Project: Buff Shadow

B

buffbiff21

Gawd
Joined
Sep 27, 2006
Messages
1,014
What's up everyone! Welcome to my build log!

Come on in, sit down, and grab a drink because I have nearly a HUNDRED pictures so far. :p

Time to introduce my rig:

Why call it the Buff Shadow?
Well, cuz it is gonna be swoll :)
And because my color scheme will be all black/silver. Mostly black.

COMPONENTS:

Lian Li PC-70B
E6600
x2 8800GTX in SLi
EVGA 680i Mainboard
2 GB Corsair Dominator 8500C5D
Raptor X + 1TB of storage
Soundblaster X-FI Xtreme Music (would have used my Fatal1ty with the drive bay device, but it would not fit... you'll see why later.)
Silverstone Zeus 850W


WATER COOLING SETUP:

x2 MCP355 DDC-2 with Petra's Top (in series)
Swiftech Storm
x2 MCW30 (chipsets)
x2 EK 8800GTX blocks
Thermochill PA120.3 (triple) radiator + 3 Yate Loon DS12SL with Silverstone 3.5 bay fan controller
Alphacool Bullseye/Cape Reservoir
1/2 Tygon R3603
+stainless steel wormdrive clamps

MODIFICATIONS:

Cut triple 120mm radiator vents on top
Cut drive rack for showing off Raptor X
Pain drive rack ^
Screw holes for mounting pumps
Paint and sleeve 850w Zeus
Paint/sleeve case cables
Sleeve pump cables
*NEW MOD:* I plan on cutting a diamond shape on the door panel of the case and replacing with it with a removable plexiglass window that is interchangable with the black aluminum via thumbscrews, so it will go into stealth mode. :cool: But that wont happen for a little while...

Between school, work, and everything else I have been at work on my newest rig for literally months. And it is still not complete. However, I am waiting only on only two things: my two EK 8800GTX waterblocks, and for me to paint and sleeve my PSU.

Here is the first round of pictures; I will comment on most of them:

Here is the case:

casegu8.jpg


Of course, I knew there would be many days of no sleep coming. I had to prepare myself. I was up over the course of two days at one point, so I needed some stuff to keep me up. Here we have a 2 liter of Code Red and a 52 oz Slurpee, Pina Colada flavor :cool:

pict0086pk0.jpg


Some more snacks:

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And here is my method of preparing the case to be cut:
pict00291wb2.jpg

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Next, I will post all the supplies.
 
Here we have a 8800 from November (the green one) and one from February (the black one) Luckily I got black PCB for both of them! Because getting green PCB would totally screw me over.

pict0122pf9.jpg


Here is me trying to take a picture of the Petra's Tech shop pen that came along with one of my orders. :p

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Clamps and fans:

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Some random stuff:

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Distilled Water: (I had two of these)

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A bunch of barbs:

pict0023zw4.jpg


My jumped (see the paperclip!) guinea pig PSU for testing water loop(an old 350W piece of crap)

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Tubing (I ended up using the Tygon; the black stuff shown here was very tough to bend. (But it would have looked cooler!)

pict0028tt5.jpg


Next up I will post the case mod and sleeving of stuff.
 
Here I drew holes for mounting the two pumps:

pict0037ml2.jpg

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I also needed to put the fan on the other side of the front of the case, and screw a hole for power routing

pict0035vs2.jpg


There :) I had to buy a 3pin power extension... and sleeve it.

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The cutting! Props to my mom's boyfriend Dana for letting me use his drills. :)

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Next up, some visual mods.
 
Now time to sleeve some stuff. :(

First of all, I dremelled the Lian Li HD cage:

normally looks like this (this was not my case - I found it via Google);

hdcagelu5.jpg


... and painted it.... :)

pict0040rk1.jpg


I took all the cables that came with the case OUT of the case and did the following with a sharpie: (not recommended... Took me forever)

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Sleeved my fan controller:

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Sleeved the pumps:

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Next up: the vinegar baths.
 
I put the vinegar in these and left them for a few hours:

pict0012ef7.jpg


While that was soaking, I went to Home Depot and Kragen to get some gasket stuff and screws to mount the pumps. Why gasket? Because the top of my case looked like this:

pict0047oz4.jpg


So I got some for the holes. Then, I got some of this, which is a thin sheet of gubber gasket:

pict0048zl9.jpg


...And sprayed it black (of course) for sitting under the pumps (so they dont send vibrations through my case)

And here it is rimmed in gasket (I tightened up that middle one):

pict0052ey4.jpg


With rad mounted:

p1010008zm5.jpg


the pumps, mounted:

pict0076km1.jpg


Next up, I began installing everything. :D
 
Nude main board:

pict0053sz0.jpg


Storm and MCW30 on board:

Note that I took the MCW30 off and am using the stock cooler heatpipe that came with the 680i for now, until I get my GPU blocks I am limited to this. (theother MCW30 will not fit on the SB past the 8800's massive heatsink)

pict0066ot8.jpg


Ready for tubes?

Reason I did not use my Fatal1ty's drive bay device: So that is up for sale...
I could barely mount my ODD up here.

