Silent Water Cooled SN25P

[ejones]

Ok, you guys have given me the mod’ing bug! Watching what has been done to these poor little boxes fascinates me.

So I have started my own mod. Actually, it’s my second. The first was to put a 4 line VCD in the front panel of my SN25P. Then I saw Craig’s Project Blue so I had to buy an AlphaCool display. My goal is to install that along with the water cooling at the same time. I have some very specific goals and therefore some of my choices are different than others have taken. At the risk of ridicule I am compelled to share my story.

My overall objective, besides the AlphaCool display is quiet. I know a fan-less system is next to impossible, mostly because of the power supply,  motherboard and drive heat. So, I hope to get the entire system down to one 120mm fan, including the power supply. Here are my design criteria:
    •    Quiet as possible
    •    Water cooling (CPU, GPU and Northbridge)
    •    Does not have to be portable. I have a laptop for that.
    •    Aesthetically pleasing. To me at least.
    •    Mod’s don’t cost more than the computer!
    •    Doesn’t need to be overclocked. But if it can, cool.

My box consists of an AMD X2 4200+, 2 Gig of RAM, one 150 Gig 10,000 RPM Raptor and one 75 Gig 10,000 RPM Raptor, DVD burner and XFX NVidia 7800GT graphics card. Everything is running a stock speed except the video card. XFX overclocks them a bit at the factory.

The project has already started, so I’ll bring you up to date. I ordered the same face plate set from Front Panel Express as Craig. In fact, he was kind enough to email me his design (formal thank you). To meet my sound requirements, I really wanted passive water cooling, so I ordered a Zalman Reserator 2 along with the matching Zalman NWB1 northbridge cooler. Yes, I know I’m a lightweight for ordering a “kit” and letting things hang out the back of my computer.

The kit installed pretty easily and didn’t leak during the 24 hour leak test. I have new found respect for Ken working in with such tight spaces. I was really surprised how hard it is to route the water lines without kinking and still have room for everything else.

When I turned everything on for real, I was very pleased with the sound (none) and the temperatures (low). My CPU’s idle about 85 degrees Fahrenheit, the GPU at 110. That’s about the same as my air cooling for the CPU, but 30 degrees lower for the GPU. Load testing, over night with both CPU cores and GPU maxed out the system got a little warmer than I had hoped, but nothing bad. 130 on the CPU and 125 on the GPU and complete silence from the cooling system!

Right now I’m working on the faceplate aesthetics. Craig made it look at lot easier than it is, at least for me. When I cut off the power/reset assembly I realized the electronics will have to be custom mounted. So I’m thinking of mounting the circuit card to the computer case and have the button assembly mounted on the back of the new face plate. Hopefully I can get everything to line up.

I do part-time gun refinishing and I wanted to make my face plate look different. So I sprayed the new plates with a semi-gloss black epoxy and gold plated the chrome trim. So far so good. But when I went to plate the power and reset buttons the plating wouldn’t stick. I don’t think they were chrome plated plastic. So I went to the hobby store and bought gold leaf paint, hoping to reasonably match the plated trim. I tried applying it with a brush, but it looked pretty bad. So tonight I will strip that off and try again with my airbrush.

Once I get the face plate finished, I’m going to rework the power supply fan and airflow. I ordered an 80mm to 120mm fan adaptor and some other odds and ends that will be here tomorrow. My goal is to replace the internal power supply fan with an externally mounted 120mm fan. I installed a temperature probe in the power supply to get a baseline reading. Under load the temperature is around 100 degrees, again Fahrenheit.

My idea is to move the power supply up to the top of the case so it will draw hot air out of the box. If the 120mm can keep it at the same internal temperatures with less noise I’ll re-fabricate the back panel and extend the mother board cable.  If not I’ll come up with some other idea.

I’ll post some pictures later tonight. Comments are very welcome.

[Maturin]

I cant recall if this is true or not, but I swear I saw someone with a P chassis who replaced the 2 60mm fans AND the psu fan with one 120mm fan. I cant remember if it was kept inside the case or stuck on the back. Food for thought though.

[ejones]

Thanks for the reply.

I saw that when it was posted and gave it a try. Not sure if I did I right because most of the air came through the 60mm holes and very little through the power supply. So I put everything back the way it was.

[craigbru]

I'll give you a formal 'you're welcome!'  I'm really looking forward to seeing your progress.  

I remember the switches being my only real problem when I put the face together, everything else seemed to fall together so well.  You do indeed need to come up with a custom mounting.  I chose to mount the switches to the face instead of the case, simply so I didn't have to worry about things not lining up.  One other thing while I'm thinking about it.  Make sure you have enough clearance below the hinged CD cover before you permanently attach the aluminum panel.  I almost didn't have enough clearance to allow the CD cover to swing open, without hitting the panel below it.

[Eric_J]

This took much longer than I thought. To complicate matters, the PC I’m working on is the one I use to process my digital pictures. So I had to make a certain amount of progress to be able to post any pics.

Finally, I lost my password to this board and had to create a new user. I’m now GuyInTulsa!

Anyway here are some pictures:


Here is my motherboard in all it's naked glory...



