Project: ICED ARMOR

[ICEW0LF]

This thread will serve as a log of my first watercooling setup as well as results of Xeon X3440 overclocking and a few small TT Armor mods. Also I will be mucking around with a few ideas for a peltier based water chiller. The water chiller will be mainly aesthetic as I don't plan on running the peltier 24/7 but who knows - maybe it will make a difference to water temps

The Xeon X3440 looks to be great value for money - only slightly more then a i5 but gives you hyperthreading (so basically an i7). Downside is less stock clocks and hence a lower multiplier to play with. Who cares about stock clocks anyway With 2000Mhz DDR3 it still gets to 4Ghz with 20x200 and keeps the RAM in spec (just)

Stage 1:
Picture of setup pre-IFX:



Hit 3.8Ghz (Linx Stable) but the temps were out of control due to the massive vdroop on this motherboard. Basically if i wanted good idle temps i could leave LLC on and it would stay at this voltage in windows however under load the voltage raise and would go above the BIOS setting and result in crappy load temps. On the other hand i could turn LLC off and set ridiculously high voltages in the BIOS that would vdrop to ok levels at idle then vdroop even further under load. This would give me better load temps but a crappy idle temp (due to the higher voltage at idle). Seems i cant win with this motherboard temp wise. Load temps hold me back from high speeds and the other way around the idle was higher then i would like (the PC runs 24/7 and spends most of its time idle)

The Cooling was provided by a Lapped Thermalright Ultra120 Extreme and a Thermalright IFX-10 Motherboard Backside Cooler. The IFX was never designed to go on an 1156 socket however with some dodgy CPU socket mounting i made it fit.

If you want to know how it is meant to mount just checkout a review or the Thermalright website. Basically it was designed for the 775 Socket which didnt usually have anything behind the CPU. The 1156 however has a backplate for the CPU socket. Be aware that some motherboards have some surface mounted components behind the CPU so even mounting it like this would not work. Anyway this is a quick rundown of how I mounted it as I had a few people asking about it.

Firstly take off the CPU retention so that it is naked like such:



Here you can see the back of this particular motherboard has no components behind the CPU



Here is how the IFX will sit on the mobo (thermal pad between the mobo and the IFX. Not the one it comes with though as it looked like it was crap so a piece cut to size from the stuff you can buy from Jaycar was used) :



Because the CPU retention backplate is going to sit further out from the mobo we need to use longer screws. The two screws at the top are your regular case screws. For the lower screw i wanted something with a wider head so a screw of unknown origins but fitting the task was used



Here is how it looks from the rear once it is all together





Stage 2:
Pictures of setup with IFX mounted







Now most of the reviews on the net for the IFX showed very minimal difference in temps however a few things about this setup are different from their setups. Firstly the i7 is a much hotter CPU then the 775 CPUs so the amount of heat transferred behind the CPU would be greater. Secondly the way I have mounted the IFX it is pushing the TRUE120s backplate out further from the motherboard and results in greater pressure on the CPU. This has a similar effect as the popular washer mod for the TRUE.

Results were that temps dropped somewhere in the vicinity of 10 degrees however some people have had similar results with the lapping of the TRUE and the washer mod alone. Without the 8cm fan on it however the IFX would get warmish to the touch so i have no doubt that it was pulling some heat out of the area which cant be a bad thing. I unfortunately can't give any accurate results as I had inconsistent ambient temps while i was mucking around with it and didn't keep any accurate records of the results.

Was it worth doing? Probably not since little did i know I was about to move to water but i was bored, it was relatively cheap and I am addicted to Thermalright bling. If you have a pushpin cooler and you want to buy a bolt through kit then i would recommend it as it wouldn't cost much more and may help with temps. Either way it looks good and the fan sucks air off the RAM which would be nice for them.

Once stage 2 was complete I hit 4Ghz and the temps were tolerable though not wonderful

Next up watercooling!

[ICEW0LF]

After years on high end air cooling figured it was about time to take the plunge into water cooling as my temps on the Xeon@4Ghz were too high for my liking.

Hardware:
Xeon X3440 (@4Ghz so far - will go further once i work out what my RAM can OC to)
ASUS P7P55D-E Pro
Kingston HyperX 2000Mhz KHX2000C9AD3T1K2/4GX
ASUS EAH4850 512mb + Accelero S1 Rev2+ CM R4
X-Fi XtremeMusic
3x Lian Li EX33B upgraded with 3x Scythe 120mm Blue LED SY1225SL12VBL Fans. Lian Li front panels removed so I can retain the armors drive covers and dust filters
G.Skill Phoenix Pro 60 GB + 5.1TB of HDD
HX620 - Reverse mounted with hole cut in the sidepanel so it can have its own air supply
Black Thermaltake Armor - Rear Fan Grills cut out with CM R4 + Noctua NF-B9, Top case 80cm replaced with Noctua NF-P14FLX with grill cut out
Inside case i painted black years ago and it is badly scratched but just ignore that

