Project:U2-UFO

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 20:26

I have finally decided to put a build log together after many months of reading all of the ones in project logs.

I initially had my U2 case built with water cooling in place. It had an i7 920 with ASUS P6 deluxe board and a watercooled 295 card. The motherboard was not water cooled and it ticked along quite nicely at about 4 GHz on the CPU.
It was fun to do but quite frankly it looked untidy

I then moved all of this to a ATCS 840... i know you may be asking why but i think i probably felt the need to just build something (it is all practice) :cool:

Anyhow i moved house and as a result i was faced with my old U2-UFO. It stared at me with willing eyes and a soft voice saying "fill me with shiny gear!" evil evil thing!

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 20:43

With this project i have the following components

Asus Rampage III Extreme Intel X58
Corsair Dominator GT 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 PC3-16000C8 2000MHz
Intel Core i7 980X
XFX ATI Radeon HD 5870 1024MB GDDR5 in X-fire
Samsung SpinPoint F1 750GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD753LJ) Samsung SpinPoint F1 750GB x 2
ASUS optical drive
120mm Enermax UCCL12 Cluster TWISTER Fan (white) x 15
plenty of bitspower compression fittings 7/16 fittings in black
7/16 white tubing (sorry rjkoneil this is one more build setting sail to crash on the rocks)
Tagan 1100w piperock power supply
EK-Supreme HF - Full Nickel CPU Water Block
Swiftech Laing D5 Vario
EK Multioption Reservoir X2 250 Advanced
EK D5 X-Top - Black Acetal
EK-FB RE3 Acetal+Nickel Block for ASUS Rampage III Extreme
MDPC-X sleeving kit and other cable tidying goodies
LED light strip from phenoptix (thank you for the inspiration here mrdbristol)
PA120.3
PA120.2 (thanks to Thermochill here as the sent me their very last one that was not 15mm fan spacing)
TA120.1

TA120.1

PA120.2

PA120.3 which was housed in all of the old builds and as you can see i am undertaking some necessary cleaning maintenance (the lovely colour is from a red dye coolant).

Yuk!

I followed up two white vinegar soaks with five boiling water flushes

FiveOfTwelve · 3 Nov 2010 at 20:45

Are you upgrading? If not, what are you going to fill it with?

FiveOfTwelve · 3 Nov 2010 at 20:47

Oh we posted at the same time. I was going to suggest a new top for your pump because its on show in that case. Way ahead of me, I see. Good work!

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 20:49

my beautiful new and shiny motherboard block

Motherboard block and fans ready to rock!

and the lady thought that she was getting milk tray! ha! (actually the GF did not find this amusing)

CPU block oooh shiny!

Arrrgh my eyes! ze goggles do nothing!

pump upgrade goodness!

love the res hate the mounts... a bit too flimsy for my liking compared to overall quality but i will address that at a later point

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 20:50

FiveOfTwelve said:
Oh we posted at the same time. I was going to suggest a new top for your pump because its on show in that case. Way ahead of me, I see. Good work!

thank you

great minds think a like and all of that tosh

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 21:00

I know you have all seen these before but this is my project log and i will post what i like! (please dont delete me mods

)

Fairly easy to use instructions and plenty of thermal compound to do the job (i used my own MX-3, TIM does what it says on the TIN)

I Have ADH-Hey Look! Something Shiny!

FiveOfTwelve · 3 Nov 2010 at 21:01

Indeed; we have quite a few of the same components

. Quite agree with your assessment of the mounts for the res. Had major issues with them today.

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 21:04

i am too afraid of overtightening them but i will come to that later

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 21:11

time for some sleeving... i just have to say that Nils is the nicest guy i have ever dealt with

big thumbs up for customer service.

OMG! where do i start...

I know lets start here and dismantle the PSU...
Q. Why do PSU's hum?
A. Because they can’t remember the words
or in this case it is because i have taken it apart

I must remember thanks to rjk who reminded me to get the removal tool!

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 21:20

Zalman fan controllers

fan controllers tidied up and sleeved by moi
the camera flash is allowing the wire colours to be seen... trust me

the cheque is in the post!

Duesix · 3 Nov 2010 at 21:26

Hard drives mounted and the fan will go on the front which leads to...

... one i made earlier in a blue peter style

The PSU is back together (it works too!) but a tip to all who sleeve their own PSU. The sleeving drastically reduces the room you have to fit the wires back in, be prepared to fight with this when trying to put the PSU case back on unless you cable tie them together as you go.

this is the pump molex sleeved and tidied

Monkey Puzzle · 3 Nov 2010 at 23:11

Good work, it's going to look lovely when it's done. Please tell me you're not going to use any anti-kink plastic springs...

How long did sleeving the psu take?

Duesix · 4 Nov 2010 at 07:53

Anti-kink coils were a mistake on my behalf on the last build... i want something that looks far neater and not cheap.

The PSU took me about 2 evenings after work to do, i would put a movie on and just sit there sleeving. The hardest part is getting the pins out of the connector and rerouting the wiring because it is always so tangled.

Duesix · 4 Nov 2010 at 07:56

This is my trusty stand in while the big boy is out of action. i7 860 with an 8800 gt on a gene 3 board with watercooling...i like quiet!

clone · 4 Nov 2010 at 09:23

Always good to se a fellow MM nice build matey

gary996 · 4 Nov 2010 at 09:47

Looking good so far. Will be keeping an eye on this

reiyushin · 4 Nov 2010 at 10:43

Nice build in progress here!

booyaka · 4 Nov 2010 at 14:05

any shots of the inside of the lian li case with watercoolling???? very intersted to see how it all fits

Duesix · 4 Nov 2010 at 18:13

booyaka said:
any shots of the inside of the lian li case with watercoolling???? very intersted to see how it all fits

i do but i will start another thread after this is done just for you