BackDraft Evo (a Nanoxia DS1 Build)

[23RO_UK]

edit... hang on a minute.... I might need to re-read the thread lol ..Your PSU uses that space... where are your HDDs? Have I missed an update?

Patience is a virtue so I'm told G


Dont panic fella, this should explain everything...




Ok so I've managed to get the final fix wiring and cable routing completed


(can I just say if you enjoy this part of a PC build process you are in need of psychological help and should please feel free to dial 999 now lol)






And my ever reliable Kingston Hyper X 3K 240Gb SSD mouted.





The Kingston will be replaced by a Samsung Evo in the near future and supplemented by a Seagate Hybrid.

 

[23RO_UK]

Was there drilling involved? Or did you use a couple of mobo screwholes?

Your thinking 2D again mate

Try 3M Scotch Clear Mounting Tape #4010

 

[23RO_UK]

BackDraft Evo complete


Enjoy the pics...

 

[23RO_UK]

have you thought about getting another 240 for the roof?

I conducted the initial tests back in post #190

With my 2600K running at a nice sedate 4.6GHz I ran 7 threads on Prime95 and Heaven simultaneously for an hour straight, the hottest core on the 2600K never exceeded 75°C and the 680 never exceeded 42°C, the ambient room temperture at the time of testing was 23°C.

There is no need for a second rad

Awesome stuff mate, really really like this build bud

Did you manage to source a windowed side panel?

Cheers,

G

Cheers G, very much appreciated mate

Sadly no, despite Nanoxia having developed and made samples of side panels for the DS1 to my knowledge they have never put them into production...

 

[23RO_UK]

Ok with it being Sunday and me being bored...

I decided to have a little fun


Enter the new ROG RealBench V1.1 Benchmarking Suite, crank up the overclock to 5.1GHz and voilà.





I wanted to put the cooling loop efficiency to the test once again and to put it into perspective; were it a child it would have just stood there with a huge grin on it's face as if to say is that all you've got lol


Very very pleased


Edit - To put the above score into perspective, a guy running an i7 3930K @ 5.0GHz on an Asus Rampage IV Extreme with 16GB Corsair Vengance 1600mhz only scored 743 overall.


My own score is only 12 points behind

 

[23RO_UK]

amazingly clean build!!

Thank you

It could have been a lot cleaner if manufacturers would move the power supply sockets for GPU's to the bottom corner of the PCB's (so they are pretty much at motherboard level).

That's my only critique, other than that I'm really pleased with the end result

stunning mate good work

Very much appreciated thank you

The latest from Nanoxia:

In fact we did have to adjust the moulding/cutting for the Window-Sidepanels
as we did improve some small things.

Finally the sidepanels should be in Europe in about 5-6Weeks. Maybe we will
send some stock by air before, but this is under discussion at the moment.

Cheers for chasing that up G

However dialogue with out substance springs to mind...

 

[23RO_UK]

Ok time to see what I can get from the GPU


The stock NVidia GTX 680 had a Core Clock of 1006MHz and a Memory Clock of 1502 MHz.


My own EVGA GTX 680 SC Signature (factory overclocked) has a Core Clock of 1085MHz and a Memory Clock of 1552Mhz.



Hmmmmm time to have a play





This translates to -


Core Clock further increased from 1085MHz to 1145MHz Boosting to 1210 MHz

Memory Clock increased from 1552MHz to 1652MHz (6208HMz to 6608MHz effective)



Not bad for 30 minutes messing about

 

[23RO_UK]

Nice

Cheers G

 

[23RO_UK]

To clarify those settings are MAXXED out, I'm still messing about with them to try to prevent the thermal throttling.


But to put this into perspective just running my 680 SC Signature at a day to day 1115 MHz (+30) boosting to 1180MHz and with the memory at 1602MHz (+100) 6408MHz.





This leaves an overclocked ASUS GTX 770 DirectCU II boosting to 1293MHz (+135MHz on the GPU and with the memory at +550MHz) trailing in it's wake in Unigine Heaven 4.0 (DirectX 11 1920 x 1080 High 0xAA settings) by a clear 49 points (averaged over 5 passes).







Personally I would say that's a fair performance boost

 

[23RO_UK]

Ok so the day to day overclock I run BackDraft at is 4.5GHz @ 1.39V, the memory I run at 9 11 10 27 1T @ 2133MHz 1.665V (no it hasn't yet blown up lol).


