HTPC Project [Build Log]

[Deathjester]

After much deliberation the following was ordered this morning:

YOUR BASKET
1 x EVGA GeForce GTX 970 Superclock 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (04G-P4-1972-KR) £299.99
1 x SilverStone NightJar 520W Zero dBA "80+ Plus Platinum" Fanless Power Supply (SST-NJ520) £109.99
1 x EK Water Blocks EK-FC970 GTX - Nickel £79.99
1 x Silverstone SST-SOD02 Slimline Slot Loading 8x DVD±RW SATA Drive - Retail £54.95
1 x EK Water Blocks EK-FC970 GTX Backplate - Nickel £20.99
1 x Silverstone 5.25" Slim ODD Bay with Internal 2.5" Bay - Black (SST-FP58B) £12.49
2 x EK Water Blocks EK-HDC Fitting 12mm G1/4 - Blue £5.45 (£10.90)
Total : £598.90 (includes shipping : £8.00).



Which has been dispatched and will arrive tomorrow morning!!

Other than the PCIe SSD that's everything ordered for this build, but since I have the SSD's to support it I can't really warrant over £200 for the additional speed it will offer.

I also ordered some Aquaero RGB LED strips for my main build. Which means I should be able to pull my BitFenix strips out of it.

With the impending arrival of a new PSU I have paused sleeving until I can confirm that the pin out is the same.

 

[Deathjester]

There will be a photo update later on this evening; however...

Everything arrived to day and the waterblock for the 970 GTX Superclocked is installed.

The Nightjar pin out is totally different to the standard Silverstone power supplies and contains multiple dual wires from one to another...
For ......... Sake!
Why do they make these things so challenging.

So out of the power supply there is a 9x2 ATX connector (where did you get that from) and a 5x2 (again wth?) which BOTH connect to the 24pin Motherboard ATX connecter.... Seriously!
So there's more soldering / heatshrinking / dual cabling and slightly messy sleeving which I'm going to try to make look tidy... I'm REALLY not sure how...

Also it turns out that I managed to order the DVD slot loader not the Blu-ray (this will be corrected soon)

So all in all a very annoying day...

 

[Deathjester]

Picture update:

(all be it 12 hours later than planned)

Waterblock on, with a comparison to the stock cooler:

It won't be covered in fingerprints later...

PCIe Cables sleeved and installed along with the GPU:

I'll remove the little blue stickers over the EK logos once all of the components are installed.

Front panel with the slot loading drive:

 

[Deathjester]

So I went back to the acrylic tubing over the weekend...

Heated up my first tube; and made my first bend with lower temps / longer heating times.

This acrylic bending has turned in to much less of a pita...

Very pleased with this; So now I just need to resolder the fan cables on the SP120's so I can refit the radiator and then I can finish off all the acrylic tubing!

 

[Deathjester]

looking good!

I look at water cooling and I always wonder how do you know when to bend the tube to get it to line up with the other whole or connecting the tubing too! lol

Thanks

I bent it way too long and cut it down from each side to the correct length (in this instance)

 

[Deathjester]

I finished up shortening the fan wiring last night.

Then created the following:

This should allow 3 fans which are powered by the ATX connector to be controlled by PWM to the same level.
Also this allows RPM monitoring on one of the fan channels. (I have chosen to connect this to the front case fan rather than one of the radiator fans.

Which will be completed with sleeving tonight.

I have also decided to try my hand at full custom cabling; so I've ordered a Molex ratchet crimper, wire and some connectors.

 

[Deathjester]

Looking really nice!

Thanks

It is looking good

Also did you find it difficult to rewire your fans as per your diagram above?

Actually with a bit of soldering experience and a soldering iron stand it was surprisingly easy.

Just trim down an ATX wire and solder 3 male fan wires to it, twice

Then a single female -> male fan wire will serve as the RPM wire

And a female to 3 male fan wire will do the PWM.

I measured them up to the same length as the wires to the same connecter and then soldered them all together.

It was the sleeving that I had issues with... but that's all done (except I need 1 more black 4 pin fan header....)

I also realised I could run my slimline Blu-Ray power connector off the same ATX connector

 

[Deathjester]

There haven't been any updates in a while because I've had a lot going on with everything else...

Well my crimps have finally turned up:

This allowed me to shorten the cables on the last fan without soldering it...

And install it:

I might have done some of the cabling a little short, and now I've got the tools to do so I might redo it properly.
This is a top down view, showing the new cabling and the new fan installed at the front of the case.

I removed the 6 wire combs and replaced them with 12's

And I started crimping some wires:

And did my first dual wire ATX cable:

That took me until about 2am, so I decided to get some sleep...

There are 2 photos which are not playing ball, Photobucket doesn't want to let me resize AND rotate, it's one or the other.
I'll retake them later.

 

[Deathjester]

On your parts list you have 2 PCIe components (GPU and SSD) but have specced a mini-itx motherboard?

