt Pro 1000W Fans - 9x Noctua NF-F12 Chromax Black I'm still unsure about the exact water cooling parts. As you can see from the parts list, the use of RGB will be very limited and all existing RGB will be set to white, as to not distract from the copper parts.
I have made some more progress though I am still waiting on my motherboard and graphics card, which really slows down progress. Wanting to try my hands on some 3D modeling I have started using Fusion 360 to create the acrylic sheets for covering the motherboard tray and the top of the PSU shroud. I've also made the first concept of a distro plate, which will be mounted perpendicular to the front radiator. The trapezoid shapes from the PSU shroud are incorporated as well to break up the reservoir a little bit. The Ports are not in their final position, as I don't know the position of the ports of the water blocks yet. Further, I have used the Pinout template Alex has graciously provided with his latest Ensis video to create the Pinout for the PSU I'm using. As far as I know, this Pinout should be applicable to all Seasonic, Asus, and Phanteks power supplies. There is some progress on the water cooling front as well. I have decided to use two EK-CoolStream PE 360 radiators, EK Torque Fittings in black with the newly released angled adapters, and an AquaComputer D5 Next pump. The Fans will be connected to an AquaComputer Quadro. I had originally planned to use the AquaComputer radical copper radiators but those are a bit too thick for the case. Now I mostly need to wait for the remaining parts to arrive. Until then I can at least start with a few smaller things, like the acrylic cover plates.
After waiting forever to get a GPU it has finally arrived and I have installed the Aquacomputer water block, which looks stunning. I could also preliminarily install the motherboard, CPU, part of the RAM, and the CPU cooler. Now it's on to finding a good loop order and planning runs. The Aquacomputer Next D5 will be housed in the PSU compartment with the inlet coming through the top and the outlet going out the back of the case. The water cooling components have been finalized as well with using Aquacomputer for the water blocks, the pump, and the fan controller, and EKWB for the radiators and fittings. I still hope my tiny CNC manages to mill my distro plate and I get all the settings right, otherwise, I will have to look for a professional who knows what they are doing.
Things are moving along. After test fitting most of the tubing I could finally draw the proper Distro with the exact measurements for the ports. The distro is designed to be fitted to the front radiator with the EK angled adapter brackets with a size of 240 by 120mm. The pump is located at the bottom of the case, thus the return line to the distro has to come from the back, which in turn reduces clutter in the front. An InWin 925 case seems incredibly large without anything in it but somehow it is still tight and putting the final loop together will require a lot more planning. The next steps will be designing the vinyl wrap for the tubes, the plexiglass covers for the back and front of the motherboard tray, and starting sleeving for some of the cables.
