Wasmachineman's Water Cooling Adventures

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CyklonDX

Well-Known Member
Nov 8, 2022
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Cooler Master HAF XB Evo. Bought it for the hotswap bays, of which one is dead, ended up making a wipe/"bench" rig out of it.
wow the case is more expensive than it used to be. Its a really nice case.

You could use icy dock 5.25" slot for disks 3.5" and 2.5" ones.
Potentially remove that backplane from the disks - as its not really doing much. (if one slot doesn't work - its likely cap gone bad.)
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but you can also replace it with two of those
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I think this is one of the best cooling cases for desktops.
 

Keith Myers

Active Member
Oct 10, 2020
146
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28
Gotcha, I thought it might be one of the old Corsair ones. But I always forget its name. Don't see many horizontal motherboard mounted cases anymore.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
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Aaaaand I acquired a C8E in Germany of all things. €500 including insured shipping.

And now the bad part: HAVING TO TEAR DOWN THE MAIN RIG AGAIN :(
 
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Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
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External water cooling achieved:


That Pentium 4 OCed to 4 GHz running Prime95 isn't going above 46C.
The current setup:
Zalman Reserator XT aluminium baseplate with six black door stoppers as feet
Aquacomputer D5 Vario pump
Heatkiller Tube 150 reservoir with 120mm fan mount and MultiPort top
EK Torque STC black fittings and extenders
Hardware Labs GTS 240 radiator
Push-pull Arctic P12 PWM PST fans with Noctua fan resistor
Two slotted angle irons to hold the rad
Innovatek rubber decouplers with many, MANY metal washers to center the reservoir
EKWB ZMT 16/10 tubing and Koolance QD3 QDCs
Aquacomputer cuplex XT di waterblock
EKWB Quantum Torque drain valve
Fleetguard Compleat EG coolant (shit is like magic, ZERO corrosion in any of my systems and the only buildup is from the silicates it has)
 
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Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
And that's the main rig torn down for now. Am surprised how well the 5950X/Vega 64 combo runs VRChat though, i'm playing that on my old rig in desktop mode.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
jesus ****ing christ that C8E was a true nightmare to get working correctly under Windows 7. I had to reinstall to get the i225-V working under Win7 because it kept giving me bizarre errors like "The name is already in use as either a service name or a service display name" or Code 10.

btw the Aquantia/Marvell 10G NIC doesn't work under Win7, it also gives code 10.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
Based PPCS had a HWL GTS 280 in their eBay store as open box which I promptly ordered, saved almost €50 compared to Highflow.

In other news, I will be radically throwing the HAF XB's loop around: [Official] Cooler Master HAF-XB Club!

Something like that. Much less clutter.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
And that's all fittings on my external water cooler replaced with EK Quantum Torque. Good, since I needed the STC fittings for the HAF XB anyways.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
Managed to break the B550-A Strix in the SFF rig :( completely dead, no diag LEDs, nothing.

Not gonna bother RMAing a board I paid €70 used for, I just replaced with with the spare CH7 I had.

I did manage to fit a 280mm and 120mm rad in that HAF XB Evo though!
 
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Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
LOL WHAT THE ****, I RMA'ed the board, Megekko tested it, and it apparently fixed itself overnight!

Bizarre. Oh well!
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
And indeed it works just fine. Probably some humidity that dried overnight lol

Either way, I have two spare boards now, the B550-A Strix and the B550 Unify-X.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
I... committed heresy, again. I finally upgraded to Windows 10 on the main rig.

With OpenShell and WinAeroTweaker Win10 is... bearable. Not being able to alt-tab to desktop ****ing SUCKS though.
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
I'm so inclined to buy a Hardware Labs M160 radiator off PPCS because they have one in their clearance bin, but it would make a already stupidly overpowered loop even more overkill.

Decisions, decisions...
 
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Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
Just like the decision i'm facing: getting a new 4090 for the main rig and move the 6900 XT to my old/future VR rig, or just get a nearly new 3090 Ti Suprim X for the old rig?
 

Wasmachineman_NL

Wittgenstein the Supercomputer FTW!
Aug 7, 2019
1,872
617
113
hoh shit I bought a "broken" D5 Next off eBay KA. The key for the SATA power connector is torn off and the RGB is mostly dead, but I can live with the former and don't care about the latter.

As long the pump and controller itself works i'm fine with it.
 
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