Taking Immersion in Gaming One Step Further: Full PC Immersion with the CoolBitts ICEbox

erek

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The thing you don't hear in news articles about submerged cooling systems is that the mineral oil gets everywhere; even with everything sealed up nice and tight it'll travel through the O/I ports, into the cables, and on to where ever they lead. Makes me wonder what kind of liquid they're using, because if it's an oil it'll be everywhere as well, hahaha.

Edit; Got curious and looked up the data sheet for the coolant. Seems likely to be an organic oil/synthetic additive blend, but the viscosity might be low enough to avoid becoming a complete mess (I'm no expert, so it's hard to say).

https://59070dad-3273-43d6-b27d-4d6...d/3c3c1e_f0efefe8343d401aa67248142e706b9d.pdf
 
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You can do it for a lot less on your own. Seems pretty messy tho that oil is pretty expensive believe.
 
IMO oil = crap.

If I'm going to work on a fully submerged system, I'm going for a dielectric fluid such as what this company offers:

https://www.engineeredfluids.com/

Yes, expensive, but you get 5+ gallons and if the enclosure is built right, you won't have to use 5 gallons worth.
 
Edit; Got curious and looked up the data sheet for the coolant. Seems likely to be an organic oil/synthetic additive blend, but the viscosity might be high enough to avoid becoming a complete mess (I'm no expert, so it's hard to say).

https://59070dad-3273-43d6-b27d-4d6...d/3c3c1e_f0efefe8343d401aa67248142e706b9d.pdf


Ftfy


This is that phase change stuff we saw a couple years ago that is actually being used in large HPC environments. Has a super low boiling temp iirc
 
ok, I got curious and decided to do an image search for this topic and the following two stood out amongst the crowd ...

Gigabyte's creation: I wasn't sure if it was half full or half empty until I saw the goldfish swimming at the top of the tank ... https://www.tomshardware.com/news/aorus-submerged_pc-fish_pc-case_mod-gigabyte,37197.html

2.jpg



and this next one is my current favorite submerged PC photo of all time:

aquanaut-PC.jpg
 
The thing you don't hear in news articles about submerged cooling systems is that the mineral oil gets everywhere; even with everything sealed up nice and tight it'll travel through the O/I ports, into the cables, and on to where ever they lead. Makes me wonder what kind of liquid they're using, because if it's an oil it'll be everywhere as well, hahaha.

Edit; Got curious and looked up the data sheet for the coolant. Seems likely to be an organic oil/synthetic additive blend, but the viscosity might be low enough to avoid becoming a complete mess (I'm no expert, so it's hard to say).

https://59070dad-3273-43d6-b27d-4d6...d/3c3c1e_f0efefe8343d401aa67248142e706b9d.pdf


No, it will be. The mineral oil puget recommends for mineral oil pc is arguably better than this stuff and has the same problem.


https://www.steoil.com/wp-content/themes/steoil/pdf/techdata-crystalplus70t.pdf
 
From the article:

The coolant used is called EC-120, from Electrocool. Buying the full kit will give you 5 gallons of the stuff (which at retail is around $500). This is a lot more expensive than mineral oil, but still beats the $300/liter cost of the two-phase liquids used in servers.
 
What benefit can this possibly have over a custom loop. I've seen this stuff before and it always ends up being a total waste of money.

Good luck to whatever poor sap spends on this.
 
Ftfy


This is that phase change stuff we saw a couple years ago that is actually being used in large HPC environments. Has a super low boiling temp iirc
Haha, thanks.

It specifies it's not phase-change; the case design wouldn't support it with the way the "back-panel" is set up either.

No, it will be. The mineral oil puget recommends for mineral oil pc is arguably better than this stuff and has the same problem.


https://www.steoil.com/wp-content/themes/steoil/pdf/techdata-crystalplus70t.pdf
Yeah, from what I understand of the data sheet, it looks to have weaker thermal shedding properties than mineral oil.

What benefit can this possibly have over a custom loop. I've seen this stuff before and it always ends up being a total waste of money.

Good luck to whatever poor sap spends on this.
None, it's a novelty build.
 
Does it come preinstalled with icewm?
ok, I got curious and decided to do an image search for this topic and the following two stood out amongst the crowd ...

Gigabyte's creation: I wasn't sure if it was half full or half empty until I saw the goldfish swimming at the top of the tank ... https://www.tomshardware.com/news/aorus-submerged_pc-fish_pc-case_mod-gigabyte,37197.html

View attachment 212289


and this next one is my current favorite submerged PC photo of all time:

View attachment 212290
Noice.
 
FYI - New Hampshire is tax free for those who may not know.

It's ironic that you even mention sales tax being a factor.

Also came in here because I saw the sales tax & NH reference, which is a paragraph quoted from the original article on Anandtech.

Is tax that much a frustration point for online purchasers it really needs to be mentioned in articles?

I see people whine about it on SlickDeals all the time and it never ceases to amaze me that an extra few %% points on top of an item can be to dissuade a purchase from an online retailer....when they would encounter the same from a local shop.
 
The thing you don't hear in news articles about submerged cooling systems is that the mineral oil gets everywhere; even with everything sealed up nice and tight it'll travel through the O/I ports, into the cables, and on to where ever they lead. Makes me wonder what kind of liquid they're using, because if it's an oil it'll be everywhere as well, hahaha.

Edit; Got curious and looked up the data sheet for the coolant. Seems likely to be an organic oil/synthetic additive blend, but the viscosity might be low enough to avoid becoming a complete mess (I'm no expert, so it's hard to say).

https://59070dad-3273-43d6-b27d-4d6...d/3c3c1e_f0efefe8343d401aa67248142e706b9d.pdf

Even with the orientation and oil level they are using here? It seems like the coolant doesn't even get into the IO area on the MOBO, let alone up to the cables.
 
Even with the orientation and oil level they are using here? It seems like the coolant doesn't even get into the IO area on the MOBO, let alone up to the cables.
Yep, oil can climb pretty easily in that volume, more so when it's agitated; it may not be visible because it will be a very thin film, but you'll notice if you touch it or once porous materials becomes saturated. Good luck cleaning the system if you decide to go dry as well, it takes a through soak in warm soapy water (possibly a few) to remove the oil, then a good rinse with distilled water followed by air drying or a combo of displacement (alcohol) and air drying.
 
Yep, oil can climb pretty easily in that volume, more so when it's agitated; it may not be visible because it will be a very thin film, but you'll notice if you touch it or once porous materials becomes saturated. Good luck cleaning the system if you decide to go dry as well, it takes a through soak in warm soapy water (possibly a few) to remove the oil, then a good rinse with distilled water followed by air drying or a combo of displacement (alcohol) and air drying.

Throw them in a Dishwasher every so often? (y) Seriously, though, there's no way this makes any sense beyond a niche group of a niche group of tinkerers...

 
Throw them in a Dishwasher every so often? (y) Seriously, though, there's no way this makes any sense beyond a niche group of a niche group of tinkerers...


It works according to a number of people! lol

It's not even something most tinkers will mess with once they know the list of cons and lack of pros. It's mostly a conversation piece to say it works, or "Look, that's cool!", but there's no benefit without going more exotic with the cooling liquid and complete setup.
 
It works according to a number of people! lol

It's not even something most tinkers will mess with once they know the list of cons and lack of pros. It's mostly a conversation piece to say it works, or "Look, that's cool!", but there's no benefit without going more exotic with the cooling liquid and complete setup.

Yeah, I've got easily pushing $700 worth of water cooling equipment in my system, and I wouldn't touch submerged cooling unless someone was paying me mad bank to do it for them, and never for myself.
 
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