New Build - Thoughts

[Gareth]

Just fitted it & problem solved, thankgod. Not ideal but atleast I've got a GPU which is a bit better to Play Fallout Vegas on for the time being.

 

[Gareth]

 

[Gareth]

more progress on the new build tonight, I'll try and take some better pictures over the weekend. But I've drilled the fittings for the reservoir and test fitted the radiator and pump:

 

[Gareth]

Another small update.

The mission was simple, to replace all the screws that were silver for black items. One problem was the M4 nuts (on the pump base & reservoir clamps), as it seems to be impossible to buy them from anywhere in black so I ended up spraying them myself, pretty pleased with the results:

Ignore the silver Bitspower stops on the pump, they are just there temporarily!

 

[Silent_Scone]

Can't wait to get mine on the go. 580 GTX next week so holding out

 

[Gareth]

Yeah I was going for the 6990 but have realised I'm probably not going to fit one in due to the reservoir! So will have to opt for something else. I presume the 580 will be a lot smaller? It's either that route or 2 x 6890s etc

 

[Silent_Scone]

There are no official dimensions mate, it's all NDA too so nobody will give me an official launch date. 'Legally bound' n all that. Wet farts..

It does look a lot shorter than AMDS 6890. 470GTX ish

 

[Gareth]

Another update, I've now fitted the first parts of the tubing (fillport > reservoir & reservoir > pump) I've also finally bought all the fittings required and the Gentle Typhoon 120mm fans (1450rpm) for the radiator, these need to be sleeved and possibly sprayed before being fitted though.

I've also ordered pretty much everything from MDPC-X ( http://en.mdpc-x.com/ ) which I should hopefully receive soon and then I'll be busy sleeving all the cables up.

 

[Adam]

Looking good mate

 

[Gareth]

cheers mate, I'm looking at introducing a watercooled 580 GTX as well now.

 

[Adam]

Nice one, I wish I took this much time and effort into my build. It was abit rushed tbh , but it works lol

Just realised, I havent changed the coolant for over 18 months now. Temps are all fine and have been the same since day one (room temp varying obviously). Might just leave it abit longer lol.

 

[Gareth]

Ah yes, one of the reasons I'm not rushing it tbh. I want it to be able to last and don't want to have to be taking it apart all the time to check it over and clean it, so I'm being careful how it's setup and what components I use.

 

[Gareth]

Another delivery, this time from a well respected PC Builder/Modder from Germany.

MDPC-X

MDPC-X Tools

PC Building Tool Kit (Bitspower fittings, various black screws, washers, fan connectors & cable clips

Sleeving & Shrink

Sleeving

Got a lot of work to do now!

 

[Munson]

This rig has quality written all over it. Nice to see someone doing it properly.

 

[Adam]

Just one question. Have you had the motherboard in with the res?, also will the GPU fit ok?

 

[Gareth]

No not yet ( none of the components have been bought yet, I'm waiting to see what happens with Sandy Bridge and the CORE i7 CPUs ), but the motherboard will definitely clear the reservoir. The original plan was to go for an ATI 6990 but I'm pretty sure unless they are shorter than the 5970 series it won't fit, but by the looks of it the EVGA 580 GTX looks very good and is 10.5" long, so the plan is to get the water-cooled version ( comes out towards the end of the month ) how much room do I have? 11"s LOL!!

 

[Adam]

lol well at least your looking into it, nothing worse than coming to put it together and it doesnt fit

 

[Gareth]

Another Update, the results from the sleeving I've managed to get done this weekend, made good progress considering I've never done it before and thankfully didn't make too many mistakes.

Fans Before & After :

I've also done 2 out of 3 of the standard Corsair fans but have no pics of them.

SATA cables:

I've still got 2 more of these to do.

In addition to this I've also fitted the fans and radiator into the case, but due to lack of daylight don't have any pics of that so far.

 

[Darren S]

Awesome. I put my i7 system together in about an hour - and have left it like that since! Good to see what happens with a decent amount of commitment and TLC are put into a build.

D.

 

[Jason_E]

Awesome build!

 

[Adam]

Those cable sleeves look the dogs

 

[Gareth]

cheers guys, this is the boring stuff as well tbh, can't wait until the real components start going in.

 

[Gareth]

Radiator & Fans

 

[Adam]

Looks a good fit.

 

[Adam]

BTW, are the fans on top of the rad pushing or pulling ?

 

[Christopher]

Love the attention to detail!

 

[Gareth]

BTW, are the fans on top of the rad pushing or pulling ?

Pulling air into the radiator, they are good fans as well, virtually silent.

 

[wozzaa]

You might get better temps with them exhausting air out. As pulling in means you only have 1 exhaust at the rear of the case. Also got the heat rises thing.

Have to try it out when it is all running.

 

[Munson]

Should definitely be pulling air out through the top of the case, surely?

 

[Adam]

Yeah thats what I thought as it will be pulling hot air from inside the case through the rad. The ideal setup would be push>rad>pull, but you need to room to have that many fans involved, thats why mines on the outside of the case.

It may be better turning the fans round and putting them inside the case so that they are pushing cold air into the rad.

 

[Gareth]

Ok yeah, appears I've been given duff advice:

I'll re-think this, but I'll either fit more fans underneath or just fit them underneath going up into the radiator.

 

[Adam]

Yeah so you would have been coming out with the hotest water temps, as I say, and the graph agrees, the best results would be a push>pull setup, with shrouds helping even further.

 

[Gareth]

For the time being I'm going to spray the fans matt black and go with them underneath, I may later on add more fans to the top to pull but will see.

 

[Adam]

Yeah that will be fine mate

 

[Gareth]

I've finished spraying them matt black, one of them is already fitted (don't have time now to take pics) but here they are painted:

They look 100% better IMHO

 

[Adam]

Yeah they look spot on fella

 

[Adam]

I hope the weight of the paint on the blades doesnt affect the fans performace

 

[Gareth]

lol, they are still spot on tbh.

 

[Darren S]

What colour coolant are you having, Gareth? Decided yet?

D.

 

[Gareth]

Nope, all dependant on the motherboard & GPU, it's looking pretty certain that the GPU will be the EVGA GTX 580 Watercooled version, which doesn't seem to have very much of any particular colour. At the moment my current thinking is wait until the GPU comes out (supposed to be the end of the month) and see how I feel then, if I can wait for Sandy Bridge & CORE i7s then I will, otherwise its ASUS Rampage III and i7 950. My preference was blue coolant but it's more likely that hardware will force me to go red.

To be honest the hardest decision is which colour scheme to go with, one of my reasons for getting the Gentle Typhoons (fans) was that I could paint them matt black and not have a 'showy' case full of bling-bling fans with loads of LEDS, I prefer the coolant and tubing to do the showing off and let everything else fade into the background, I think it will give it a much more clean look.