I think I put the wrong Kingston drive on the parts list. It was meant to be the m2 one

 

[Deathjester]

Ah hehe! That makes sense

Following the release of:

Samsung SM951

I think this will replace the Kingston drive anyway.

 

[Deathjester]

I bought some new spray paint and re-sprayed the RAM last night.

 

[Deathjester]

Ram looks great. I'm intrigued about that spray gun, any info on it?

Thanks

It's just a handle for a spray can; but gives much finer control than just using the push on the top of the can.

 

[Deathjester]

It was like £4 in Halfords

 

[Deathjester]

Since I haven't had much chance to work on this in the last few days, I thought I could at least upload an updated spec sheet for it:

Main Build
1 x Intel Core i5-4690K 3.50GHz (Devil's Canyon) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £199.99
1 x Asus Maximus VII Impact Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £179.99
1 x Corsair Vengeance Pro Silver 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (CMY8GX3M2A1600C9) £64.99
1 x Samsung SM951 128GB M.2 PCI-e Gen3 8Gbps x 4 Solid State Drive (MZHPV128HDGM-00000) £89.99
1 x SilverStone NightJar 520W Zero dBA "80+ Plus Platinum" Fanless Power Supply (SST-NJ520) £109.99
1 x Corsair Obsidian Series 250D Mini ITX Compact Gaming Case - Black (CC-9011047-WW) £75.95
1 x Silverstone 5.25" Slim ODD Bay with Internal 2.5" Bay - Black (SST-FP58B) £12.49
1 x LiteOn DL-4ETS Slimline Blu-ray Burner SATA Slot Loading - Black £59.99

GPU
1 x EVGA GeForce GTX 970 SC ACX 2.0 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (04G-P4-2974-KR) £289.99
1 x EK Water Blocks EK-FC970 GTX Backplate - Nickel £20.99
1 x EK Water Blocks EK-FC970 GTX - Nickel £79.99

Water Cooling
1 x EK Water Blocks EK-FB ASUS M6I - Acetal+Nickel (Original CSQ) £49.99
1 x EK Water Blocks EK-D5 Vario X-RES 100 (incl. pump) £105.95
1 x Hardware Labs Black ICE Radiator GT Stealth 240 - XFlow £36.98
8 x EK Water Blocks EK-HDC Fitting 12mm G1/4 - Blue £5.45 (£43.60)
1 x Corsair Fan, SP120 PWM High Pressure Fan 4 pin, Dual Pack (CO-9050014-WW) £25.00
1 x Be Quiet! Shadow Wings Fan PWM - 92mm £8.99

5 x E22 Ultra Clear 12/10 Hard Acrylic Tubing 500mm Length £4.99 (£24.95)

Liquid
1 x Mayhems Pastel - Ice White Coolant 1L £14.99
1 x Mayhems Dye Ocean Blue 15ml £5.48

Total : £1,500.28


Main Build


GPU


Water Cooling Loop


Liquid

 

[Deathjester]

Sorry real life got in the way of this build unfortunately.

Well after repeatedly getting fed up with not being able to bend the acrylic nicely I finally decided to switch manufacturer / distributer.

I bought 2m of EKHD Acrylic tubing, which arrived yesterday, and finished off the build last night.

I just need to colour match the liquid now, I will upload some photos once I get home tonight.

 

[Deathjester]

A little later than promised...

I'm going to redo a little of the cabling because it's a little messy, and I still need to work on colour matching the coolant.

I also want to take some shots with better lighting and a deacent camera in a few days and get them uploaded...

 

[Deathjester]

Well done on the bends I'm there myself finding it very difficult to get right. Yours look very neat considering some of the bends look very tight.

It looks very neat and precise, excellent job
Also the colour scheme has been implemented perfectly

Thank you.
I have to say I found the bends much easier once I started using the EK stuff.

 

[Deathjester]

Yeah, it was a pretty tight fit to get everything in, but I think it's worked out pretty well in the end.

The one running from the Pump to the GPU was probably the hardest; since it needed to go over the RAM and under the Blu-Ray drive.

I think if I ever have space on the PSU I'll wire them straight in again, it's so much cleaner, I'm really not keen on the number of connectors I have in my 900D build; but I'm looking to redo that in the next few months (probably no new components, just rerouting and re-wiring)

 

[Deathjester]

Excellent work, a truly stunning build
Just wondering what the temps are and what noise it creates?

The temps aren't bad, Idles at around 25c, load can take it up to around 60c.

Streaming movies etc it's practically silent due to the fan profiles, once you wind it up actually playing games (Witcher 3 mostly) it gets a little noisy, but it's only just noticeable over the sound of the TV.

I just reused the one which came with the PSU for the Molex connectors which I wasn't going to use.
It was just a case of tracking the cables back to the ATX plug from the molex connectors.

 

[Deathjester]

Final Shots

Ok so it's taken a little longer than I said it would but anyway: