Inspirations

Before I start my worklog on my upcoming watercooling build I would like to thank all the people that are involved in helping me with my doubts & giving me advice since I was a total noob hehehe...

Big thanks to Overclock.net, the members in the water cooling forum is probably the most helpful people that I ever meet online. Special thanks to Martin & Skinnee Labs for all the unbiased testing data that they put out online for people like us. Without their data, making decision would be extremely hard for me & I will probably end up opening so many threads asking questions around instead of reading.

Thanks to Martin & Bundymania for their reviews on radiators, helped me a lot on choosing the right radiator. Biggest inspiration on why I want to watercool is probably form everybody awesome build that I saw in the Water Cooling Gallery in OCN & XtremeSystems. Really motivated me since its so aesthetically pleasing. Thanks to Million Dollar Pc too, the gallery in there is like porn hahaha...

Thanks to Irie too, gave me some inspiration on the luminous panel. Thanks to the members in forum.lowyat.net too, without them getting watercooling parts would be my biggest challenge.

Note: Feel free to skip the first few pages, its more of collecting parts here & there, unboxing this & that. No major updates & also ignore the "crazymofomodz" trademark, decided to stop putting that half way of the worklog. Didn't really care if anyone wanted to use my images or not

Current Progress:

*Reserved*

This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 31 2013, 02:51 AM

My old rig...

Please ignore the un-sleeved cables, cheap mobo & the ghetto screw driver support.







This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 09:54 PM

Fittings...









This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 10:10 PM

Got the reservoir already





Just a quick unboxing on the NZXT Hue & XSPC Raystorm.







This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 10:16 PM

RX360 Unboxing & initial thoughts

Unboxing the radiator was fast. This was how it came, packed in the retail box.






I like the matte black finish it has, feels different when you touch it. I even tried putting it in front of my air conditioner & it becomes so cold in less than a minute.






This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 10:20 PM

1st. must be good.

Okay flushing time....











Radiator build & paint quality is excellent. Price is cheaper than other radiators. The end tank for mine isn't completely flat, its a little swollen but maybe this is just for my unit? So far I tested there isn't any leaks but will check again once I get my pump. Radiator is quite thick so check if it fits for your casing or not before buying.

This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 10:27 PM

Unboxing the Switch 810



First look is nice, I like the black matte paint feel to it. It feels very nice when you touch it.



I would prefer if the window is square instead of this shape. Top panel build quality is bad. So flimsy, in fact the clip came broken. Basically there is two tiny plastic holding the top panel for its quick removal feature. All you need to do is press the panel & pop it out but 1 of my plastic clip was broken so it's very hard to get it in place. Its still useable but it takes really long time to find the hole to put it back in its place.



This is what I am talking about.



Cable management is great in this case, lots of big rubber grommets. All the cables are black colour so that is a good thing, even for the fans too. It came with a fan hub, so you can plug all your fans over here. Little things like this makes the building experience easier.



This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 10:37 PM

Another feature is the quick removal side panel feature. Basically all you need to do is push this screw downwards & pop that side panel off. It gets stuck sometimes, probably need to spray the mechanism with WD-40 to lubricate it. You can also secure the side panel with two more screws if you desire to do so.



This is another great feature. It allows you to mount your hdd/ssd into your 5.25 drive bay. Just mount the hdd into the tray & slot it into the drive bay. It will connect to this pcb & you can plug the cables into this.



Notice those holes at the drive bay? Basically if you mount a radiator that is too long, your fans with push pull setup can still be installed. The holes allows airflow for the fans.



Front fan filter comes out easily. Just push it & pop it out. All the fan filters in the casing is great! The filter holes is quite small so this will ensure less dust particles will enter but this will add more restriction to the airflow though. I dont mind because the previous cooler master casing that I was using, the fan filter was shit. The holes was quite big & the casing gets dusty overtime.



Got new stuff in the mail today. Ordered some thermal paste & modding tool kit.



