Dragon Orb 3 MOD

[Toysrme]

Ok. So I've been quite pleased with my dragon orb 3. It's kept my athlon XP 1500+ running at stock voltage @ 1627(10.5*155) happy for three weeks now.
(Not correct, running at 1.8 volts, sorry)

However, just like that damned "Delta" that I had the "pleasure" to own and the 7000 everflow fan are both just to loud...

So! In keeping with the "Let's slap a big fan on my heatsink!" That's what I've done. I've slapped on a Sunnon 120mm fan.

For the twist, no Adapter is used. (Come on folks, most are poorly designed and who on earth would pay $8 when you could just buy an 8 cent funnel and have fun with that)

The fan is mounted on the side of my Lian-Li PC-67 case directly opposing the CPU. A mesh grill is used to keep my fingers happy.

I made a simple air duct running from the high speed fan that runs 1/8 inch around the blue fin's of the Orb.
The duct extends 1/8 inch onto te fins.

Now the sound level is better, the fan is still loud. It's just not as loud. It is also more pleasing, altho that's subjective, I think everyone agrees the loud sound of air moving is much better than the "hair dryer" whine of the high"er" speed 60mm's.

Now for the Cooling aspect.

Temperature is measured from the diode on my KG7-Raid. The Lian-Li fans are set to high. Load is produced running Sandra's Burn in wizzard for 1/2 hour.
CPU at idle 110f
CPU under load 115f
Case at idle 83f
Case under Load 86f

Before
CPU at idle was 113f
CPU under load 119f
Case at idle 86f
Case under load 92f

My case temps varry wildly, the reason being is that my case sensor is suspended via thread directly in the airflow comming off the orb.

This was pretty much just for fun, and to aleviate a small problem. I think it was successful.

I'm currently researching enclosing the orb and making possibly the a "Water Orb" by running water through the fins like W Pierce did with his silver orb. This is a future project, but I do plan on getting to it.
(inspired by seeing an old Pentium heatsink in a plexyglass box used as a waterblock, THEN Pierce's article)

Feedback other than Orb's suck would be appreciated as this is my first attempt at any modding.

Watercooling is my next step. First the water orb just to screw around, but if that dosnt work well off it comes and on to swiftech <g>

[RangerJoe34]

well your temps seem fine considering on the cpu that you have.

and not all converters are crap, go to hardcorecooling.com and they have all sorts of good stuff

[Toysrme]

Sorry, just getting alittle jab in at some of the poorly designed adaptors. Damn! If you look you can find that between 1/4 and 1/2 of them are nothing but boxes... Ya, that really helps airflow <g>

Sigh I'm a hypocrit tho, I gave in early and got one from the coolerguys(60-80mm). It didn't line up on the dragon orb at all, but I did mount it in true University of Alabama Drum-Line fashion with duct tape(there's a reason NASA is in Huntsville LoL) and just for the hell of it used a bent coat hanger to give it alittle "attitude" stregnth.

OK that coathanger was a joke, but cooling it was alittle softer than the stock setup and the above posted. Noise wise, no shrill, but more air moving. Using the scientific "hand" test and, "see-which-fan-can-blow-up-my-college-dorm-sized-garbage-bag-test the fastest" the 80mm ultra high speed Sunon won out over the 7k everflow on the D Orb. However cooling was the same, Apparantly due to the lower pressure comming through the cone. And I did put a strip of tape running down the screw cutouts to make the entire inside "flush".

I would leave that option open to people like me that just want less noise, but not looking for more performance. But like you can read anywhere on the net, something like 60mm-92mm would be better suited if you want more performance.

Anyways, I pawned the Sunon off an a friend that had just bought an sk6 for his 1.2 athlon(he dosn't o/c) but he was tired of his "damn delta" also.

The water-dragon-orb may progress faster than I anticipated. Will have a free hour tomorrow(today now) I think I'll run by a friend that's a prof in the Eng college and see what he can do (I can't wield, only soldier :'( imagine, a young alabama male saying that, sigh).
If anyone wants to donate the rest of a watercooling setup =) feel free LoL!

[The Overclocker]

i am trying to imagine a dragon orb with a 120mm fan on it, have you tryed taking the fan on the orb off, if you dont the air from the 120mm may fry it by turning it too fast

[Intraveinous]

Orbs suck...



hehehe... :D :p :D

Nice job man, which 120mm case fan are you using? Are the fans in the DragonOrp still in the Heatsink and plugged in? What'd you use to cut the hole?
Pics would be cool as well...
Peace
John

[Toysrme]

Pics I can't help you with, So far a digital camera aint in my college budget heh.

Sunon 120x120x38mm, 4 pin, (KD1212PMB16A)
3100 rpm +/- 10%
108 CFM of Air
42 dba
4 Pin connector

No the Dorb fan is gone, the entire point of this was to get rid of it <g> I just can't take the noise of these high pitched fans.

A hole saw was borrowed from a friend to cut the hole.

BTW I will also admit I cut it too large by just a hair, I should problably do something about that, but...

[Toysrme]

I guess I wasn't that clear. The 120mm fan is NOT on the D-orb, It's attached to the case opposite of the D-orb. Air travels down a small duct onto the d-orb.

And again, no the 7k everflow D-orb fan was taken off, it would serve no purpose to leave it on and the idea was to get rid of the whine and keep roughly the same performance...

[Sonny]

I was planning to do something similar to this & I also got an DOrb3. It's wasn't to have a silent system but to get better cooling. When I got my new case I couldnt bring myself to punch holes on the side of the case. I got an idea for you. Do you know what a velocity stack is? Something like 2 funnels facing each other & joined by a cylinder. It'll help keep the velocity up & keep the flow of air very smooth & it'll also minimize the deadspot in the center of that 120mm fan you got. The reason why most funnels fail is that all they do is try to concentrate the air into a smaller area W/O any compensation for the exit of air. You usually loose some pressure & it is also a flow restriction. A velocity stack will limit these problems by a huge amount. Could you post some screen caps of your temps at load & idle?