2021/04/25 11:51:40
Cool GTX
tom's Hardware Best Thermal Paste for CPUs 2021: 90 Pastes Tested and Ranked
 
temp are very close, so application technique become the biggest possible difference
 
a quick look at the companies website fail to disclose any specific application limits
 
KPx
 
PK-3
 
If your ready to build, use what you have.  - it is not clear if you were going to buy PK-3 or already have some
 
If your worried about spreading the PK-3, do a test run & check your contact pattern
2021/04/25 13:06:54
B0baganoosh
I now have both lol. I bought the pk-3, but the block came with kpx.
2021/04/26 17:47:45
B0baganoosh
Reservoir came in today. It's beautiful. I hooked up the whole tube and just ran some distilled water to test the pump.





2021/04/26 20:04:14
driam
One step closer!
 
What is the small power supply you are using? Looks very convenient for testing.
2021/04/27 03:19:14
B0baganoosh
driam
One step closer!
 
What is the small power supply you are using? Looks very convenient for testing.


https://www.digikey.com/short/mz0pvtrd

It is a little 35W 12VDC power supply that I wired a molex connector and switch to just to run the pump. Much easier to test the pump with than using the psu from the computer lol. It was lying around from another project.
2021/04/28 19:34:49
SterisTheGreen
That's a really cool name, very fitting! 
2021/05/01 13:04:48
driam
Thank you for the info on that power supply. 


2021/05/10 20:43:06
B0baganoosh
I took a risk today. The motherboard is due in tomorrow and I figured I wasn't going to want to do everything in one stint, so I spent a few hours today and disassembled the old build to start the upgrade process.
 
Getting ready:

 
Disassembled:

I left the PSU in as the shroud is a colosal pain to take out and put back in. I think most of the cables will stay relatively close to where they are anyway so that should be fine. Bye Bye optical drives.
 
Push side installed on 420mm rad:

 
Mocked up the water loop and cut tubes. I may have to trim a little off the CPU tubes when the motherboard is in, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there. Hooked everything up, got two pull fans installed on top of the rad, and started the leak test:

This case has a wireless phone charger in the front-top of the case and there isn't really room for a 3rd pull-fan. Also, I ran into my first actual snag. I had 3 extra 120mm fans that match the case, but they're not PWM and their cables are too short to run to the fan controller that mounts to the back of the motherboard. They came with a little splitter cable that hooks to ATX power and has a 12V, 7V, and 5V connector set (one for each fan). That basically forces them to run steady at three different speeds, so I hooked up the bottom one that half-blows under the PSU shroud, half blows under the pump/HDD at 5V (lowest speed), the middle one at 12V (highest speed as it has most direct airflow channel), and the top one at 7V (medium speed as I didn't want it creating a weird vortex issue with the intake for the 420mm. I may switch the top and bottom fan speeds after I power everything on and see what it feels like in there. Ideally, I'll get some extenders and run them all to the controller as it has 4 DC-fan headers for chassis fans like these. Or maybe I'll end up getting some new 140mm PWM fans for some quieter airflow...again, I'll have to see how it performs.
 
Also, this reservoir is snug as a bug in here. Had to slide it out to fill it lol:

 
leak testing:

 
Other note, with how snug it is, I opted for a little extra service loop in the tubes to make sure I have room to slide it out for filling and to pull out the valve on the right to drain it. I had one of those 1L squeeze bottles with the thin nozzle on it that you can put right in the hole in top of the reservoir for filling so that was super handy here. Also, my little power supply with switch soldered into the output was wonderful again. Switching the 36W supply output on and off is much more comfortable than cycling the 1000W supply on the AC mains repeatedly lol.
 
Definitely a learning experience. I have what looks like a tiny chunk of tubing stuck in my CPU block now........dag-nabit!...so I'm not sure what to do about that. I am currently running just distilled water and going to drain it to put in EK clear premix...is it possible that the little chunk will just drain with the water? How do I get that out of there?
 
Edit: a further note...the whole motherboard tray is going to have to move down at least a half-inch. This case allows that to happen relatively easy...assuming I can get to all the screws with the PSU shroud in place lol. I just figured someone might have noticed that the rear fan-hole (which will be cleaned before the 2080 Super hybrid radiator is put back) is currently in a place where it may interfere with the 420mm rad-fan above it.
2021/05/10 21:13:11
driam
You could take the CPU water block apart, optimus made their blocks easy to open and clean from the looks of it. Better to get that rubber piece out now, then when it goes back to the pump, or worse the radiator. 
2021/05/12 07:54:06
B0baganoosh
The UPS driver showed up at 8:30PM last night with the motherboard. so much for "out for delivery, expected between 12:00PM and 3:00PM" lol. Oh well, they're busy and a question he asked me made it seem like he was a new driver or new to this route, so I definitely wasn't mad at the driver. It just meant that I couldn't actually finish the build last night. Some progress though.
 