Water Cooling:
EK-Supreme HF
Swiftech MCP655 Water Pump with Speed Controller
XSPC Laing D5 Top/Reservoir Combo
Swiftech MCR320 3x120mm Radiator Stackable
3x Scythe S-FLEX 120mm Fan 1900RPM SFF21G Fans
Scythe Kaze Station 3.5" Black Fan Controller
PrimoFlex PRO LRT Tubing UV Blue 7/16"ID
Bitspower Silver Shining 1/2" Barbs
Distilled Water
1m Coil of 99.99% Pure Silver 1mm wire in the res

Other Rig Hardware:
Onkyo TX-SV50PRO
A5 Passives
JVC Sub
Logitech G7 & G15
Razer ExactMat
Samsung PX2370
Dell E173FP

Hardware to come:
Bitspower 90 and 45 rotary fittings to tidy up the tubing
Bracket for the Rad which isnt made from duct tape
Bitspower Dual 20cm Cold Cathode Kit UV
New GPU with full cover block

Will cut some hose holes in the top of the case once i have the rotary fittings and brackets for the rad so i can put the noctua 14 back up there. Will also cut some cable management holes and a cpu back plate hole while i am at it

@4Ghz Lapped Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme + IFX-10 was 50 idle / 85 load with LLC on
New Setup is 35 idle / 65 load at the same settings
Water temp is currently 25 with a ambient of 22 - usually less then 5 degrees difference at idle from ambient and less then 10 degrees difference from ambient on load. This is with the fans on minimum and the pump only on Speed 2 - whole thing is basically dead silent

Happy with the results so far





















Water temp on the left and ambient on the right

Next update will include pics of the case mods done since these pics (CPU backplate hole, cable management holes, tubing holes, proper rad bracket) as well as a better look at the case mods that were already done (grill removal, reverse PSU mount with sidepanel intake). Also will include pics of the proposed peltier water chiller and its mounting.

[ICEW0LF]

To answer a couple of questions from the case gallery thread rather then clogging it up in there:

Originally Posted by Tribulus

Icewolf - Such a beastly classic case, Could you post up a picture of the whole desk? Your mounted speakers and case have got my mind wondering. :P

-Also why is your CD Drive located halfway down the front? accessibility?

Originally Posted by MorgzMods

Seconded. It looks bloody awesome
If possible, what kinda prep work did you have to do in mounting the speakers?
e.g. making sure your drilling into a support or?

Mounting the speakers would be a bad idea with A5s as they are rear ported and sound better when moved out from the wall. If i wasnt in a rental house though i would consider mounting them to the wall if they were on some sort of arm to bring them out.

The speakers are just sitting on some stands that i got cheap on ebay. They really made a significant difference with the A5s though so i definitely recommend stands for anyone with these speakers. I will post a picture of the whole setup in the next update.

As for the CD drive two thirds of the way down the front well firstly having the PC on the desk next to me it seems daft to have it up the top as it is much easier to use at this height. The other reason though is that i have three 120mm fans on the front and for looks i prefer to have them evenly spaced. With 11 drive spots it means that i have the DVD drive and the power button panel in between the fans.

The third fan at the top isn't on in these pics but will be there in the next update (broke the fan speed controller on that fan so had to solder it back together)

[ICEW0LF]

Stage 4 pics:

Basic Case Mods - Some of these were existing some are new

The TT Armor came with possibly the most useless top mount fan in the history of cases (check it out here as well as pics of how the case came from factory). basically if you look at the plastic which was over the top of the top fan spot in those picture you will see a small array of holes over the top which you would struggle to fit a pin through. If you have this case then you should definitively at least drill these out so that some air can get through. I did that first then just ended up cutting a square out of there. Otherwise make this case modern and put a 12 or 14cm hole there




Some basic cable and CPU holes. Had to also cut a notch near the PSU as the rubber surrounding for the sidepanel hole was making the sidepanel not quite fit in properly. If i was to do it again I would just move hole a cm or two towards the front of the case but when i marked this up it was lining up with the fan on the HX620.





Ironically i was too lazy to repaint the inside of the case which you can see but did give the inside of the sidepanel which you wont see a nice coat of paint



Really i should have taken this opportunity to get the whole thing powdercoated but I will wait till next time it is rebuilt as i may discover some other things i want to change before then

Pics of fan grills cut out and edged. Also a hole above the 9cm to pass thru pump and rad fan power cables





Couldnt get all the way around the 9cm fan hole as the PSU plate was in the way but the 12cm hole turned out well. The edging is done with pinchgrip which is an excellently lazy way to do it as no glue is needed and it looks reasonably good.


extra holes were added to the PSU plate for the reverse mounting and some of the tabs had to be bent out to accommodate my PSUs plug.





