7950x Cooler suggestions

[Threepwood]

m assuming you mean an AIO
By watercooling?

an AIO, is an All In One liquid cooler, as in, it has the rad, the block, the tubes , liquid (not water), and pump, all in one package, where he is saying AIO, he specically is asking how would an AIO fair against a peerless assassin,in which the AIO will be better, I went with an AIO recently, and probably will never go back to air

 

[katie279]

Yes, it was more the fact folks seem to say they need topped up but can't be, eg :

https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/s/CnzIG3W1MS

None of these posts really seem to specify if this is after a year or after 10 years, so I assume based on what you've all said, it's a fairly unlikely event.

My new AIO has just arrived - so think I'm ready to start designing. Based on your post, I'm wondering if I should make it look like a skull, that looks like a duck..... and if you turn your head sideways it looks like a bunny....

 

[mickyflinn]

@katie279

This mite interest you on how to separate and control the fans via a separate header on your motherboard using a fan splitter for better fan control as the Arctic uses just one for fans and pump combined.

 

[katie279]

@katie279

This mite interest you on how to separate and control the fans via a separate header on your motherboard using a fan splitter for better fan control as the Arctic uses just one for fans and pump combined.

Oh very handy, will have a look at that!

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

Yes, it was more the fact folks seem to say they need topped up but can't be, eg :

https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/s/CnzIG3W1MS

None of these posts really seem to specify if this is after a year or after 10 years, so I assume based on what you've all said, it's a fairly unlikely event.

My new AIO has just arrived - so think I'm ready to start designing. Based on your post, I'm wondering if I should make it look like a skull, that looks like a duck..... and if you turn your head sideways it looks like a bunny....

The majority of AIO
Can't be topped up without some major
DIY hackery (is hackery a word )

But there are exceptions
I have several swiftech AIO
Those use better quality components
And we're designed to be expandable
And to allow topping up

A lot of people just assume none can be topped up

It depends on the material used for the tubing
How fast/slow Permeation occurs
Permeation is a relatively slow process
But a rough estimate would be at least several years
But not 10 years

 

[pastymuncher]

Yes, exactly my thinking - cases seem to have crept up and up in price, but not necessarily in quality - one of my annoyances is that metal/glass/plastic cases are basically optimised chambers for sound transmission - which people then spend a fortune trying to buy more expensive devices, fans, sound proofing to limit the effect! Wood is a brilliant sound insulator, so most of that issue disappears instantly!

Plus wood is beautiful, so is much less soulless than aluminum/steel boxes....

I plan to make it a decent tower size also to avoid any of the usual fiddling you have to do (another annoyance I have!).

I'll have a think about 200mm fans also - you got any photos of your build? Sounds great!

Sorry for the late reply. The case itself is made of 18mm MDF then wrapped in black Fablon. I originally wanted to paint it black but after a test piece couldn't get a satisfactory finish due to the MDF soaking the paint up and even after sanding wasn't happy to continue. The top section is 230mm and seperated from the bottom section by a 4mm thick aluminium motherboard tray. I went that thick so that I could tap it for the motherboard risers. The bottom deck Is 180mm high and houses the PSU and originally the pair of D5 pumps as well as hiding the many cables out of sight.I got hold of a full set of Corsair grommets for one of their cases for just a tenner on Ebay and lined strategically placed holes for cables with them. I routered the top of the desk to take a almost full size piece of laminated glass as a window and I think it looks great. I have no resonance/vibration from the fans which is a bonus from making it out of wood. I had to find a solution for the power/reset/HDD LED and found a extrenal device that covers all three on Amazon for a few quid. It has a long lead which plugs into the motherboard front panel headers and a sticky pad which I used to fit it in the center of the front of the case just under and between the fans. Despite being a chep device from China I have had no problems with it at all.

