Watercooling a full Antec 1200 case

[Tattysnuc]

...I have just ordered two Gentle Typhoons 1850's for the h60 and will try mounting these as intakes rather an exhausts (though with the hot air being expelled from the case by the gpu's, i'm not sure how much difference this will have.

Soon be here by tomorrow so will let you know.

Is it here yet?

[1stRaven]

Nope. Text from DPD/Scan show it will be here between 18:00 and 19:00 today.

[Pob255]

Antec did make a large 200mm rad for the top bigboy fan, however getting hold of them in the uk wasn't easy.
http://store.antec.com/Product/cooli...5-75210-7.aspx

It's aluminium unfortunately so you will have to be careful with your choice of coolant to avoid galvanisation
I think nickel plated (internal not external) blocks would be ok

edit: not sure what your side panel is like for space but zalman made a fan bracket http://www.zalman.com/eng/product/Pr...ad.asp?idx=225 http://www.quietpc.com/gb-en-gbp/pro...ories/br123ff1 mainly designed to hold a fan over the cpu cooler but can also be used to hold a fan beside the graphics cards to help increase air flow

[1stRaven]

Yeah, used one of those zalmans before but the side panel fan is pretty much over both cards anyway.

That 200mm rad looks interesting. Would it be possible that that 200mm rad under the 200mm fan, along with another 2.120 rad (maybe an extra thick one - http://specialtech.co.uk/spshop/cust...-pid-7874.html ) mounted across both the rear exhausts is enough to cool both the cpu and dual gpu's?

If so, then I just need to find a way of mounting a res and pump....

[Pob255]

off hand I don't know but I'd guess not, a single 120 on the lower fan, as you currently have should be ok

[1stRaven]

So look what turned up...

The Apache fan was one I have had sat around for a while and I thought to test it in the side window and remove an older 120mm fan that was in there (no idea what make - no markings on it)



All fitted now. Typhoons have replaced the stock Corsair H60 fan and Antec 1200 fan in a push/pull config. Also swapped the direction of airflow so they act as an intake rather than exhaust.

At idle



Handbrake cpu encoding running for 5 mins



Results speak volumes really.

[Tattysnuc]

Dang! Tha's pretty condemning for the fans you had prerviously. a drop of 9C on load is pretty amazing! Am I to assume the the whole watercooling project is now scrapped, or are you just going to look at a 2.120 rad and a 1.200 rad to fit internally?

I've not seen any 200mm fans that warrant this as a viable solution - anything over 120mm was pretty much poo-pooed by Bit-Tech in their review, which has been the only decent comparison that I've found online to date.

See http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/coo...ize-case-fan/6

The Antec looks and sounds ok until you see what it can do vs the Gentle Typhoons.

To consider to leave as much room in your case as possible. Using 30mm m2.5 screws (or whatever size the threads in your rad are), sandwich the radiator in a push pull configurations, but with one fan mounted to the outside of the case. You can put a fan grill over it if you want it to look funky. It's quite discrete, but you'd be surprised how much additional space that that gives you. It can be quite a natty little trick if you find that the room where the 200mm fan is mounted inteferes with the 2.120 radiator mounting.

Also, if you consider the Quick release fittings, don;t go for anything less that the VL3N. There rest are just a little too restrictive. I've been waiting for ages to find 3 sets of VL3N's in stock - 1 set per rig (2 rigs) plus 1 set that I can attach so that I can drain from the rig, but the most specialtech have had in stock is 2 of the males, which leaves me then having to buy a new set.

What's the noise of those tyhpoon 1850's like? I've only got 2 in my case a I'm not sure now if they're 1850's or 1450's.

[Blackmage]

1stRaven how did you get your AMD overdrive to allow clocks pass 875mhz?

[1stRaven]

Dang! Tha's pretty condemning for the fans you had prerviously. a drop of 9C on load is pretty amazing! Am I to assume the the whole watercooling project is now scrapped, or are you just going to look at a 2.120 rad and a 1.200 rad to fit internally?

I've not seen any 200mm fans that warrant this as a viable solution - anything over 120mm was pretty much poo-pooed by Bit-Tech in their review, which has been the only decent comparison that I've found online to date.

See http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/coo...ize-case-fan/6

The Antec looks and sounds ok until you see what it can do vs the Gentle Typhoons.

To consider to leave as much room in your case as possible. Using 30mm m2.5 screws (or whatever size the threads in your rad are), sandwich the radiator in a push pull configurations, but with one fan mounted to the outside of the case. You can put a fan grill over it if you want it to look funky. It's quite discrete, but you'd be surprised how much additional space that that gives you. It can be quite a natty little trick if you find that the room where the 200mm fan is mounted inteferes with the 2.120 radiator mounting.

Also, if you consider the Quick release fittings, don;t go for anything less that the VL3N. There rest are just a little too restrictive. I've been waiting for ages to find 3 sets of VL3N's in stock - 1 set per rig (2 rigs) plus 1 set that I can attach so that I can drain from the rig, but the most specialtech have had in stock is 2 of the males, which leaves me then having to buy a new set.

What's the noise of those tyhpoon 1850's like? I've only got 2 in my case a I'm not sure now if they're 1850's or 1450's.

Watercooling can move back a bit but think it is the way forward. Still unsure that the two smaller rads in the case will provide enough cooling so I think an external rad box is the way for forward, plus it means I can move the stuff between cases a lot easier if I need to.

Noise levels are fine - I don't tend to notice fan noise anyway and I think the other 6 fans are probably louder than the typhoons anyway.

The AMD overdrive has always allowed me those clock speeds. never changes anything from stock those as if I do, i get strange block shapes over the screen when gaming.

[Pob255]

I've not seen any 200mm fans that warrant this as a viable solution - anything over 120mm was pretty much poo-pooed by Bit-Tech in their review, which has been the only decent comparison that I've found online to date.

See http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/coo...ize-case-fan/6

The Antec looks and sounds ok until you see what it can do vs the Gentle Typhoons.

That test they do is heavily pressure influenced (as I discovered when I did my mini fan round up)
As the bag fills the back pressure massively increases and as most 200mm fans don't do well vs back pressure and the gentle typhoon does very well vs back pressure I'm not surprised by those results.

As air cooling extraction fans and general moving air through your case, 200mm fans work very well, trying to push air into an enclosed space they do badly.

The performance of the Gentle Typhoon vs back pressure is one of the big reasons it's rated as one of the best fans for radiators.

[1stRaven]

Just a quick update on this. Case was getting quite dusty so cleaned it up this morning and now the cpu, is running again, around 8-10 degrees above the motherboard temp.

Seems strange but fans are working, flow is correct and nothing has changed (apart from having some compressed air blown through the fans and the grills cleaned.)

load temps have also risen (motherboard is at 29 degrees, cpu is at 65. )

[PurpleShift]

This makes me miss my antec case, but my 350d is nice and small

[dfour]

]
sorry couldnt resist over 3 years since last post.

[1stRaven]

A bit of a random bump. Brings back memories though.

For the record, I never did go the watercooling route. Upgraded to a single card and removed all of the hard drives into their own server.