Bought a koolance case from a college student that ran out of money while building his machine.
HUGE ass case. Has a cpu block, chipset block, and HDD block. I'm going to add a gpu block at some point, but right now it looks like there will be plenty of airflow to keep the vid card cool.
So far I've just hooked up the cooling system and did a fill/leak test on it. Everything looking good.
Tonight I'm going to put a Soyo Dragon 2 Plus v1.0 motherboard with a 2.4c P4 and start seeing what kind of overclocking i can get out of it. Everything I've read indicates if the water cooling is working properly I should be able to easily run at 3.0 ghz and possibly 3.2 ghz.
Starting off with a gig of ram from Corsair. 2x512mb sticks to take advantage of hyperthreading. Got a 9600 video card and hope to upgrade that before too long. Probably upgrade vid card about the time I add a gpu cooling block.
Anyway, here's the pics I've taken so far. All the lighted fans, fan covers, etc. etc. came with the case. The guy I got it from had done some mods before he ran out of money.
http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/neostog/album?.dir=/5d29
Water cooling project
Good luck with your project. The only comment I have is that I think that's the exact same motherboard that died on me after about 2 months. I didn't have much luck with that but it could have just been a bad one I got. I've been through quite a few MBs.
I'm interested to see how it goes. I've considered watercooling and don't mind initial extra setup times but don't want high maintenance afterwards so I'll see how it works out for you.
I'm interested to see how it goes. I've considered watercooling and don't mind initial extra setup times but don't want high maintenance afterwards so I'll see how it works out for you.
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Neost
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According to koolance you only have to check the water levels every month or so, which is easy to do if you have a window in the side panel. They recommend a total flush and coolant replacement at like 2years.
I did some reading and found a good article on various solutions that can be used. I'm going to mix my own as opposed to paying 6 bucks for 500ml of someone else's mixture.
I'm going with a 70/30 solution of distilled water (70) and wetter wet (30). Wetter wet is a high performance engine coolant that will decrease the surface tension of water and actually enhance flow as well as provide some anti-corrosive agents. I think I'm going to put a few drops of an algicide in it also. The case has a black light that the clear tubes run right past, but I don't know if that's enough UV light to kill bacteria/microorganisms.
The koolance controls kind of suck, at least on this case. There is a temp readout that you can change from C to F. There are 3 preset modes for the fans/cooling. mode 1 runs the fans at 7v (very, very quiet) until temp reaches a certain point, then it kicks them into 12v (much more air flow, not a WHOLE lot more noise). mode 2 sets the 12v kick down 10 degrees and mode 3 pretty much just runs the fans at 12v.
The case model I am using is a PC2-901w. That model has actually been discontinued. The cooling system isn't any different from the newer low end cases, I think it was discontinued more because it's just a beige box than anything. All the newer models are Antech towers I believe that come in various colors.
I did some reading and found a good article on various solutions that can be used. I'm going to mix my own as opposed to paying 6 bucks for 500ml of someone else's mixture.
I'm going with a 70/30 solution of distilled water (70) and wetter wet (30). Wetter wet is a high performance engine coolant that will decrease the surface tension of water and actually enhance flow as well as provide some anti-corrosive agents. I think I'm going to put a few drops of an algicide in it also. The case has a black light that the clear tubes run right past, but I don't know if that's enough UV light to kill bacteria/microorganisms.
The koolance controls kind of suck, at least on this case. There is a temp readout that you can change from C to F. There are 3 preset modes for the fans/cooling. mode 1 runs the fans at 7v (very, very quiet) until temp reaches a certain point, then it kicks them into 12v (much more air flow, not a WHOLE lot more noise). mode 2 sets the 12v kick down 10 degrees and mode 3 pretty much just runs the fans at 12v.
The case model I am using is a PC2-901w. That model has actually been discontinued. The cooling system isn't any different from the newer low end cases, I think it was discontinued more because it's just a beige box than anything. All the newer models are Antech towers I believe that come in various colors.
"If you're not a risk taker, you should get the hell out of business."Tenuvil wrote:Having water pipes running through my PC just seems like too much of a risk to justify the overclocking gain.
-Ray Kroc quotes (American pioneer of the fast-food industry, founder of McDonald's. 1902-1984)
The policy of being too cautious is the greatest risk of all.
-Jawaharlal Nehru
What kind of man would live where there is no daring? I don't believe in taking foolish chances but nothing can be accomplished without taking any chance at all.
-Charles A Lindbergh
With racing, you never rest on your laurels, and there are no counterfeits.
-Julie Krone
If the creator had a purpose in equipping us with a neck, he surely meant us to stick it out.
-Arthur Koestler
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Go for it!!!! : )
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Neost
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Yeah, 3ghz and over is available at reasonable prices these days. But what's the fun in that?!?!?!?!?
It's gotta be a fun project and burning up a 3+ghz chip isn't very fun. Neither would be burning out a 2.4 ghz, but I'll take that risk. It is an acceptable level to me.
If this is successful, I may upgrade to a 3+ghz chip and shoot for 4ghz. That of course depends on how well my "homebrew cooling liquid" does.
Searched out a gallon of distilled water that is osmosized, theorized, liquidized, etc. etc. (it went through every distillation process available plus UV light to kill bacteria, etc. etc.) and bought a quart of a high performance auto additive that purports to make a vehicle run 40 degrees cooler (this is not an antifreeze). Couple of drops of algicide and i'll be set to flush the listerine/water mix that I leak tested with.
I remember reading some time back about a guy who sunk his motherboard and other components into a cooler full of mineral oil or some other non-conductive liquid and OC'ed a box to like 5ghz. I may try to find that one again in the near future....just because.
It's gotta be a fun project and burning up a 3+ghz chip isn't very fun. Neither would be burning out a 2.4 ghz, but I'll take that risk. It is an acceptable level to me.
If this is successful, I may upgrade to a 3+ghz chip and shoot for 4ghz. That of course depends on how well my "homebrew cooling liquid" does.
Searched out a gallon of distilled water that is osmosized, theorized, liquidized, etc. etc. (it went through every distillation process available plus UV light to kill bacteria, etc. etc.) and bought a quart of a high performance auto additive that purports to make a vehicle run 40 degrees cooler (this is not an antifreeze). Couple of drops of algicide and i'll be set to flush the listerine/water mix that I leak tested with.
I remember reading some time back about a guy who sunk his motherboard and other components into a cooler full of mineral oil or some other non-conductive liquid and OC'ed a box to like 5ghz. I may try to find that one again in the near future....just because.