The pc has evolved since I first built this case when I built a pc based around a Asus Z170 ROG Hero motherboard (back when they were still quality boards and reasonably priced) and a 8700k cpu and it was originally water cooled. Back then I had a pair of Bitfenix Spectre Pro 200x30mm fans at the front and a pair of Aerocool Silent Master 200x25mm fans at the rear all controlled by a Zalman ZM-MFC2 multifunction fan controller. This is a great bit of kit as it shows live power draw as well as four sets of temps. The front fans have filters mounted on the outside of the case. The radiators were mounted in a filtered box on the windowsill drawing outside air through them while the pumps were sat in the bottom deck of the case along with the psu and all the cables out of sight. The eight 140mm rad fans were controlled by a Lamptron FC5 v2 four channel fan controller. The fan controllers were mounted in a box that I also made sitting outside the case under the desk. While keeping the same cooling set up it was upgraded to a Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Pro motherboard with a 9600k cpu. Back then it looked like this:-

Spoiler: Early pics

After a while I got the upgrade bug again and disgusted with the ever increasing prices choose my first ever non-k cpu, my current 12600 along with my first MSI motherboard for over a decade the MSI Z690 Edge WiFi DDR4 which was by far the most expensive motherboard I have ever had. Originally it was water cooled but after a while I got fed up with the complexity of my loop and startyed thinking about going back to air cooling after some 17 years of custom water. I knew my Gigabyte RTX 3070 was capable of being cool and quiet as I tried it with the aircooler before putting it under water but didn't know how the cpu would do. I ended up biting the bullet and ordered a Thermalright Peerless Assassin SE120 which turned out to be a cracking buy at under £40. I went for the ARGB version to blend in with my red and black theme. While I was putting the gpu back to air cooling I noticed that the metal backplate was basically doing nothing but looking good so I put a thermal pad across the pcb at the rear of the gpu die so that it would contact the backplate. I also upgraded all thermal pads to Gelid high performance ones. The mod worked a treat and the backplate was now getting warm and actually earning it's keep. The cpu cooler was a doddle to fit and looked great. During long gaming sessions the gpu maxxed out at 61 degrees and the cpu at 58 degrees which was extremely pleasing, even more so because I had the cpu cooler set to silent mode in the bios. It now looked like this:-

Spoiler: Back to air.

I was really impressed with the fans that came with the Peerless Assassin that I ordsered a three pack of them for less than £14 delivered. I got a couple of fan clips on Ebay for a couple of quid and fitted a third fan to the PA 120. It dropped temps a couple of degrees but more importantly the fans never ramp up while gaming now. At the same time I realised that my NVME drives were running very hot, especially the Gen 4 one between the gpu and cpu. I had already fitted heatsinks that cool the front and rear of them as the ones that came with the motherboard didn't have good contact and the drives were throttling. I toyed with the idea of bigger heatsinks and strapping 40mm fans to them but came up with a much better solution and that was to cure the cause of the heat most of which was from the gpu cooler. I built a metal shroud that wraps around the bottom and the sides of the gpu and using a PCI-e 4.0 riser mounted the gpu horizontally in it with a nice gap all the way around the bottom and sides so that the heat coming off the cooler would be blown rearwards by the front 200mm fans and then caught and expelled out of the case by the rear 200mm fans, a sort of tunnel effect while still leaving the top open so the card could get cool air. This resulted in a whopping 20+ degree drop on the primary drive and 12-14 degrees C drop on the second drive which is Gen 3 and not as hot as the Gen 4 drive anyway. It also dropped the cpu temps by a couple of degrees so it now hits a max of 56 degrees C when gaming. The gpu temps remained more or less the same. The shroud did create a problem and that was the soundcard was in the way so I got a riser for that as well and fitted it in the bottom deck. The shroud is mounted on 4x 100mm lengths of M4 threaded bar that sit on rubber "cushions" on the motherboard tray. It now looked like this:-

Spoiler: Next modifications.

I was still not quite happy with things and recently tidied up that mess of ARGB cables and swapping the led 200mm fans over to proper ARGB ones I got from Aliexpress which only took a week to arrive and for a total of £42 delivered I am very pleased with them. I picked up a ARGB hub from Amazon while I was at it and that is mounted in the bottom deck. As a result I now only have a single ARGB cable going from the motherboard to the hub and every fan is plugged into the hub. All ARGB lighting is controlled by OpenRGB with no motherboard, gpu or any other software installed as I was fed up with installing several pieces of bloatware just to control the colour of the lighting. At the moment I am more or less happy with the build but am fighting a strong itch to sidegrade to a AMD AM5 build with a 7800x3d in a X670E motherboard. It is pretty pointless as the 12600 is taking everything I throw at it and most games are running over 120fps at 1440p with Ultra details. The only positive would be that it would put me on a upgradeable platform. I am just about containing the itch but it's still there!! Anyway, this is the current state of things:-

Spoiler: Current state.

