I have started a new build and thought I would share my progress. The intention of stage 1 is to achieve a passive build capable of VR and look at temperatures. Current specs: CPU: 6400T (4C,4T, 2.8 Turbo, 35W) MB: GA-H270N-WIFI PSU: Pico 160W GPU: Palit GeForce GTX 1050 Ti Volume: 8.5l As a base, I'm using an Streacom FC5 Evo. This is a slightly earlier model, as it has dual USB 3 ports at one side, rather than the newer models which have them split. Additionally I picked it up off 'the bay' quite cheaply! Here is it dry fitted. The GPU is a second-hand special off Ebay. Apart from a being a bit dusty it passed a 30 min burn in on FurMark so good to get naked. Bit of a clean later, its time for some cosmetic surgery. The case only has a single full length slot, so a little nose job and its good to go. A 2U PCIE riser and a small extender (Thanks Silverstone) and its all good to go. Next update when the RAM, Streacom GPU block and some industrial quantity of TIM arrives.
The GPU kit, along with some heatpipes has arrived. Its the first time I have worked with heat pipes so I had brought extra due to my oafish hands. However, it turns out they are relatively easy to bend and I got a relatively good set of bends completed. Next up I need to attach them to the graphics card. Unfortunately the screw holes we too small so I had to invert the retaining threaded bolts so they would fit. It attached pretty nicely and now looks the part. Carefully placing the GPU into the riser assembly, the heat pipes were gently bent into position and squished using the brackets against the case wall. Then everything was taken out and greased. reassembling lead to the following: I have now attached a Noctua CPU cooler on the CPU side while I wait for the rest of the brackets and some RAM to arrive. I needed to check I still had clearance on the riser. It appears I do, just! I hope to get some ram tomorrow in the post, so I will post some tests on Furmark to see how well the GPU is cooled but the heat pipes to the case wall.
I love my Streacom FC5 Evo case. I remember making quite the mess of the TIM when I installed the CPU heatpipes. My only complaint was that the height of the case is such that at the time very were very few internal USB3 cables that would fit, so I made do with USB 2. Your thread indicated passive cooling so I am wondering about the Noctua cooler? FYI If you are interested I have a pattern for a SSD rack that will mount into the case. Easy to make, I cut mine out of a cereal box, and will hold three SSD drives. I found it very useful as the power cable in the pico-psu are very short and I couldn't reach the second HD mount location.
It’s a great case, very well made. I only have two brackets (that came with the case) so have set the GPU to be passively cooled while I wait for some more brackets to turn up. I ordered them direct from streacom but didn’t realise they were coming from China so I now have a bit of a wait. I’m using a m2 drive so got the ssd side covered. Thanks for the offer.
Its pretty hot in my garage today but I decided to run a FurMark burn test now the RAM has arrived. I stuck a spare temperature sensor between one of the heat pipes and the case wall to get an indication of case / heat pipe temperature. After an hour the temperature sensor had peaked and stabilised around 50c Its using a gold SFX PSU at the moment but its drawing just under 90W at the wall running FurMark. Screengrab of FurMark/GPU-Z and HWMonitor for those who are interested: Spoiler That's a 36c delta after a 1 hour FurMark. Needless to say, I can’t wait for the rest of the brackets to arrive and go fully passive....
My package from Streacom arrived and so the CPU is now fitted with heat pipes as I can connect it to the case wall. I ran an hour burn in test with Furmark and Prime95 running. GPU and CPU both will saturate the case after about 20 min's (case at 50c) and sit at around 60c. Total power draw about 108w from the wall using a gold rated Silverstone SFX PSU and two molex temperature sensors. I await a HDPLEX DC-ATX PSU and so will then try to mount that along with a power brick inside the case. I have a clear case lid coming, so should hopefully I will have this all setup to replace my gaming PC soon. In the mean time, I might delid the CPU and see if direct contact has a big impact but could really do with a delid guard to avoid crushing the wimpy T chip.
