Project: Black Ice

Staffy50

Staffy50

Staffy50

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Joined
2 Jan 2010
Posts
360
Current state;

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This is my first attempt at watercooling. Going to be upgrading my old i7 920 to a i5 2500k in the upgrade too, rest is pretty much what i had before.

Build Components;

Project Black Ice
2 x HIS ATI Radeon HD 6950 IceQ X Turbo 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £209.99 (£419.98)
1 x Corsair Professional Series AX850 High Performance 850W Modular '80 Plus Gold' Power Supply (CMPSU-850AXUK) £169.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £167.99
1 x Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £159.98

1 x OcUK Tech Lab - D5 Vario Pump & Alphacool Clear HF D5 Top Value Combo £84.98
2 x Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-15000C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMZ8GX3M2A1866C9) £67.99 (£135.98)
1 x EK Supreme HF CPU Waterblock - Nickel Plexi £56.99
1 x EK CoolStream Radiator XT 360 (120.3) £48.98
2 x Hardware Labs Black ICE Radiator SR1 120 - Black £44.99 (£89.98)
2 x EK-VGA Supreme HF - Nickel Acetal £38.99 (£77.98)
1 x EK Multioption Reservoir X2 150 Advanced £33.98
1 x Lamptron FC2 5.25" Bay Fan Controller - Black £24.98
1 x Mayhems Pastel - Raspberry Purple Coolant 1L £14.99




I will update this in a blog style day by day update in the first few posts.

Pictures will either be from my phone (easy to upload) or my camera depending on the necessity of picture quality.



Day One 28/11/11

Allready owned parts and GPU Blocks arrive

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I am planning on leaving the L shape metal plates on as heat sinks. For me they look better than the little HSnks for the RAM. Went with the acetel blocks as the nickel/plexi were out of stock. They will be mostly out of sight and still fit in with my colour scheme.

Blocks going on

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The instructions that came with the block are wrong, as it came with the easy mount kit. (not sure if all of yours are like that ocuk staff) so heres a link to the proper one if anyone else using these blocks ;

http://www.ekwaterblocks.com/shop/EK-IM/EK-IM-3831109805039.pdf

Blocks On

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Well thats all i can do today cause of a late delivery.. Roll on Day Two!
 
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UPDATES

HAF X and 360 RAD orders cancelled as they are now out of stock. Instead i have gone for a Xigmatek Elysium case and am looking for a new rad i can get by

Day `Two 29/11/11

Well a bunch more arrived today, however i still dont have my tubing or cable braiding so cant complete the build.

Look at the size of that case!

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CPU in and block mounted

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Build so far

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Mobo in. RAM. 2 RAD's. HDD's. and pump location preped...

Done as much as I can with what I have so far, now waiting on my 360 rad, tubing and led's which are arriving tomorrow. Still deciding what to do with the fan orientation at the bottom rads, obv pulling in would be better than pushing out, but for the ease of dust management its tempting.. There is a fan pulling in in front of the HDD's so the air should be coolish...

Im leaning toward having the roof rads push out so the intakes are on the front and the huge side pannel fan. we'll see tomorrow..
 
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Update 17 Jan 12

So, it was time to drain the loop...

This probaly is not done the 'by the book' way, however it worked :)

Attached a longer bit of hose to the top of my res

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Then lifted the case onto a chair and leaned it towards me to drain
Not naked, wearing phys shorts!

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Next i raised to res to the top to begin flushing the system

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Pumped about 4l through till it was clear.

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Next i wanted to install my new temp sensors, so after that was drained i set about making the faceplate.

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Build quality was pretty poor, however the face of it was unmarked...

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Unfortunately, one of the sensor completely fell apart in my hands. Replacement is on the way, but the sensor its self is now in my refilled loop... Cheers Phobia..

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The inside is looking much better now, and the cables are all braided :) (excuse the red sata cable, temp as my WD Raptor drive died, Replace with a M4 :) )

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Still need to sort out the cable management, waiting for my zip tie order to materialise..

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Just a quick update.

Pc is now running however the build is not complete as im waiting for a few oversight orders to come in..

Heres what it looks like right now.

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Im not sure on the colour of the fluid, may change to a brighter blue colour at some point.

The ATX and PCIE cables will be braided as soon as my heat shrink arrives.

If you guys have any ideas about what else todo go ahead and post :)

Cheers:D


When its done i'll take some better pics with my camera, but for now the ease of the auto upload on my phone is stopping that :)
 
You need some foglights in there, its soooo dark in the drive bay area :p

Looks good though, personally dont like the purple fluid, bit dark, but might be swayed with more lights :)
 
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