Corsair 600T watercooled build: "Blue Dragon"

joxang

joxang

joxang

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Thanks to everyone who looked at my last worklog. I was very happy with how it turned out but there were a few nitpicky issues I had with it:
(1) cable management space was a bit limited and the result was a more cluttered build than I would have liked.
(2) no dedicated HDD racks, only room for two HDD in the 5.25 bays.
(3) only room for one double rad, so no chance of adding gpus into the loop in the future.

Been looking at lots of different cases as I wanted to mod a 'future-proof' case that I could use for the forseeable future, and as I won't have time to do new projects in the next year or two. This is probably going to be my last major build for a while :(.

I will need at least two triple rads for this build, though I'm pretty sure I can get a quad rad in there. It's only a mid-tower, so it's gonna take some planning and a whooole lot of dremelling :).
 
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Package actually arrived this morning. Box was MASSIVE. Mid-tower my sainted ***.



Actual case is a lot smaller, though still a good few inches bigger than my Lian Li PC-8FI. I wouldn't strictly call this a mid-tower...probably straddling the line between a mid and full tower.


I had some reservations about going for Corsair (long term addiction to LL and Silverstone) but I have to say the build quality is stunning. Plastic bits are stylish and strong, and the metal bits are all very solid. No rattles at all. The case was a good deal heavier than any other mid-tower I've handled before though.

Size comparison:



Clearly the big brother :).

Taking the case apart was a pleasure too - everything came out (and slotted back together) really nicely and with 100% accuracy. No screws or rivets - just plastic catches. The steel frame itself is actually quite compact, but still an inch or so longer than most other mid-towers.
 
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Meet the rad brothers! Magicool Slim 360mm:

Phobya Extreme 480mm:

Triple rad first I guess :). The 600T has 55mm of space above the mobo for a radiator. This includes 25mm for fans that are actually stealthed by a mesh outside the chassis, and 30mm between the top of the chassis and the motherboard for a rad. There is a mount, but only for a 240mm rad but I reckon from some photoshoppy measuringness that there should be room for a 360 up top. Here's the cuts (to the plastic) needed:


This would render the top 5.25 bay out of commission for something like a DVD-drive, but not for anything that only occupies the front of the bay (e.g. a fan controller).

Now the Phobya Extreme. 240mmx260mm means this is rarely found internally. Unless you mount it on a case door. The 600t (507mm x 592mm x 265mm) is one of the few mid-towers that is technically wide enough to mount it on the inside. Problem is the inner chassis is only about 220mm wide and the 265mm width measures the maximum point of the curved case sides bulging out. Ruler out:






Quad rad is a go :D.
 
Was carrying case and tools back inside and I tripped on the top step, something went flying and hit the glass.

Case is unscathed though xD.

Anxious wait to see if landlady's going to charge me to replace it :-(. Could be my 2500k monies...
 
Well while that window's being sorted may as well pop another update on here.




That pile of paper below is my revision notes. Got an exam tomorrow...revising whilst dremelling is actually highly effective :).


And cut, showing where the last 360 ran fan will sit.


Top is done. The bare metal will be edged off with some rubber trimming, all ready for triple rad installation :)!
 
Tanks guys :).

@Marvin - yeh, was really tempted by the white one. But as my old case was silver on black I thought I wanted a bit of a change. Very happy with how the graphite looks actually, it's just the right level of darkness I think.

Now I need to decide whether to keep my RIIIE or go to Sandy Bridge. Dilemma.
 
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Speed said:
If it was me, I'd sell the R3E while it is still worth decent money and go SB! :D
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Well trying to sell everything off now in MM, just listed it :D. I'm away on holiday for a week so will give it until then to see if I can get a decent price for everything. Otherwise with the broken window and all (will cost me £130, and lovely landlady is paying for half!) I won't be able to afford the upgrade to SB. No harm in staying with my x58 stuff, I got a really good chip. Just got that upgrade itch :).

subbytna said:
I've got that same case and I'm almost crying seeing it ripped to bits lol
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Lol :p.

The trim arrived today. It's great stuff - fits like a glove. Next step is cable braiding (will do over my week's hols) and ordering the rads!
 
Mayfair said:
If it isn’t too much trouble, Could you trust me the place you got this from? Might need some of this for cable management holes.
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As khemist said, loads of people stock it. I got the smallest size (1mm gap/4mm edge) as it's very thin metal.
 
Well this is totally on hold now thanks to a number of incidents. Namely the broken window, and a ******** eBay piece of **** (here)

Currently -£580 in my Paypal and owe £125 for the broken window so I'm probably going to be without a new computer for a little while :(.
 
Likkle update. Been taking a nice relaxing week off at home at my parents's house. Bought some detacheable Corsair AX cables to braid. No camera here obv so had to use my iphone - HORRIBLE white balance and colour. The braid is actually light blue, light gray, and white (as I originally got the braid for a P55 gigabyte motherboard). I think it should match the black + gray + blue highlights of the P67 gigbytes quite well though. I will be going with blue coloured coolant for this build.









You get the idea :). Did this one a lot neater than my HX850 in my last build but heatshrink still isn't perfectly lined up. It's what happens when you braid and watch Game of Thrones (EPIC!) at the same time.

[PS @xxela1337: I got suspended for 'concealed swearing'. I phonetically spelled the first letter of a swear word, and added -ing to the end. Honestly...how did they know I wasn't trying to say 'fishing' or 'fandangoing' or something].
 
KiiYzOo said:
lol, I'd need to convince my dad to let me spend yet more money on my pc as I'm struggling to convince him to let me get a new graphics card, let alone spending at least £50 on sleeving that will only improve the looks of my pc :p
anyways I was thinking orange and white, good idea?
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Sounds like a pretty good match to me. Yeh, if you're going to braid then save up for the special stuff. It's so much better than anything else that if you're going to spend effort learning to do it then braiding a whole psu, it's a total waste of money getting cheaper stuff.
 
Components:
i5-2500k
Gigabyte P67A-UD4
Corsair 1600Mhz 4 x 2GB
Asus RoG Matrix 5870 2GB Crossfire
Corsair AX750

Currently just benching on air. My 'OCUK guaranteed 4.8Ghz chip' can barely reach 4.6Ghz!! Will probably swap it for a retail chip with more warranty and let it sit on 4.5 :).







 
hyperst said:
Maybe with all 4 memory banks full it will reduce the OC on most chips, not too sure though but it used to be the case.
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Pretty sure with SB it doesn't matter now - but I'm running with two atm anyway as the cooler obstructs the first slot :).
 
Thanks for the comments :D.

KiiYzOo said:
Love the shot of the CPU BTW sooooo wish I had a dslr or even just a better camera than my dhd's one :p
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See if your camera has a macro mode - even lots of really rubbish compacts do. Then it's just a matter of shooting in good lighting, and with a tripod. As long as the lighting is good, even phone cameras can produce really good pics :).

And lots of pics are bad because of hand-held camera shake, and bad lighting, which go hand in hand (bad lighting = long exposure = shakiness). If you invest in something like a gorilla-pod, or a small desk tripod, it massively improves the piccies you can get from the cheapest cameras.

These are all from a Ricoh compact as I just sold my DSLR kit.
 
Sorry for the lack of updates - I had the rads on order but they only just got shipped out yesterday due to stock levels. Mini-update - cut down the top panel so I can fit three fans under it, and just testing with red fans.




This has been sanded down to be nice and smooth :).





Not sure if I'll keep red led fans for final build, but will experiment with different colours. Hopefully the rads will arrive soon :D.
 
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