My new HDPLEX 400W HiFi DC-ATX board arrived. Its a lovely bit of kit. Another hour burn of FurMark and Prime95 give the same sorts of temps seen before (Low 60c's on both CPU and GPU) I have come to realise a couple of things: Extra wattage - The temporary PSU configuration (Dell 130W brick) and HDPLEX 400W HiFi DC-ATX uses an extra 7watts at the wall 115w vs 107w with the gold PSU. HDPLEX 400W AC-DC - I really want this to come into stock (end of August apparently) PSU cooling - I need to get the heatsink against the case wall to get some passive cooling onto it. Messy - I need to shorten some cables I have a bit of extra space - TBC..........
HD plex has been added to the case and screwed in. To wire this up I did contemplate just using a set of very short sleeved cables but I thought I would try something a bit different. First a Jig: Bend up to 90 degrees..... Attach connectors and solder. Allowing a bit of extra time to make sure the solder breaks the enamel coating down. A little puff of smoke indicates a winner.... Then a test with a multi meter to make sure a decent connection is present.... 23 x the above (with two resolders due to lack of enamel melt) helped create:
while those pins look cool - they freak me out! i would definetely electrocute myself from forgetting the machine was on and needing to adjust something...
They are enamelled, so should be really safe. So look scary but safe as houses! Edit: however, I should add I was defecating a brick from the above said house when I first turned it on!
Some more pictures upcoming, please keep the feedback coming. Do you remember this bit? Well the my next part of the build has arrived. Spoiler My plan is to build a decent size heat sink on the left hand side of the case. The aluminium bars will be bolted together to the case wall / floor with thermal compound between them. Heatpipes will then run through them (6mm drill bit will be getting a work out) and the volume of Alu will hopefully absorb the heat from the GPU, radiating over time into the environment, like a big night storage heater. I still have to trim the top cover, but my son is in bed now so it will need to wait before I can get the tools out. For those interested, it will be about ~1.85kg of aluminium being added to the case once the trim is complete. The current case wall is 650g, so I'm pretty much quadrupling the thermal capacity for the GPU and I guess doubling the surface area (including case top and bottom that will now be fully utilised). The 1050ti currently saturates the case after around 20-30 minutes, with the case reaching around 50c. My hope is the increased surface area and thermal capacity will increase and reduce these respectively. I guess in the next few posts we will find out.
I flipped the GPU around, cutting the back of the case and fitting some standoffs. I used a spare riser cable and refitted the GPU heatpipes, then no picture from the GPU. It appears I have managed to make a small hole in the riser cable with the screws out the back of the GPU. Dumbass! New riser on order
Mini-update: The new riser has arrived and I have decided to upgrade the GPU a little. Its been taken from my watercooled gaming PC and I forgot how big the card was until I had the loop stripped down. It was a bit late by that point to put it all back together so I proceeded anyway. I guess as I have all this spare room in the case i should use it. The new riser just fits with the bigger card. I intend to make a custom copper block to cover the chip and memory so that will hopefully be my next update.
great to follow this project, your embedding work is awesome, I am just wondering if the CPU is not a bit "light" compared to the new GPU
Thanks, im really enjoying it. Its nice to do a build without time pressure to get a working machine back up. I am contemplating an upgrade to a I7-7700T but will see how my budget holds when everything is finished
I spent a while measuring the components on my GPU and came up with the following: Its a majority of aluminium, with copper block heatpads to directly connect to the heatpipes for the chip. The intention is this will cool the GPU and memory, with 8 heatpipes to go into the case heatsink. That's double whats there currently and I would hope this should transfer the heat away. I intend to make a VRM cooling block for a 9th heat-pipe as a second activity. After some measuring and re-measuring I cut the aluminium plate that would form the base: This was then put in my mini-mill and I started the cutout. And finished with this: I'm waiting for the copper I ordered to arrive so I undercut the cutout and will trim it to allow a really snug fit. I'm hoping with some persuasion it wont need any screws, I'm getting bored of drilling an tapping m3 screw holes but might end up doing it anyway to ensure a tight fit.
