Scooters weekend upgrade

[AMDScooter]

Swapped out the trusty H70 and stock cooler on the 7970 for:

XSPC Raystorm CPU block
EK 7970 GPU block
Swiftech micro reservoir
HW Labs Black Ice GTX 240 Radiator 4 fans push/pull
GT AP-15 1850rpm fans (quiet and great pressure!)
Swiftech MCP655 Pump with speed control
Tygon R-3603 1/2" ID tube.. about 7 ft.
Handfull of 1/2" barbs.. fittings and clamps.


Old-n-busted...


New hotness...






Few pics of the process...










The TIM on the EK block is a bitch to work with but transfers heat well. You have to cut and install it yourself and it's worse than working with double sided tape.




^^^ Like my "pencil" mod? The GPU block is pretty heavy and causes the card to droop a lot if it's not propped up. I'm thinking of cutting a piece of clear acrylic and putting some blue LED's in it to light the bottom of the case in diffuse light like the Raystorm block does for the area around the CPU socket.

Preliminary temps tests show about 13c cooler under 100% load for the CPU and at least a good 35c+ drop in GPU 100% load temperatures! And no more GPU fan noise! I had my 7970 looping unigine heaven last night at 1225Mhz GPU and 1825Mhz Memory on stock volts for about an hour. 38c max temp under full load and quiet! Stock speeds are 925 GPU and 1375 memory. 300Mhz increase over stock GPU and 450Mhz over stock memory is nothing to sneeze at. I then ran 1200~1800 for a few hours of BF3 action. No issues.

Happy camper here.

[zetachi]

sweet

[kbohip]

Nice job Scoot, I like it! Those temps are awesome. It almost makes me want to get back in to custom w/c'ing but then I remember the costs.

[AMDScooter]

^^^^ Thanks guys! I wrangled a bit over the cost and maintenance as well. But I do game quite a bit even over the summer months and it turns out the noise reduction alone would have been worth the effort in my opinion.

[kbohip]

Yeah, your setup is a lot more clean looking than my first ghetto try at water cooling was years ago. I'm curious, did you just use regular distilled or R/O water with no additives?

[Keven]

Nice Scoot!

I've never been able to w/c, one because of the cost but two, I can't get over running tiny tubes with liquid through my computer. I know you can use mineral oil or non-conductive liquid and people build computers in fish tanks and all that, I just can't get over the sight of seeing liquid running through my computer.

No, sir, I'm a heat sink & fan man myself, but I do enjoy your pictures scoot.

[kbohip]

Nice Scoot!

I've never been able to w/c, one because of the cost but two, I can't get over running tiny tubes with liquid through my computer. I know you can use mineral oil or non-conductive liquid and people build computers in fish tanks and all that, I just can't get over the sight of seeing liquid running through my computer.

No, sir, I'm a heat sink & fan man myself, but I do enjoy your pictures scoot.

My first foray in water cooling ended in disaster. My cpu block cracked while I was at work and the computer was on! When I went to get on my computer, I couldn't figure out why the mouse was acting all weird. Turns out the mobo was wet and the video card was literally dripping water. It killed the video card and the mobo, a Gigabyte 7VRXP that I hated so much I still remember the model!

[AMDScooter]

^^^ Ouch! I have yet to have a "disaster".. me<=== knocks on wood. Been the entire gambit.. air.. water.. water with pelts.. phase change.. etc. I'm pretty comfortable with water at this point and it's come a LONG way since I first started messing with it.

[kbohip]

^^^ Ouch! I have yet to have a "disaster".. me<=== knocks on wood. Been the entire gambit.. air.. water.. water with pelts.. phase change.. etc. I'm pretty comfortable with water at this point and it's come a LONG way since I first started messing with it.

You'll be fine. My mistake was deciding to save a few bucks on what I thought was a better cpu block than a Swiftech back then. I also liked how the cpu block I bought had an acrylic top instead of the Swiftech's copper top. Of course the problem with that was the chance of the acrylic cracking, which Swiftech must have known, hence why they didn't make theirs like that. Ah well, ya live and learn.

Oh and btw, I see you've given new meaning to the term "pencil trick" with your setup. Only us older modders around here probably know what that means anymore though.

http://www.motherboards.org/articles/guides/41_1.html

[AMDScooter]

You'll be fine. My mistake was deciding to save a few bucks on what I thought was a better cpu block than a Swiftech back then. I also liked how the cpu block I bought had an acrylic top instead of the Swiftech's copper top. Of course the problem with that was the chance of the acrylic cracking, which Swiftech must have known, hence why they didn't make theirs like that. Ah well, ya live and learn.

Oh and btw, I see you've given new meaning to the term "pencil trick" with your setup. Only us older modders around here probably know what that means anymore though.

http://www.motherboards.org/articles/guides/41_1.html

Preaching to the choir as far as the pencil trick goes. Though I used conductive trace repair for mine. This is one of my first water kits:



That CPU shim should look familiar. I also remember using "golden fingers" on classic athys and snapping/jumping pins on CPU's.

[Dutchcedar]

I like your EK block.

My favorite was window defroster paint to turn an XP into an MP.

[AMDScooter]

I like your EK block.

My favorite was window defroster paint to turn an XP into an MP.

Thanks. It's a darn good performing block for the price. The acrylic has presented no issues and should look even better when I replace the "pencil" with an acrylic rod with some blue LED's installed. Should make the lower half of the mobo look blue like the upper. But it's a nice unobtrusive glow.. not too bright.. not too dim.