Water cooled P180 done. Pics inside

Blown 89

2[H]4U
Joined
Oct 21, 2002
Messages
3,436
I posted this in the WC forum too. Let me know what you guys think :D

Thanks to everyone who gave great advice.

Case shot with my new USB Xbox controller setup for Toca 3:
48366.jpg


I snaked the radiator fan's speed control through the 3.5" bay slot and put it in the rail guide. I'll secure it when I lengthen the other speedcontrollers and put them in.
48367.jpg


I ended up using the aquajet to keep bubbles from re-entering the system, I'm a little disapointed in the aquatube in that respect. If it weren't for its killer looks I would have just gone with a T-line. The reservoir is mounted on the drive rails so it slides out for easy refilling and draining. The fill port is on the top of the res so I don't have to unhook anything when I fill.
48368.jpg


I could have done better with cable management considering the case I'm happy with the the minimal effort it took to hide as much as I did. Big thanks to Erasmus354 for rad placement idea. It really fits in there like a glove. Drilling and cutting took me no more than 10 minutes and the fan bolts right up to the stock location. Easiest mod ever ;)
48369.jpg


Here's where I notched the bottom drive bay to give my tubes a little extra room. The cut is rounted off but I'll cover it in rubber trim later just to make sure.
48370.jpg



All in all I'm very happy with the results. The P180 was practically made for this project as you can see with the PA160 placement. My overall goal was complete silence from an internally mounted WC setup and I feel I've hit the mark. With the front door shut I can't hear the computer at all.....in fact, I've discovered that my monitor has a really annoying buzz that makes me want to jump out the window. Idle temps before were about 60* C on the CPU and 6800. Load temps spiked up to 70* and 79* respectively. WC temps remain constant at 38*/40* and 43*/44* under load. Case temps are 41*. All fans are stock Antec fans set on low. All of that is measured with ASUS's motherboard utility so take it with a grain of salt. I'm sure I didn't apply the Arctic Silver properly and another rad would probably help but such is life. I haven't tried overclocking yet because I'm having some memory issues but overclocking isn't a huge concern...silence (and the constant urge to mess with stuff) was.

Equiptment added in this build to quiet the old computer (which could be heard in the next room):
Swiftech Apogee (no shavings...yaaay! :D )
Swiftech MCW-60b
OCZ ramsinks
Eheim 1080 (a lot bigger than it looks in the pics btw)
Noise Isolator relay board
Antec P180
Aquacomputer Aquatube with Jet, Led, and drive bay
Seasonic S12 (friggin awesome PSU imo)
Samsung Spinpoint 250 GB SATA 3.0gb/s (the switch to this from my old ATA drives eliminated the majority of my case noise. I higly recommend the Spinpoints to anyone looking to quiet their comptuers)
Pioneer DVR-111D


Remaining stuff:
160GB WD SATA HD.
3.0 ghz P4
ASUS P4800-E (crap mobo IMO)
2 gig Patriot ram
PNY 6800 (unlocked and OC'd)
M-audio revolution 5.1


Thanks to everyone on the WC forum for their help. I'd also like to give www.performance-pcs.com a plug....their support was out of this world (emailed me back in just over an hour) and their shipping time to Phoenix beat Newegg and Zipzoomfly by a day.
 
I like how you managed to fit that giant pump in there so well :)

Very clean setup, I like it alot. The Seasonic PSU would be so much better if the cables were sleeved, I think that will be my next mod. Overall very nice setup indeed.
 
heh.. my thoughts exactly.. wow that pump is big and nice placement. fit's like a glove! nice work :D
 
Erasmus354 said:
I like how you managed to fit that giant pump in there so well :)

Very clean setup, I like it alot. The Seasonic PSU would be so much better if the cables were sleeved, I think that will be my next mod. Overall very nice setup indeed.
The S12 came sleeved. Check out the ATX cable. Any cable that isn't sleeved is an extension that I had to use to reach a device.
 
Nice H2O setup!

I shall post pics of mine in a week or so... should be sweet also.

Btw, what graphics card is that and what ramsinks did you use on it?
 
takeabao said:
Nice H2O setup!

I shall post pics of mine in a week or so... should be sweet also.

Btw, what graphics card is that and what ramsinks did you use on it?
It's a PNY 6800. I used OCZ ramsinks. They get super hot when gaming but I've been expirimenting with a very slow moving 90mm Zalman fan blowing over them and even with minimal airflow they are ice cold. I've decided that they'll be fine without airflow and just ramsinks. I secured them with a very small dab of super glue on two corner and used the supplied tape. I'm sure they'll twist right off.
 
Nah, i say keep aircooling



But, that does look sexy. If i may ask, whare did you get your aqua comnputer stuff
 
Blown 89 said:
With the front door shut I can't hear the computer at all.....in fact, I've discovered that my monitor has a really annoying buzz that makes me want to jump out the window.
lol
 
Great mod, do you have a worklog or anything? Did you have to cut out any parts from the P180 like the middle harddrive mount? I'd like to do something similar to mine down the road to reduce the noise.
 
2gigs said:
If i may ask, whare did you get your aqua comnputer stuff
In the for sale forum. If I had to do it again I'd pick a different reservoir. Aqua computer + high flow = bad combination. I have a problem with the reservoir sucking air back into the loop, that's why the res is topped off. The Aquatube helps but all that's doing is adding a restriction. Unfortunately the Aquacomputer stuff looks really cool. www.sharkacomputers.com and http://www.tempestcool.com/ carry aquacomputer stuff.
 
zflajs said:
Great mod, do you have a worklog or anything? Did you have to cut out any parts from the P180 like the middle harddrive mount? I'd like to do something similar to mine down the road to reduce the noise.
I thought about doing a worklog but the combination of impatience and the fact that there are a ton of other WC'ing logs I decided not to.

I did have to cut the P180 a bit. The lower BTX/CD bay had to be cut off and the lower HDD and 3.5" bays had to be cut too. All of that took 10 minutes tops. Other than that the PA160 bolts right up to the stock fan mounts. If I want to ever put those parts back in all I have to do is either screw or rivet them back in. I stole the idea from Erasmus354, his thread details what needs to be done to mount the rad.
 
This is sweet... if only I didn't spluge on the ninja... but hmm... i need something to during the summer :D

Is the eheim hooked up to your PSU? or is it being powered by a wall plug?
 
nice work. Sure helped your temps! :eek:

Where did you get that USB Xbox controller? Do they sell those or did you modify it?
 
metallicafan said:
Where did you get that USB Xbox controller? Do they sell those or did you modify it?
I made it. It's really easy. Strip a USB cable and the xbox dongle (you don't need to cut the controller's actual wire), solder color to color (minus the yellow wire, I think, check the guide), load drivers. The mod I linked does an LED and a dual wire mod which I didn't use.....I simply got rid of the entire xbox connection and bought a seperate dongle for the xbox. It was easier (and cleaner looking) to simply strip both wires and solder wire to wire than it was to solder on to terminals on Microsoft's connector. Google is full of other guides that don't do the dual connector.

Here's a guide,
http://www.metku.net/index.html?path=mods/xbox_cc/index_eng3

Drivers:
http://www.redcl0ud.com/

Here's the 360 controller on a PC:
http://www.techgage.com/review.php?id=3833
 
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