So here's the little chunk in the CPU block:

 
I drained it, took apart the block, which was easy...then put it back together, which was a little bit more complicated getting the outer O-ring to go back into that shape. Some gentle prodding and wiggling prevailed. I just didn't want to break the thing.
 
Board in, CPU mounted, RAM in, most connections made:

 

 
The plastic film on the motherboard heatsinks is a real pain. They perforated the edges and covered the tops and sides (in between the HS and PCIe slots), which means when you try to peal it off, it tears and leaves all these pieces behind instead of coming off as one chunk. No idea why they did that lol. I have to borrow some fine-point tweezers to get those things out of there.
 
Some notes so far:
The PSU shroud, while looking great, is just a horrible thing to work around. It makes everything snug and hard to reach. It also was designed in after the case was designed (it comes with Rev 2, but not with this version of the case, they just offered it as an add-on after they designed it) and you cannot easily get to the screws behind the power supply. I did this install with it in place for that reason. I may at a future date just drill a hole in the motherboard tray below the motherboard for screw-driver pass-through so I can get the thing out of there easier. The bottom edge of the motherboard sits below the edge of the PSU shroud (mainly because I had to lower the motherboard tray to make clearance for the radiator fans). Now that It is all connected (which was a pain), I have to see if I can raise the motherboard tray back up because right now I can't get my NVMe adaptor card into the bottom PCIe slot. I had to put it in the second slot, which will limit me to 8X on each slot.
 
I don't know how to get the pre-attached heat-sink off my M.2 drive to be able to use the motherboard slots. Heat gun? Any tips there would be helpful. If I could install this drive into one of those places, I wouldn't need to worry about the PCI-e slot usage.
 
I realized that I have no 4-pin molex connectors in the case currently to use for the pump power lol. I need to add that accessory cable, which...getting things connected under this PSU shroud means sticking my fingers into that little opening in the middle there and about a 2" gap along the bottom of the rear panel with the other hand to try and shimmy connections in and out of the supply. Oh what a joy. 
 
I ordered some 45° fitting adaptors for the pump housing. The tubes currently stick out too far to put the glass panel back on and I'd have to kink them to get them to fit right. Putting a water loop just took up all the room this case had lol. I ordered some fan cable extensions while I was at it so that I could have the front fans controlled by temperature instead of just always-on at different speeds-each fan.
 
I learned that I cannot fit a 3080 hybrid in here now. I thought there'd be room for that radiator on the front, but not so much. I mean...maybe...I could get angled fittings for the top rad, re-route the tubes, and fit the 240mm rad to the right of my reservoir...maybe...but getting the tubes to reach and look nice would be a chore. I'd likely have to disconnect the reservoir tubes and run a tube from the hybrid rad on each side of the pump housing. That might look rather terrible. Unless I could squeeze those tubes under that hard drive. A little room there and the hybrid tubes are pretty small.
 
One thing I found concerning: The back of the motherboard has traces around the CPU mounting bracket holes. You have to put a metal nut there to mount the CPU-mount posts. I feel like they needed to leave some more clearance there and it makes me nervous. I may need to find some nylon or fiber washers to put there so I can sleep at night.
 
OMG...so it has bothered me for years that on the GPU I have, it says "GEFORCE RTX" on it, but there's been this weird "HYBRID" lighting behind that sticker that doesn't line up with the letters for "GEFORCE RTX"...I was like "this is the weirded lighting choice...really don't know why they did that." the "GEFORCE RTX" was a sticker....a STICKER...I did not know that. I removed said sticker and there's a beautiful metal-feature that says EVGA Hybrid. Way better. I can't wait to see what it is actually supposed to look like lit up lol.
 
Still to do:
-install all the SATA cables (1 SSD on the back of the motherboard tray and two HDDs still in here (one under shroud now).
-Install 4-pin Molex accessory cable from PSU to pump.
-tidy up all the cables, get the far-side panel on.
-drain loop, put 45° fitting adaptors on pump, put EK clear pre-mix fluid in (just running distilled for the moment).
-Oh! Turn the thing on! See what happens lol.
-tweak, tune, test, repeat until satisfied.

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