My First Water Cooled Project 900D

[BigDaddyKong]

I picked up an XSPC Extreme AX360 kit and a 900D to try my hand at using a a full blown water cooled computer.

After getting a lot of inspiration from here, this is the start of my project.

I am using the XSPC AX360 with dual D5 bay res.

My favorite part of all this is the Aquaero 6 Pro. I wanted the XT, but they were sold out, and going to take over a month to get one in.

And just to give Tom a little chest pain, here is a little back door action.

Unfortunately, I need to work on class work, so I must stop for a few days.

I have an NZXT LED light kit I plan to install. I am going to stealth mod a BR drive and replace the temp drive I have stuck in the slot. I need to order some fan extension cables for the front fans, I was surprised Corsair did not make them longer. The Corsair 140 in the rear is making an annoying clicking sound when I slow it down from the mobo, so I think I am going to look for a replacement for that.

Future plans are to pick up an Aquaero 5 LT and slave it to the 6 Pro so I can control all the 3 pin case fans. Next year when new GPU's are released to make a worthy upgrade over my 7970's, I will pick up a set with full water blocks, and add a 480 in the bottom. I would also like to modify the power supply cover from the HAF X to work in the bottom of the 900D to cover up the power supply wires, and make a cover for the back of the drive bay to hide my tubing. That is the biggest downfall of going with a bay res. You need some slack to pull it out and fill it, so you can't make all the lines tight.

With a little testing, my temps are pretty good. For some strange reason, my GPU's are actually cooler in this case than my HAF X, buy 7C. My 3770K at 4.5ghz is running at 66C after an hour of P95. in game, it seldom breaks 45C. That's with SP120's running at 1200RPM.

 

[Dragolu]

Looks great. Im glad it all worked out with the cooling.
It does need some cable routing work though.

 

[Surfie]

Looks great. Im glad it all worked out with the cooling.
It does need some cable routing work though.

This. Now, i'm no expert (hell, I mismanage cables too), but it does need some cleaning up...

Now, I suspect that this is a deliberate choice (because it is a work in progress), but I also note that the tubing for the water delivery is a bit longer than it needs to be... Not by a huge amount or anything, but by enough (and kudos for hiding it behind the MB tray).

I did have a question for you too, for what purpose did you buy the aqua-aero thing?
EDIT: Oh - right. Fan controller. I'm so spoiled having one built into my case that I forgot that most people still need to get them seperately.

 

[BigDaddyKong]

Oh, it does WAY more than just fan control. I have it monitoring coolant temps before and after the CPU block. I have a flow sensor, but I got wrong cable, waiting on it to come in now. Also, you can use Everest, or Hardware monitoring, and export that data into it, and display it on the screen and setup cooling profiles based on that data. You can also setup to shut down your rig if you have a failure. It can display a clock, its just very versatile.

The back side is very much a work in progress. I spent three evenings flushing, testing and routing water. Some of the excess is there for a low point drain. I can just lift it up, and crack the seal on my flow meter, and it will cut down the mess drastically. The XSPC rad does not have any extra drain bungs, only inlet and outlet, so I improvised.

 

[Shaw]

I find it funny how you use cable combs but haven't done any cable management lol.

 

[Kaapstad]

I don't like the tubing going behind the motherboard, it does not look right and you may end up with problems with kinked tubing.

Also the area around the back of the CPU socket can get quite warm.

 

[BigDaddyKong]

Like I said, I have to stop for school work. I will be sorting out cables later this week. My main priority was getting it up and running in good working order for testing after being down a couple of days. Besides, I have to order some cable extensions to tidy a few things up like the front fans, and an Aquabus cable for the flow meter. I can't get the USB connection to register correctly. After looking and looking, I think I might get an external BR drive. There is just no way to hide the cables that well. The best thing I can see is get black ones to camouflage them. My internal drives are too short for a right angle connector, and that gap is not wide enough to get a sata cable through.

One thing I have learned from this, never try doing this with your main rig. If you have to, start saving and do it from scratch. Once done, upgrades with be simple.

Another thing I want to experiment with this week is pump speed. With both set on 3, I am getting this annoying low pitched drone that is driving me crazy. I think its just a frequency thing. I want to see what happens when I turn down the first pump a half notch below the second.

My temps are good, P95 at 4.5hz after 40 minutes on a 3770K the 4 cores are averaging 69C. At idle I am getting an average of 21C. I am pretty tickled with it.

My coolant temps are 24.5. I was surprised that there was not much separation between pre CPU and post CPU, 0.5C. When under heavy load, they equalize very quickly.

Also after the pic, I used a zip tie to raise the tubing from around the CPU socket. Its a couple of inches higher. Kink wise, that tubing is tough to kink.

Ha HA HA HA! I just noticed from my own pictures, I have the flow meter turned backward lol. Add that to the fix list next week.