computer watercooling idea...

[KSDbass]

I'm looking at watercooling my computer, but I got to thinking. You can only cool the water down to room temperature, because that's how the radiator works. But what if i got a radiator that was meant for an 80mm fan, and just covered it in the cold side of peltier coolers? I think 120mm might be better, but I'm not sure yet. Any thoughts?

[Manifest]

I don't know much about computers but I thought this video was cool:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=PtufuXLvOok

Mineral oil cooled computer :eek:

[KSDbass]

I actually saw that on a website, and the problem the had was that there was no convenient way to cool the mineral oil down, so the computer had great cooling until the mineral oil had absorbed all of the heat it could.

[Spyharpy]

I have an Apple G5 tower (quad processor) I bought nearly two years ago and it has liquid cooling built in. The manual shows the location of the tiny radiator and piping where the water circulates. I believe the current lineup of the fastest desktops still utilize that type of cooling.

[KSDbass]

Yep, Dell and Apple both watercool their top of the line computers. But I'm overclocking, and I want my stuff to be as cold as I can get it, so I'm trying to use peltier coolers to cool the water down below room temperature.

[A.P.F.]

I would use a pelt directly on the CPU and WC the remainder, that way you have maximum cooling on the hottest component and good cooling on the remainder. I would also be inclined to have a dedicated loup for the chipset and memory.

[KSDbass]

I didn't even think of that, thanks Percival. Would I need to cool the hotside of the Peltier though?

[Zwaplat]

Cooling your CPU and graphics card with Peltier elements and then cooling the hot side of them with WC is the usual way it's done. The other way round is a bit silly, because you'd have to have a system to cool the Peltiers as well.

There's also a system for the real overclocking nutters, which is Vapochill. It uses a system like on a freezer, and can cool a CPU idle to -40°C or something like that.

Of course, the chilliest you can get your CPU is with liquid nitrogen...if you have a large enough supply, that is. :D

A good site for reading up on hardware and modding: http://www.madshrimps.be
If you ever come across an article on how to keep water cooling ducts and systems sterile: yes, I did write that.

[KSDbass]

I'm pretty sure it was the website that they did the mineral cooling where they also used liquid nitrogen to OC an Intel to like 6 or 7 GHz, it was crazy. I've heard of the vapochill systems, but i'm trying to keep this project reasonably priced. The pelts are going to cost me $36, and the watercooling system won't be too bad, I'm going to make a reservoir, and i've already got the tubing.

Right now, with two desk fans and the stock cooling, my 8800GTS is idling at 125 degrees... I haven't gamed with it yet, but Crysis is installing, and so is 3dmark06. We'll see how hot it actually gets.

[A.P.F.]

I didn't even think of that, thanks Percival. Would I need to cool the hotside of the Peltier though?

As Zwaplat mentioned, a WC circuit on the hot side of the pelt is quite efficient. In the old days, the hot side was cooled with air. If you have lots of coin to throw at the problem, a VapoChill is the way to go.

[Fred Sanford]

I work in IT and work on Cisco stuff and servers daily.

The last thing I would do is water cool anything.

To each his/her own I guess.

[KSDbass]

Well, I would definitely run the setup for a few days before I put it in my computer to check for leaks, and since water has a higher specific heat capacity than water, I'm up for it.

[Echo63]

my brother is running a liquid cooling system in his computer, he did have a large cooling tower sitting beside his case but he recently changed it too a different unit.
i will get some pics next time i visit him, and post them for you guys