I ordered silver but I got black instead, not a big deal...just colour difference. Quality seems reasonable, cant tell much until I started sleeving with it.



This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 11:17 PM

Time to remove that stock intel cooler! Cooler, gtfo...



Just finished cleaning it with alcohol...thats right, intel i5 2400. Made a mistake last time & didn't get the 2500K but I am going to sell this off soon once haswell is out so no big deal. This processor is still pretty good though...



Installed to the motherboard. Before you guys say anything, I just want to say that this motherboard is just a temporary solution. Will be changing to ROG motherboard when haswell is out



Oh my, that motherboard looks so tiny in that casing hahaha...





This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 11:25 PM

Easy removable hdd tray is cool





Where do you think the NZXT hue sits well? I think the 3rd bay looks better...



3 of the leds on the led strip are not working as it should. I believe the wire inside the strip is loose or something because there is a specific spot when I press it, it works otherwise it shows a different colour.



Drilled some holes for the radiator. Trying to use magnets to collect the metal shavings.



This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 11:40 PM

can wait to see those "Monsters" performance in your setup

Injured myself while drilling...







The psu cable looks nice this way. Its not the cable that I am going to use though, this was my previous sleeving job. I still need to make my custom cable because this cable length is too short & I am not planning to use any extenders.



Actually I wanted to go for this setup, where I have the cables on top of the reservoir but This makes the cable look too long. Maybe later if I get a new motherboard that is bigger in size it will look better. Will see how it goes...



This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 31 2013, 12:38 AM

So I decided to add some red highlights to my casing since it will be an ASUS ROG theme build. So I started with striping down the casing.



Next was to remove the casing feet...



This is the top panel that I removed previously. It was 2 plastic joined together with more than 10 screws so had to open it in order to remove the mesh.



This mesh is from the bottom part of the casing, i.e the casing plastic foot. It was quite simple, after removing the 4 screws from the bottom you can then pull out the plastic feet. Then you can use a plier to bend the mesh notches straight. After doing it for all then just push it & it should pop right out.



After applying some red coating to it...



So this is where the problem came, first of all I was painting above the original coating & without any primer. On top of that I applied too thick coats already so the next day I wasn't very happy with the result.



This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 31 2013, 12:42 AM

The next day I started sanding all the red coating I applied last night. I sanded until the original coating was removed. Cleaned it & started coating it with red paint under the sun. It was very hot so the paint dries up quite fast. I applied thin coating every 10mins or so. Sorry didnt take picture of this process too, plus I was sweating like hell under the hot sun so yeah...

Tip: Use a primer, but if you are a poorfag & cheapskate like me then just sand it all the way so that your paint can stick better to the material surface. Make sure you do in under a hot sun for it to dry faster, I did the painting at night & it didnt want to dry. The next day the result didnt turn out nice but after re-doing it under the sun it turned out better.







I like the red highlights at the top but when I cover it with the top panel, only half of it will be visible. Plus I think its not enough red yet, still thinking what to paint, not much choice I have because some of the materials like top cover etc are made of those rubberized matte black material so painting that is not an option I guess. I am thinking of putting some red leds for under glow effect & maybe on the top so the lights will bleed to the side and gives it a nice effect.

Haven't decide yet, because I dont want to overdo the red colour otherwise it will look too red & ugly. Will see how it goes with the flow hehehe, let me get some corsair fans first & fan controller.

This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 31 2013, 12:47 AM

Wonder how the NZXT chasis will be modded o.o....

wont be modding it. Maybe just need to drill couple of holes & thats about it I think. Will see how it goes with progress, if modding is needed then will give it a shot...

I might spray the mesh to add some red accent to it, but all that is at final stages once I have all the stuff fitted in.

u buy the raystorm WB only? or kit?

ya waterblock only... why?

This post has been edited by infernoaswen: Dec 30 2013, 10:17 PM