Liquid cooled cases (1 Viewer)

A while back (maybe a year ago) a discussion came up about liquid cooled cases. I've done a little searching here and on the internet, but haven't come up with anything like the pages & pics that people had posted here. Can you post some links or pics of this stuff, please? Thanks!

Sure, I'll post tha link to tha one I have...



Koolance

Looks cool Mark but what's with this:



I hope those fans are spinning at some very low RPM, like 1200.

If you're thinking of going water-cooled, I highly recommend a DIY solution. I've used parts from www.dangerden.com and have been quite happy with them.

I've yet to see a commcercial system that I would be happy with out of the box.

If you set it up well and you have a large enough radiator and your computer isn't terrifyingly hot, you can even get away with not using a fan.

Those fans are for the radiator inside that top of the case. Two blow out one blows in. It has 3 settings for speed. Not sure what the rpms are but basically the setting represent low, high and a setting to adjust based on the current temp. The sound from the fan is surprisingly low if you set it on the lowest speed. Especially with the absence of all other internal fans. Besides the power supply.

here's a good site for information on watercooling.

http://www.procooling.com

No offence to the folks who have them, but geez water and electricity don't mix...

I would love to have a near silent system but.........

The only way you'll have problems is if you aren't careful or you have extremely bad luck, and with luck that bad something else equally bad could happen (the fan could burn out on your psu or heat sink, for instance). In the time that I've known people who use water cooled systems I've never seen any water related mishaps.

I spent so much time and money making my htpc super quiet but it's still just a little bit louder than the flourescent lights in my basement. Water cooling is definitely something that will get more popular as time goes on. All these new chips are getting faster and running hotter. I wouldn't be surprised to see Dell offering a water cooled setup within 5 years.

actually distilled water is a very poor conductor.

Aside from that, if you actually take your time and do good work a water cooling system will be far more reliable than a heatsink and fan. Especially now that the new athlons have a temperature diode. If your watercooling setup fails it still has enough heat capicity to slow down the the rise in tempurature of the cpu long enough to allow the tepurature diode to kick in.

the only thing that keeps watercooling from becoming a standard is that people are still leary of it due to all that stuff they teach in grade school about not using a blow dryer in the bath tub.

I don't think they use just water. If I remember right they add something to it. Kind of like anti-freeze for the car. But, as for it leaking, that is why you test it for about 12 hours. Just to make sure.

I just ordered a Koolance case, will post my review eventually. With powersupply and a bunch of accessories, it was $500.

-Vince

Rob,

Yeah they removed our Powder Dry Chemical fire extinguishers
from the Data Center where I work. They installed water
extinguishers (Desalinized,Deionized,Distilled) and they
claim I can spray one on our huge Liebert Power Supply
Units... If there is a fire I am walking out and letting
it burn!

I don't care how many times they tell me it's safe.. How
do I know I can trust thier Deionizing and Distilling
process? It's never the water that conducts the flow of
electrons it's the particulate matter suspended in the
water that forms chains that the electrons can jump across.

As an old mainframe jockey, I can tell you that water was the cooling device of choice for old mega million dollar mainframes. We used deionized water with corrosion inhibitor added. It was almost impossible to change a power supply without spilling some water somewhere. Never seemed to have a problem.

Lew,

Yep same here.. Granted I haven't been working with the
Mainframe for quite that long but I know the history rather
well and the "Glycol" pumps are still in the walls!

And nope they never had problems with the setup either.

Mark,

What size tube does Koolance use, 1/4? I'd like to buy some fittings and elbows for better routing, but can't find the tube diameter on their site.

-Vince

FrozenCPU.com- Note I bought a 500 watt enermax powersupply along with the case, 2 hard drive coolers, North bridge, Cpu Cooler, Artic Blue Compound, and a drive mounted fan switch contoller.

I think the total was $498 shipped. Would have been below $400 without the power supply and some other extras (fan controller and intallation)...

Beware of Enermax PSUs. I had a 450-watt "Whisper Quiet" model and it was the loudest PSU I ever owned. Got rid of it quickly!

I have Enermax in my HTPC- I disabled the secondary fan and it is super quiet...

The noise issue isn't one for this system I'm working on, as it is in a server closet away from my work environment... but Enermax is well reguarded for power output and reliability- key factors for me.

-V