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

Sorry couldn't read all that
Just too many large blocks of text for my
Brain

But the very first bit does bring a good question
When @katie279 said make it out of wood
Did she mean mdf or "proper" wood?

Mdf isn't the easiest material to get a good paint job on
It's really absorbent
And the dust from cutting or sanding it
Is pretty nasty
From memory it's got formaldehyde and don't remember
Exactly what else in it
So a good mask should always be worn using it really

Fablon isn't a bad solution though
Another option would be the stuff they vinyl wrap
Cars with

 

[Threepwood]

so, I'm going to build a case out of wood was a big fat lie
so many liers around nowadays, or has it always been this way?

 

[pastymuncher]

What are you babbling on about. Katie279 is the OP not me. I chose MDF because it was cheaper than would plus I can buy it in sheets.

 

[katie279]

Don't worry Pastymuncher, Threepwood fights like a dairy farmer...

I'm still deciding, but thinking of walnut most likely....maybe oak or elm - will head down the lumberyard and see what's about - the place looks like something out of an american horror movie, but they have tremendous lumber - so worth the risk of all the metal hooks, chainsaws and strange country folk....

 

[katie279]

Mdf isn't the easiest material to get a good paint job on
It's really absorbent
And the dust from cutting or sanding it
Is pretty nasty
From memory it's got formaldehyde and don't remember
Exactly what else in it
So a good mask should always be worn using it really

Ah, I've mastered MDF - there's a few tricks that let you get a perfect finish!

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

Don't worry Pastymuncher, Threepwood fights like a dairy farmer...

I'm still deciding, but thinking of walnut most likely....maybe oak or elm - will head down the lumberyard and see what's about - the place looks like something out of an american horror movie, but they have tremendous lumber - so worth the risk of all the metal hooks, chainsaws and strange country folk....

Sounds like my pc room
Looks like pc world and steptoe and sons yard
Had some sort of weird offspring
Though you may be too young
To know who steptoe and son are lol

And good you've mastered mdf painting
I mean Technically it's wood
Just a composite of wood and chemicals
But seeing it done in "real" wood will look great

Ps.
Never heard that one before
How the hell do dairy farmers fight?
Throw friesians at each other.?

 

[katie279]

Sorry for the late reply. The case itself is made of 18mm MDF then wrapped in black Fablon. I originally wanted to paint it black but after a test piece couldn't get a satisfactory finish due to the MDF soaking the paint up and even after sanding wasn't happy to continue. The top section is 230mm and seperated from the bottom section by a 4mm thick aluminium motherboard tray. I went that thick so that I could tap it for the motherboard risers. The bottom deck Is 180mm high and houses the PSU and originally the pair of D5 pumps as well as hiding the many cables out of sight.I got hold of a full set of Corsair grommets for one of their cases for just a tenner on Ebay and lined strategically placed holes for cables with them. I routered the top of the desk to take a almost full size piece of laminated glass as a window and I think it looks great. I have no resonance/vibration from the fans which is a bonus from making it out of wood. I had to find a solution for the power/reset/HDD LED and found a extrenal device that covers all three on Amazon for a few quid. It has a long lead which plugs into the motherboard front panel headers and a sticky pad which I used to fit it in the center of the front of the case just under and between the fans. Despite being a chep device from China I have had no problems with it at all.

