Project "Waited so Long"

[Craterloads]

Alright guys, super exited about getting this log going, not done one in a while but this one ive wanted to do for years. Been after this case for the best part of a year, simply none about since they ceased production along time ago and not many sold at the time given the price. Literally as rare as hens teeth until last week when one turned up but looked extremely dodgy so held off. Almost gave up hope but shock horror one turned up yesterday, phoned seller and seemed like a decent guy. Dropped everything and on my way for a 300mile round trip! Old fella must have been in his late fifties, took me to his shed a behold covered in dust and dirt, stored away for the last 5 years their she sat. Thankfully it's all just surface dirt and is pretty much mint underneath, not a dent scratch on the thing.

This will be a slowish project as there's a lot a planning, research and sourcing to be done.

Anyhow ill get some pics up later today before and after cleanup.

For now will leave you with a clue, case model number begins with "TNN". Sure one of you old schoolers will know what case it is

Edit - For those who haven't figured it out yet. Zalman TNN-500AF

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cases/display/zalman-tnn500af.html

Specs/Aim

Must be 100% passively cooled, no fans what so ever.

• CPU - Intel i7 4770K Haswell - Upto 130w will be fine
• Motherboard - MSI Z87 (Blue Ones) Motherboard or Asus Z87 Pro (Gold ones) (Leaning toward MSI as I think the colour match will be better)
• RAM - 16/32GB Corsair Vengeance Gold
• GPU - GTX 760 / 670 (around the 200w mark type GPUS) Perhaps higher - Looking into various ways to up the stock 75w cooling capacity. Whether that be getting a new better quality copper block made with more heat pipes fitted or trying to integrate the stock case cooling along with an additional passive card cooler. Not sure yet.
• PSU - Either re-use 400w stock PSU or switch/mod a Seasnoic 520w Platinum PSU. Full braided and must be internal.
• HDD - 12TB Mechanical hard drives / Hitachi 4TB Drives (already have 2)
• SSD - 2 x 256GB or 2 x 512GB drives. Leaning towards the cheaper OCZ drives as are only like £140 a pop. Doubt ill notice the difference.

 

[Craterloads]

Haha, spot on.

He said he got fed up with noise, was into his PC's before switching to Macs! Still queued up on his hardware though, knows his Haswell's from his IvyBridges, which was a pleasant surprise. Bad for me he knew what he had was worth some money, rather than trash 99% would have thought. Charged me a pretty penny too.

 

[Craterloads]

Ahh glad there's a few you who know there stuff from the no compromise era.

Oooooh it's one of those. Weren't these like £1k at release?

Edit: Hmmm, it's not got as many gubbins as I remember. Was there another one like this at some point? Similar idea but more thingies EVERYWHERE?

Do all modern parts fit ok with it? Just with those being where they are I'm not how well they'd line up with a modern board.


I hope I kept that suitably vague for those not in the know.

Yea that's a £1000 in 1994, imagine what it would cost today with inflation, labour, and price of aluminium.

Loads of gubbins and heatsink things

It will fit 1155/1156 therefore also 1150 Haswell which I'm planning to use, well within the TDP. 2011/X79 not sure about fitment and TDP is 130w. Cooling can handle upto 100w so Haswell is perfect. Possibly may able to cool a 4930K at stock undervolted but will be pushing it.

Main issue I have is with the GPU as the cooling is only rated to 70w or so i think, but need to check. I am primarily use for gaming and HTPC stuff, so minimum power i need would be a GTX 760. May have to hold off till 22nm stuff appears or do some modding/custom stuff.

Secondly the PSU, Haswell requires a modern PSU so that's something i have to look into also.

Great thing CPU wise these were designed to cool power hungry 100w 90nm stuff, with modern 22nm frugal Intel chips, should be a breeze.

 

[Craterloads]

300?

500

 

[Craterloads]

Ok OP your secrets out, enough of your riddles pictures please......

Taking ages to clean up, spent 5 hours last night removing thermalpaste and still got Gpu block to do so many little screws and bits and bobs. Ill stick the old pics up before cleaning shortly and the cleaned up ones later in evening possibly.

 

[Craterloads]

Ok some quick pics, here's how I received it. Not in the best of condition. But I do intend on fully restoring before progressing.

Was hoping the fade/purple was just grime, but is actually the anodizing fading, luckily is only the front door so need to get that sent off. Thinking of possibly doing it in zalman blue!!

As you can see caked in thermal grease, not just 1 type as well. Looks like someones ran out half way through and has started mixing ceramic stuff with the light grey stuff and some darker Arctic Silver type stuff!! Cant imagine that's going to help with thermals

Digging the old ram heatsink colour combo, will deffo be going gold myself or may try salvages the covers off these. Saying that cheekily, since two sticks were faulty, I requested an RMA with crucial and they have accepted Lifetime warranty after all.

One caster completely seized and rusted, which is an annoyance as is set to lock so cant move the thing about on the wheels. Luckily a quick Google and found an identical replacement. Footmaster GD-40s, same model as the ones used on the case. £22 delivered.

 

[Craterloads]

Finally finished cleaning, stripped it completely apart, washed and have begun reassembling. Needed to be done as was filthy but more importantly I can see clearly what I'm working with without the grime. Condition is good considering age, no dints or scratches but a few things have crept up that will need addressing.

My goal before starting project is to fully restore case, which will consist of: -

1. Replacing seized castor - Replacement found
2. Front door re-anodizing. Either stock black or Zalman blue (perhaps ill request a Photoshop of the case with blue door in place to see what it looks like)
3. Northbridge Heatsink - Small heat sink need re-anodizing blue as again has faded.
4. Edit - And source a iMon remote which seems quite difficult

re-assembly. Nice and shiny!

 

[Craterloads]

Updates

Case completely cleaned and reassembled

Found a localish anodizing place

In touch with Marc @ Liquid Extasy to custom design and build a Universal HeatPipe block for GPU

Hi guys,

I'm currently in planning stage of my new project to build a 100% passively cooled system using the Zalman TNN-500AF

Currently the GPU block is rather puny, made entirely out of aluminium and maximum cooling capacity is 75w via 3 heat pipes.

I would like to have a much beefier version of this with minimum 6 heat pipes, capable of cooling a 150w + GPU.

My 3d modelling skills are none existent and my Photoshop skills just as bad

I've been in touch with Marc @ Liquid Extasy and he has said he would be interested in taking up this job, so before I take it further would like to get a better grasp of things.

This is the original Zalman HeatPipe Block (click to enlarge)



I wish to create a block with minimum 6 holes for heatpipes, pref 8. Heat pipes are 6mm in diameter, and assume holes in the block are too (but will double check)

This is how it is layed out in case, and how it works.



I would like to use for example the EK-VGA Supremacy as a base for my new block, perhaps with a widening at the top so can get more heat pipes holes in there. This is a rough Photoshop of my vision (please don't laugh)



Please could anyone more experienced in the field offer a helping hand with a better design or suggestion to mine, and perhaps a better mock up than my poor Photoshop attempt. (the above images were sent to Marc @ Liquid Extasy and he kind of understand my vision, but since he speaks no English its a little difficult to grasp if we are on the same page. So if I can offer a clearer vision / mock up it would help greatly)

many thanks

Marc said he'll come up with a design and send me over file to have a look and maybe suggest some changes if need be.