Here is the Zalman northbridge cooler. The mounting hardware worked fine, but the surface of the chip was so small I had to shim around it to keep the cooler from tipping.



The CPU cooler did not mount with the existing hardware. But I was able to use some of the Intel parts for the CPU cooler.



Here is the CPU cooler in place.



I did notice my home made CPU mount was a little off center. I would have had to start from scratch to fix it. So, I decided to try it out first and keep an eye on the individual core temps. So far so good.



A view from the side. At this point I thought I had lots of room. That's because I had never routed 3/8" tubing before!



Here is my tubing routing job. Things were a lot tighter than I thought.

Well, that's all for tonight. More to follow.

[kenaneu]

Looking very nice so far!  

Simple and clean is always cool!

[craigbru]

Looking very nice Eric!

[Eric_J]

Thanks guys!

I'm finishing off a copper pipe hard drive cooler. Hopefully I can get some pics up tonight.

[kenaneu]

I'm finishing off a copper pipe hard drive cooler. Hopefully I can get some pics up tonight.

Copper pipe FTW!  

[Eric_J]

You are my inspiration! Even using JB Weld… ;-)

The only thing I did different was out of ignorance. I bought 3/8” stuff by mistake. I remember you saying you had a hard time finding the fittings. I walked into Ace Hardware, saw a bin full and thought; Score!

It wasn’t until later I realized my mistake. Didn’t want to drive back to return them. Plus they had no ¼” stuff. So, 3/8” it is.

[kenaneu]

Yeah, 3/8" is easy to find.  

It's the 1/4" stuff that's a real pain to get, and is expensive.  If the res of your tubing is 3/8" as well, then you got the right size for your project, and should be all good.  Be sure to do a little "leak" testing once your JB has dried.  It sounds dorky, but I usually just block one end of the tubing and blow on the other.  You'll know real quick if any air is escaping or not.  Also unblock one end and blow on it to make sure the JB hasn't accidentally sealed off the tubes either!  Sounds goofy, but it's way easier to fix problems before your loop is all full of coolant!

[Eric_J]

Already on it. Did the "weld" job last night. This morning I propped it up so both end pipes were sticking up in the air. Pored water in one end until I could see it rise in the other.

If everything is dry when I get home, I’ll add it to my circuit.

[kenaneu]

Sounds like you've got it all covered!

Pics!?

[Eric_J]

Coming soon!

[Eric_J]

Ok I got a few pictures last night. I would have taken more, but my camera battery needed charging.


Here is the finished face plate.



This is the heat sink (wings) for the hard drive. It's made from aluminum “L” stock. The copper piping will sit on top of the wings.



This is the profile. I didn’t realize the Dremel chewed up the sides so badly. This design has gone through 3 or 4 changes. I’m a visual designer. I cobble something together and look at it for a while. Then make changes and repeat until I’m happy.

The camera battery is charging so I will have more pictures soon...

[craigbru]

Nice work Eric!  That face plate is the sweetness...!  :cheese:

[kenaneu]

Very nice!

The faceplate as a nice dark mood to it!  

I'm interested in seeing your HDD all installed with the cooling!

[Eric_J]

You guys are too kind  

[Eric_J]

Last night was a bad night for water cooled moding. When I disconnected the existing tubing to install the hard drive cooler, water spilled all over the mother board. It was distilled water with a blue Zalman additive. The system did not have any power, so I wasn’t too concerned.

I put HDD cooler in the circuit, mopped up as much of the blue liquid I could find. I also thought it was a good time to drain the system and replace the water with Fluid XP+. I didn’t remove the motherboard or any of the components, just used paper towels and a hair dryer.

Then I applied power and watched the Fluid XP+ (red) work its way into the system like a blood transfusion. Then the system shut down all by its self. No pop, spark or crack, just off. I cycled the power a few times and tried the BIOS reset. No luck. I tried the same thing this morning with the same results.

I called Shuttle this morning and they offer a replacement motherboard for $175. Ouch! Before I spend that much I’m going to disassemble the whole thing tonight and inspect it and reassemble. With a little luck this will solve the problem.

I‘ll put a few picks up tonight showing the HDD cooler. Wish me luck.

[craigbru]

Oh, what crappy luck!  You're certainly not the first here to have that problem.  Good luck to you!

[Eric_J]

Thanks Craig!

Not sure I can blame luck. I knew I should have torn the whole thing down... But I really wanted to see the new HDD cooler working. I think it was more a lack of patience than bad luck.

[craigbru]

Lack of patience is a problem for me sometimes as well.  If you put enough money in to a project though, you learn not to mess up.  It costs way too much!

[Eric_J]

Spoken like a veteran mod’er.

[zerotol]

Yep patience is not something we posses , i spilled some water too when removing my wc on my SN25P i used a hairdryer to remove it.And i too couldnt wait a day so that it would have been dry for sure.But fortunately its still kicking.

[kenaneu]

Been there, done that.

I've blown a couple of boards.  The only time I had a leak and didn't kill the board was a couple months ago - thank goodness for FluidXP.  Anyhow, take the rig apart, blow dry it all, or even put the mobo in the oven for a while on super low (200 degrees or below) and get it thoroughly dried.  You might still be able to salvage it.  

Good luck, and my condolences on the mishap!