The pc has evolved since I first built this case when I built a pc based around a Asus Z170 ROG Hero motherboard (back when they were still quality boards and reasonably priced) and a 8700k cpu and it was originally water cooled. Back then I had a pair of Bitfenix Spectre Pro 200x30mm fans at the front and a pair of Aerocool Silent Master 200x25mm fans at the rear all controlled by a Zalman ZM-MFC2 multifunction fan controller. This is a great bit of kit as it shows live power draw as well as four sets of temps. The front fans have filters mounted on the outside of the case. The radiators were mounted in a filtered box on the windowsill drawing outside air through them while the pumps were sat in the bottom deck of the case along with the psu and all the cables out of sight. The eight 140mm rad fans were controlled by a Lamptron FC5 v2 four channel fan controller. The fan controllers were mounted in a box that I also made sitting outside the case under the desk. While keeping the same cooling set up it was upgraded to a Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Pro motherboard with a 9600k cpu. Back then it looked like this:-
[/SPOILER]

Really helpful - loads of good tips and lessons in here! Looks great and no surprise regarding the quietness - as you say the density of the MDF will help hugely!

 

[katie279]

Ps.
Never heard that one before
How the hell do dairy farmers fight?
Throw friesians at each other.?

Hehehe, sorry, you either have played Monkey Island or you haven't....!

 

[pastymuncher]

Don't worry Pastymuncher, Threepwood fights like a dairy farmer...

I'm still deciding, but thinking of walnut most likely....maybe oak or elm - will head down the lumberyard and see what's about - the place looks like something out of an american horror movie, but they have tremendous lumber - so worth the risk of all the metal hooks, chainsaws and strange country folk....

Walnut or elm would look gorgeous especially if you oiled it to bring the grain out. You can't get anything like that around here just pine, pine, MDF, chipboard, more pine, OSB, hardboard (which I was tempted with as it can look nice if use choose the right finish) and oh yes, I nearly forgot, more pine. They love the stuff around here!!

I would love it if you could tell me how you get a fine finish on MDF. I have tried sealing it with supposedly MDF sealant that B&Q sells and even tried a couple of coats of watered down PVA glue but it still absorbed the paint. I gave it one coat then sanded it down before giving it another, sanding down and a third coat and then gave up and went with fablon instead. It looks ok but the stuff is easily knicked or slit.

I'm off to bed now as I have a awful dose of flu and feel lousy. Happy New Year to you and your family and everyone on here.

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

Walnut or elm would look gorgeous especially if you oiled it to bring the grain out. You can't get anything like that around here just pine, pine, MDF, chipboard, more pine, OSB, hardboard (which I was tempted with as it can look nice if use choose the right finish) and oh yes, I nearly forgot, more pine. They love the stuff around here!!

I would love it if you could tell me how you get a fine finish on MDF. I have tried sealing it with supposedly MDF sealant that B&Q sells and even tried a couple of coats of watered down PVA glue but it still absorbed the paint. I gave it one coat then sanded it down before giving it another, sanding down and a third coat and then gave up and went with fablon instead. It looks ok but the stuff is easily knicked or slit.

I'm off to bed now as I have a awful dose of flu and feel lousy. Happy New Year to you and your family and everyone on here.

Shame you can't get decent wood there
But at least you could pop over
Towards Dufftown direction
And get a decent whisky
Few glasses of glenfiddich and you won't notice
You have the flu lol

Happy new year to you too mate

 

[katie279]

Walnut or elm would look gorgeous especially if you oiled it to bring the grain out. You can't get anything like that around here just pine, pine, MDF, chipboard, more pine, OSB, hardboard (which I was tempted with as it can look nice if use choose the right finish) and oh yes, I nearly forgot, more pine. They love the stuff around here!!

Oh really!? I'm just a bit down from you and it's wonderful tree land - loads of elm, birch, oak, chestnut etc etc - gorgeous wood. Here's some elm I was working on a while back (just to make you jealous!): https://www.instagram.com/p/CrX923JoK9c/?img_index=1 Totally right though, you get a lovely pop once I apply a finish!

I would love it if you could tell me how you get a fine finish on MDF. I have tried sealing it with supposedly MDF sealant that B&Q sells and even tried a couple of coats of watered down PVA glue but it still absorbed the paint. I gave it one coat then sanded it down before giving it another, sanding down and a third coat and then gave up and went with fablon instead. It looks ok but the stuff is easily knicked or slit.