Now for the purpose of stress testing an overclock, I use OCCT 4.4.0 and Prime95.

Below is the results of an hour long stress test using OCCT 4.4.0, the test was conducted at an ambient room temperature of 23°C.





As you can see the hottest core never exceeded 66°C, I think this clearly demonstrates the efficiency of the loop

 

[23RO_UK]

That is very impressive mate!

Yeah I'm very very pleased with it G

Mate how much was that PWM splitter? The fan controller broke on my case so 4 fans are out of action at the moment :/

Erm $9.95, they aren't available in the UK so I had to order mine direct from The States mate.

 

[23RO_UK]

Hope you don't mind me asking about the PSU shroud. I'm looking to have one made for my own PC.

When you measured it up, how much space did you leave around the PSU, and how much did you cut out of the back panel for cable routing?.

To get the measurements you require simply mount the PSU, measure across the top (width), down the side for the height (most PSU's will sit on a support of sorts to eliminate any vibration through the case floor) and then measure to the required length taking into account space for a cavity to hide the cables.

I didn't need to cut anything out of the back panel as I just used the existing cable routing hole provided.

Excellent build though. I've really enjoyed following this thread.

Thank you Chris that's very much appreciated mate

 

[23RO_UK]

I have just come across this thread today and it has had my attention for the last few hours, just taking in every beautiful detail. I must admit for the 1st four pages or so i was absolutely loving every choice you made and loving your vision. Then you drop a bombshell and almost go back to the drawing board and I'm thinking NOOOOO!!!!

I really didn't like your choice of motherboard and i felt genuinely disappointed at missing out on seeing what could have been. I would like to just congratulate you on achieving what i consider to be the most stunning build i have seen (even with that motherboard lol).

I wish i had time and money right now, as you have really inspired me to further improve (start again) on my own build.

It's actually quite refreshing for someone to give a true honest opinion lol


The EVGA Z68 FTW is and always will be to my mind one of the most visually stunning boards ever produced; unfortunately the BIOS is a complete and utter unworkable nightmare, it's such a shame that such a great board could never unleash it's full potential.

At the time I was truly gutted


The good news however is that whilst the Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H might not be anywhere near as visually striking (some will say it's a plain Jane in comparison), it functions flawlessly and overclocks like the Devils own!!


Thank you once again for your kind words and praise Kev; I'm very very happy with the aesthetics, the star of the show however has to be the sheer efficiency of the cooling loop

Looking fantastic. A build you can be very proud of for sure

Thank you Rooster, I'm so pleased with the end result mate

 

[23RO_UK]

I emailed Nanoxia and explained the issue and they sent my a new fan controller. Back up and running now

Nice one G, If I had thought about it I could simply have sent you the PCB of the one I stripped out of mine

Sorry my bad there mate.

Just need for them to pull their fingers out with that windowed side panel now...

 

[23RO_UK]

Hey Guys, it's been a long road but BackDraft has now finally evolved into it's finished form (yes I'm now finally happy with it)


From this -






To this -







As you may notice I've made a few changes...



I've removed the rear extract Alpenföhn 140mm Wing Boost Plus PWM Fan and replaced it with an MNPCTech "Brain Drain" 120mm Billet Fan Grill (CNC milled from 3/16" thick aluminum with a machined brush aluminium finish), the quality of the MNPCTech products are simply flawless


The cooling is now straight forward in through the front out of the top.







The grill ties in perfectly with the GPU backplate








I've rerouted the PCIe extensions for the GPU (I was never truly happy with them before).











Nanoxia have also now finally released the Windowed side panel for the DS1











BackDraft Evo is now complete proper.







Thank you for looking

 

[23RO_UK]

Just a quick note, Some of the above pics were to dark so I've brightened them up some

 

[23RO_UK]

You are a fussy bugger i love your work!!!!

Cheers Nick

It's the PC OCD thing lol

Now this one is done and dusted time for the next one...


Ps. I'll be looking to see what you do with your wee shopping list

Wow that case is gorgeous :0 and loving that waterblock on your 660

Thank you Charlie, you can't beat the stunning visual aesthetics and performance of the Heatkiller blocks IMO.