Pic from the front. Scratches aren't so bad around this side and give it a errrr.... rustic charm? until it gets powdercoated (one day, if its lucky). The top rear HDD rack has also been removed as it was unused and has to be the worst spot temperature wise to put any hard drives anyway. the 3 Lian Li HDD bays up the front can hold 9 which should be more then enough for me.

BONUS PIC: NEKKID ARMOR IN THE SHOWER........RAUNCHY!



Next lot of pics will be the rebuild with bitspower UVs, q block and rotary fittings which should tidy up the tubing a fair bit. Instead of making a bracket for the rad i picked up some EK-UNI Holders which should do the job


Here are some overclocking results for the Xeon X3440 at 4Ghz as well



These results are with LLC on as you can tell from the load voltage increase that i mentioned in an earlier post. I am fairly new to OCing on 1156 to know their characteristics. Would playing with any of the other voltages allow me to lower my Vcore? I am happy enough with mid 70s under Linx as it will never get that hot when gaming but it would be nice if it was a bit lower. Bear in mind these temps are with the rad fans on minimum and the pump speed only on 2.

I will also post up some runs with LLC off to give you an idea of the vdrop and vdroop on this mobo. now that its on water the non LLC idle temps might be ok but we will have to wait and see

I cant say I have mucked around with IMC PLL and PCH much yet to see how they effect the temps or required Vcore but a point in the right direction would be nice

[MorgzMods]

looks good mate
but you needa get that thing powder coated. if not for you, FOR ME

i just had a closer look at the speakers then, and noticed the stand.

Keep up the work mate

[ICEW0LF]

New parts are in to tidy up the tubing and make use of the new holes. Should have got 2 more 45s for the CPU block but that will have to wait for next time. Other then that the top mount fan is back in and the front top 12cm is fixed again. Oh and the tool-less radiator mount has been replaced

2x Bitspower 20cm UVs
1x Bitspower Q block
2x 45 and 2x 90 Bitspower Rotary Fittings
EK-UNI Holders
1x Thermalright 1156 Backplate
1x Mystery GPU Block (No idea what brand it is as no visible markings. It came off what was possibly a 9800. Let me know if you recognise it)

[Huggy_Bear64]

Why is there a random waterblock on top of your case?
I'm very confused

[stranger2502]

stickers look bad in my opinon, would look cleaner and nicer without

[Pr3dator8]

Originally Posted by Huggy_Bear64

Why is there a random waterblock on top of your case?
I'm very confused

i could be wrong but maybe mounting a peltier coolering thingy (as mentioned in the OP) onto the random waterblock in an attempt to cool the water?

[7yphon]

If you wanted to do that wouldnt you turn it around so it's using the case as a big heatsink which would make it cooler...... correct me if im wrong

[ICEW0LF]

Originally Posted by stranger2502

stickers look bad in my opinion, would look cleaner and nicer without

I agree but haven't had the heart to remove them yet as they have been there for years. Might try to relocate them to the inside of the door tonight

Originally Posted by Pr3dator8

i could be wrong but maybe mounting a peltier coolering thingy (as mentioned in the OP) onto the random waterblock in an attempt to cool the water?

Correct. The peltiers i have at the moment are too low powered to do anything more then get my water temp to within 1-3 degrees of ambient at idle but i will be getting some bigger ones as well as stacking some to see if i can make a more noticeable difference. I will put some pics up with one peltier mounted tonight to show how it fits\looks.

Originally Posted by 7yphon

If you wanted to do that wouldn't you turn it around so it's using the case as a big heatsink which would make it cooler...... correct me if I'm wrong

Problem is that the case under the peltier would heat up pretty quickly and wouldn't really dissipate the heat very well - interesting idea though. The peltiers work better when you can take the heat away from the hotside (water or heatpipes) rather then just having a sheet of metal or a regular heatsink on them. You really need active cooling even with the small peltiers I have at the moment. Otherwise the hotside gets too hot and the cold side starts heating up too

[fang_laluna]

looks great is this full tower?

[ICEW0LF]

Originally Posted by fang_laluna

looks great is this full tower?

these cases are classified as full tower but really they aren't anywhere near as big as a 800D or similar. They are capable of EATX motherboards but it would be pretty cramped with one in it. The Lian Li HDD bays that i put in it are probably too long to make EATX usable (not that I would want to and the cable hole i cut destroyed some of the mounts for it anyway)

Pics of the PC with a peltier on it:









Sticker free:

[Enjoi]

god job dude, looks much nicer that u added the 90* fittings and such.

[fang_laluna]

does the peltier really help with the temp?