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Next, fill & bleed.
 
Yes, this was sturdy enough :p :

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Sneak Peak from the front: (I have one of those bezels for the optical drive)
pict0079ud6.jpg

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At this point, I am reluctant to post pics... because it is almost done.

I want tension to build... and I want there to be a big grand finale, ya kno? :)

So hang tight until my EK 8800 GTX water blocks arrive. (should be here very, very soon)

I'll be back...
t23d02.jpg
 
Nice rig you have cookin' up there son. Just do us fellow [H]'ers a favor and take more legible pics so we can follow along better. Still, nice stuff.



 
Dark Prodigy said:
Nice rig you have cookin' up there son. Just do us fellow [H]'ers a favor and take more legible pics so we can follow along better.
Click to expand...

Thanks, and lol I know man. My camera is utter junk. Spent all my cash on my computer, I will have a better camera for the final picture set though :D
 
NICE!!!!

ill have to say it as well. Get a new camera. Ill be getting my water cooling up and going soon.
 
Blocks came today :D Just in time too as I found my good camera.

boxsh4.png


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Heres the case, yes it looks like a mess right now because I had to take stuff out and etc... You can see some of the stuff I modded clearer now :)

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There you have it. I am really beat right now - wait till tomorrow or Wednesday and I will redo the loop again and get everything running.
 
you need to take it all apart and start over using that camera.
lookin good
 
here are some more pics

After I stripped the HSF from the 8800:

p1010031np7.jpg


G80:

p1010032ke3.jpg


:D

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Case again:

p1010018my4.jpg


p1010019la5.jpg


boiled some distilled water:

p1010021br7.jpg


Washed out with vinegar and boiling distilled water about 5 times:

p1010022er8.jpg


Currently my system is leak testing. Should boot it up tonight :)
 
May I ask why you are doing all this vinegar soaking? And why boil distilled water?
 
buffbiff21 said:
Yes, this was sturdy enough :p :

[MG]http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o148/buffbiff21/PICT0083.jpg[/IMG]
[IG]http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o148/buffbiff21/PICT0080.jpg[/IMG]

Sneak Peak from the front: (I have one of those bezels for the optical drive)
[IG]http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o148/buffbiff21/PICT0079.jpg[/IMG]
[IG]http://i119.photobucket.com/albums/o148/buffbiff21/PICT0085.jpg[/IMG]

At this point, I am reluctant to post pics... because it is almost done.

I want tension to build... and I want there to be a big grand finale, ya kno? :)

So hang tight until my EK 8800 GTX water blocks arrive. (should be here very, very soon)

I'll be Bach...
t23d02.jpg
Click to expand...

I'll be Beethoven :p

Anyway, looks great so far :D
 
just a thought, but maybe you shouldn't have paper next to your gas stove burners.
keep it up, lookin good
 
here is the moneyshot: some tubing is a little cloudy cuz I actually had it running before I started this build log:

p1010046qp1.jpg


my fan controller's voltage regulator:

p1010043ta2.jpg


pumps:

p1010060ur6.jpg


drives: (see that raptor? :D)

p1010047ci0.jpg


now all i have to do is sleeve this piece. I plan on painting the actual wires white and then sleeving it black. (was going to do the opposite, but Ill just keep it all black :p)

p1010048yy5.jpg
 
am I seeing dust on your case? especially the HD cage. :p

edit: where did you get those thumb screws?
 
I like the way you tubed it, especially going from the second gpu back to the northbridge.

Looks Hot!

Did you lap the CPU yourself, it looks good in that shot.
 
warmace said:
I like the way you tubed it, especially going from the second gpu back to the northbridge.

Looks Hot!

Did you lap the CPU yourself, it looks good in that shot.
Click to expand...

Thanks! Yeah I lapped it myself. I got pretty experienced with lapping stuff... I recommend practicing on every old heatsink/cpu you have before doin your main one.

here are some pics from after i was done: for the full lap log check out my post here.
PICT0058.jpg

PICT0059.jpg

P1010026.jpg
 
Hmm yea it appears that I exceeded the 10gb bandwidth max for the month.. but I dont know when the month ends.

Yet i can still see the pics..


Can you guys see the pics again??


EDIT nevermind now I cant see em.....

Are there any free image hosting sites with unimited bandwidth someone can recommend?

*EDIT AGAIN*: nevermind again, I just read this
I will transfer the pics later tonight, unless I find a party or sumthin :p
 
Keeping the NB & SB watercooled would have definately helped your overclocking if that's what you were going to do. Still looks good though.



 
looking good. those block looks very nice, especially when compared with some of the recently posted DD blocks
 
Dark Prodigy said:
Any particular reason for 2 SLi bridges?
Click to expand...

LOL I copped one from a friend who also uses the EGVA 680i board.

I thought it looked cool :D

BTW I added another mod idea on pg 1 of this thread. It will be a plexi window :D
Also, I bought some HR-05s for the chipsets. They should arrive tomorrow (Newegg is lightning fast due to my dewlling in CA :) )
 
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