Yeah part of the trick is the MDF itself, partly it's the paint itself (ie quality) and part is the layering. Basically you're half there - however would highly, highly recommend Zinsser primer (probably others, but the key is to get a shellac-based one as this really kills the annoying grain on the edges). Also worth looking at decent quality MR-MDF (ie moisture resistant) - makes a big difference to finish.

Once dry, sand down and put first paint coat (again good quality paint makes a difference), then de-nib (really lightly sand, just to take off any bumps), then keep going until you're happy with the finish - then importantly put one more coat on. Most factory finishes for kitchens use 6-7 coats as a flavour - but 3-4 coats is usually plenty.

Doing above you'll end up with a really flawless finish - even with rollers (very close to kitchen cabinet finish) - only way you'd improve is by spraying and that would only make a minor improvement for reflections and the like.

I'm off to bed now as I have a awful dose of flu and feel lousy. Happy New Year to you and your family and everyone on here.

Oh dear, get well soon and happy new year to you and everyone else!

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

@katie279 yeah definitely makes sense
To use quality paint
Buy cheaper stuff either you have to do
A load more coats
or it just doesn't do the job properly even with more coats
Also assuming zinsser isn't water based?
Which would make sense on mdf
Thought you might have to use mdf edging tape
But sounds like you don't

You're obviously a woman of many talents
Really looking forward to what
You might come up with as a wooden pc case

And no I never played monkey Island lol

After midnight now
So happy new year to you
And everyone else too

 

[katie279]

@katie279 yeah definitely makes sense
To use quality paint
Buy cheaper stuff either you have to do
A load more coats
or it just doesn't do the job properly even with more coats
Also assuming zinsser isn't water based?
Which would make sense on mdf

Correct - that's part of the secret, it just clogs the pores in MDF rather than swelling the grain like water would.

Thought you might have to use mdf edging tape
But sounds like you don't

Nah, it's not actually that effective unless you have an edge banding machine - takes way too much time, plus it doesn't work for anything other perfectly flat edges (think bevels, angles, skirting boards, profiles etc)

You're obviously a woman of many talents
Really looking forward to what
You might come up with as a wooden pc case

Have a bit of time to start the case design, mainly musing.through airflow at the moment, so will post some thoughts this week!

 

[pastymuncher]

Oh really!? I'm just a bit down from you and it's wonderful tree land - loads of elm, birch, oak, chestnut etc etc - gorgeous wood. Here's some elm I was working on a while back (just to make you jealous!): https://www.instagram.com/p/CrX923JoK9c/?img_index=1 Totally right though, you get a lovely pop once I apply a finish!


Yeah part of the trick is the MDF itself, partly it's the paint itself (ie quality) and part is the layering. Basically you're half there - however would highly, highly recommend Zinsser primer (probably others, but the key is to get a shellac-based one as this really kills the annoying grain on the edges). Also worth looking at decent quality MR-MDF (ie moisture resistant) - makes a big difference to finish.

Once dry, sand down and put first paint coat (again good quality paint makes a difference), then de-nib (really lightly sand, just to take off any bumps), then keep going until you're happy with the finish - then importantly put one more coat on. Most factory finishes for kitchens use 6-7 coats as a flavour - but 3-4 coats is usually plenty.

Doing above you'll end up with a really flawless finish - even with rollers (very close to kitchen cabinet finish) - only way you'd improve is by spraying and that would only make a minor improvement for reflections and the like.



Oh dear, get well soon and happy new year to you and everyone else!

Hi Katie, that is one very nice bit of wood and if big enough would make a gorgeous table (coffee table/side table maybe). What did you end up doing with it? Do you get your wood direct from the forestry guys? We have a few timber yards in Elgin and nobody sells bits like that.

Thank you so much for the tips on MDF finishes and I will keep a eye out for that Zinseer. I think a big part of the problem I had was that even though it was quality paint it was water based as was the PVA glue. I have used that water resistant MDF and used it to replace the standard plasterboard when I gutted the bathroom a few months ago. I thought it seemed different to cut and work with to normal MDF as it didn't seem so dusty when I cut it. I ripped the bath out and fitted a proper shower instead. The corner that has the shower I "tanked" the MDF then used sheets of splashboard on top and doubly made sure everything was sealed. Next project using MDF I will try the moisture resistant type.