Tidjian

All right so I recently got into the idea of overclocking, naturally I've always been one of those store shoppers who bought his computers pre-built. However now with my first setup I went a little overboard, but it's going to be a lot of fun to play with.

This is my setup;

Thermaltake Armor (casing)
Thermaltake Toughpower 1200W PSU
Asus P6T Deluxe (mobo)
Intel i7 920 PCU
12GB Corsair Dominator 16000 (6 dimm's @ 2GB)
2x Nvidia EVGA GTX285's running in SLI
WD Velociraptor 300GB 10,000RPM
2x WD Caviar Black 1TB

Bigwater cooling system on PCU (located in top shelf of case)
140mm (RPM unknown) built in fan on back of case.
140mm (RPM unknown) built in fan on bottom front, blowing on hard drives.
One massive side panel fan, size and RPM unknown as well, which blows directly onto the GPU's and mobo.


Now so far temperatures are running a little high, idle's are around 42 degrees . GPU idles are around 55 degrees. Prime95 put the PCU at 78 degrees in full capacity, and GPU's seem to never go above 60 degrees. Now keep in mind I have not overclocked or attempted to overclock any of this.

I know the liquid cooling unit is not really the best on the market, in fact after I got it I kind of regretted not putting more focus into it. However for the time being im stuck with it. So the goal here is to try to make due with what we have and get temperatures down as best as possible.

This is the idea and im hoping some of you cooling experts can shed some light on it.

Experiment A .

I was considering removing the 140mm fan off the back panel of the casing. But adding this one in it's place;

http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/delffb1212eh.html

However the idea is instead of having it blowing air out of the computer, what if I reversed it so it blew air into the computer, ideally right over top of the CPU and it's cooling tubes.

Then place the 140mm fan that was on the back, onto the top of the case blowing upwards and out of the case through the top vent. Then add another 140mm fan inside the case to the right of the video cards (behind the cd drives and hard drive shelving) that blows directly through the GPU's and out the back of the case. Thus creating a wind tunnel type effect hopefully pushing cool air in through the back at very high RPM speeds running over the CPU and then having this said funnel split off with half the air escaping through the top fan. While the other half being pulled down and thrown over the GPU's and out the back.

We won't add in the idea that the GPU's themselves have some fairly loud and powerful fans on them as well that help push that air out the back.

The only concern I have is whether pushing that air inside the case as said above is going to be a good or bad experiment

Oh and keep in mind there is also an option of placing two 140mm fans on the bottom vent of the case that would suck air up and push it directly onto the GPU's. Which could possibly be these;

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835234002



Any opinions?

ljason8eg

Honest opinion? If you want better temps, scrap the Tt watercooling kit and buy a TRUE/ Megahelem. You'll get far better temps.

Nothing you do, short of replacing most of the water cooling kit with better parts, will get you substantially better temps.

Not sure what you're trying to do with the fans, but it would be best if the rad got cool air though, and not exhaust air.

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Powelly

Welcome to OCN, and might I say what a wonderful first build! Quite a lot to read there, and sorry I can't help - I've never water cooled before. How does your loop work? And what waterblocks are you using and where? I'd say ditch the water, go a megahalem (although that doesn't solve your GPU heat problem).

Also, make sure to fill out your system details.

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Jason4i7

Agree with the good build, it looks like it will be fun to play with.

I would agree with ditching the prefab WC kit. They aren't "bad" per say, but you dont want to use it. The mega or TRUE would benefit you more. If you really want water, build it piece by piece. There are many treads here with a great loop you could duplicate. Just look around some.

I would ditch the 12 gigs of dominators, and go with OCZ reapers or g.skill's at the same speed, and lower it to 6 gigs. As most people wont see any improvement at the current time with the way programs and OS's are written. I Suggest the switch from the dominators because of the lackluster reviews they get with overclocking.

Also Welcome to OCN!!!

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Tidjian

Thanks for the welcome.

I'll definately consider replacing the water cooling unit. I might have to wait a little while since this rig was quite costly all ready.

I was hoping maybe reversing the fans or adding fans might be a temporary fix. I havn't even tried to OC the system yet to see what OC temperatures will hit.

Thanks for the suggestions though, will definately put some thought into it.

Willhemmens

Which big water set up is that?
I have always been very close to buying a big water kit, but now i think if my cpu load temp is 35'c at 3.9ghz, why worry? They do look cool though .
Would you post any photos of the lay out?

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Tidjian

Sure, I'll take some pictures later tonight and slap them up. The bigwater system is the 720 I think, not sure. I bought the Armor + LCS setup so it was built in. It does look cool as hell.

Tidjian

Here are the pictures.

Case with side panel fan - http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/o...n/IMG_0776.jpg

Rad fan on cooling unit - http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/o...n/IMG_0774.jpg

Inside of case - http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/o...n/IMG_0769.jpg

Closer look at cooling block and exhaust fan - http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/o...n/IMG_0768.jpg

Hard drive bays with 140mm in-take fan blowing on them (doesn't seem very powerful) - http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/o...n/IMG_0770.jpg

Place to mount 2 more fans below graphics cards - http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/o...n/IMG_0771.jpg

Place to mount fan at side of graphics cards - http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/o...n/IMG_0773.jpg

ljason8eg

That's a really nice system...minus the Tt LC. They've been known to leak, and it'd be a real shame if it happened to leak and it took out other hardware in there.

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Willhemmens

What thermal paste did you use?

Beautiful system by the way

I remember seeing lots of people having the cpu water blocks leak on them.
The green waterdoes look cool though

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