8Pack Orion-X2 Build log

[Bicepo]

Hi Guys,

Have you ever wondered what it takes to build one of the most expensive commercially available PC systems in the country, if not the world?

Well as the title suggests, this thread will go through the steps that we take when building/testing one of these epic machines.

For those of you out there who aren't aware of what the Orion-X is, you can check the link to see an epic video montage, Here


Watch this space . . . great things are coming.

 

[Bicepo]

Hi All,

So a build log wouldn't be much without a load of images of the parts that we're going to build it out of, some parts are still on their way to us, so I'll update as they arrive with us.

 

[Bicepo]

Good Morning folks,

So what are we going to do with all these parts? Well our design engineer has been very busy working on a 3D model of the design for the case, which you can see below;



The overall cooling configuration is the same as on the original Orion-X, the main difference between the 2 is the GPU configuration, the system as standard will come with 4 GPU's. 3 of which are for use on the Primary system within the case, the 4th card is then available for use on the secondary ITX system in the bottom of the case. This of course is expandable to 5 GPU's should anyone want to go full overkill

In order to get all these bits to fit, the case has to be modified to get them all in. The case with its clothes off;



These are some of the standard bits that come supplied with the case that have been removed;



Next we start chopping, so the mid plate of the case needs to be modified so that the input/outputs for the case can get to the radiators in the bottom chamber. We also need to remove a part that sits underneath the ITX system so that the riser cable for the 4th GPU can also pass into the bottom chamber of the case. This is what it looked like before;



This is after, with the ITX mobo tray placed in the case;



Next we need to modify the ITX motherboard tray, as currently the curled lip won't allow the passthrough plate to be installed, it also needs trimming so that the riser cable can pass it into the bottom chamber. The motherboard tray marked up ready for the chop;



The plate chopped and placed back inside the case;

 

[orbitalwalsh]

@Bicepo

looking good !

question about 3+ GPUs, will Turing support it ?

got to see the original and @8 Pack at egx. system did look stunning fair play ! Kudo's for shipping these builds

 

[Bicepo]

@Bicepo

looking good !

question about 3+ GPUs, will Turing support it ?

got to see the original and @8 Pack at egx. system did look stunning fair play ! Kudo's for shipping these builds

Good question, SLI support remains to be seen, I mean more than 2 GPU's hasn't officially been supported since 9 series cards. The idea for the main rig is a workstation, not just for gaming. So the main workhorse system can be rendering your latest project, in the meantime, you can switch to the secondary system and work on something else, or game to your hearts content.

 

[orbitalwalsh]

you'd hope nvidia wouldn't shoot them selves in the foot, specially if say main rig was for Geomapping/Da Vinci resolve - but NVLink only seems to be 2 cards at the mo

nice to see the flip side of this, lower scale and price being made up next to this titan . one for someone who wants the best and someone looking for a proper streaming rig

 

[Bicepo]

Good Morning again,

So the project continues, We need to provide a route for the riser cable so that the 4th GPU can sit underneath the GPU's for the main system. To do this we need to cut some more holes

The first hole is so that the riser cable can pass from the bottom chamber through to the rear, just above where the PSU sits.

This is what it looks like before I butcher it;



And this is then afterwards;



Next we need to cut a hole in the mobo tray for the riser to pass back through to the front of the case;

To line this up, we made a template on our laser CNC;



Then I cut this part out also;



Then finally, I need to open out the hole in the motherboard tray so that its large enough to accommodate some mechanical drives and allow the custom cables to pass through.

So before the cutting it looks like this;



And after it looks like this;



There will be some hardware porn (make sure you read that bit correctly) coming soon

 

[Bicepo]

So as Promiced, some hardware images;

We have to give a massive shout out to EK, they have gone above and beyond to help us with this build, suppling us with their new Velocity CPU blocks and their new Vector GPU blocks. They look amazing as I'm sure you'll agree.

Primary system motherboard;





Secondary system motherboard;



RTX 2080TI cards x4

 

[Bicepo]

Good evening,

Progress has slowed a little the past day or so, but I now have some updates for you.

So the next step is to remove the front of the case so that the acrylic plates can easily be positioned in the case. The stacked radiators in the bottom of the case are also installed;




Next we install the secondary system motherboard into the bottom of the case;



Next we have cut some arcylic for the riser cable to mount onto, so the riser cable is attached and fed through the motherboard tray;





Next we install the GPU's and the rear acrylic pass through plate;



Now we can install the Acrylic pass through plate into the bottom of the case



If anyone has any questions about the build or the process we go through, just drop a post, More than happy to answer any questions for you.

 

[Bicepo]

So We've been burning the midnight oil to get this machine built up.

First we have mounted the rad in the top of the case, this is also now connected to the rear I/O plate;



James from Pexon has been working hard along side us on this project making up all the custom cables whilst we have been getting up to this point @pexonpcs;





We also now have the Res plate mounted complete with the pumps for the loops;





Now onto tubing and finishing the cables off more to come soon.

 

[Distracted]

Why are you stacking rads and how does it affect temps on the second rad?

 

[Distracted]

Really loving the build log btw!

 

[Bicepo]

Why are you stacking rads and how does it affect temps on the second rad?

Hi, it probably increases the temps by about 2c depending on the ambient. As a guide the last build we did like this with 4x 1080TI (Cooled by the bottom 480 and front 360) hovered around 40c under load, and the CPU of the secondary system (8086K) was around 70c at 5.2 also under load on non-AVX prime.

 

[Distracted]

Thank you!

So is it drawing air over the larger rad first then pulling the hot air through the smaller rad?

 

[Bicepo]

Thank you!

So is it drawing air over the larger rad first then pulling the hot air through the smaller rad?

No Problem

It pulls air up from the bottom of the case, through the 480, then the 360.

 

[Bicepo]

So James from Pexon has been cooking up his speciality MDPC-X spaghetti bolognese;



Meanwhile, we have been getting some of the tubing installed;

 

[Distracted]

So clean. Is that tape on the pcie riser?

 

[Bicepo]

So clean. Is that tape on the pcie riser?

Thanks

It is, basically to stop us from marring the surface of the riser, as it has to pass through metal work and we have to work around it as we complete the build. we will remove the tape once everything else is finished off.

 

[dannywaugh1]

Wow, Brilliant piece of design and function all in one.

 

[Bicepo]

Good Afternoon,

So we have now finished off the tubing and have mixed up some Mayhems fluid to fill the loops. The results are below, we use masking tape on the front of the res so that any drips that might come off the bottles of fluids don't drip onto the screw heads which could result in the fluid being trapped between the pieces of acrylic



Now all the RGB has been connected up, which we will setup later so that it doesn't look like a unicorn



Thats all for now folks, we will post up the completed system once were able to get some shots by our resident photographer.