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Want to build a chillbox

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freak11

Member
Joined
Jun 8, 2008
Location
Sillicon Valley
Hi guys,
I want to build a chillbox (air conditioned air cooling system). However, I dont know where to start. What do I need to buy and where? I am currently living in the UK. Can anyone help?
 
One word.......condensation. I've not used this method, but if you go too low on the temp, you'll need to insulate the board and components.
 
One word.......condensation. I've not used this method, but if you go too low on the temp, you'll need to insulate the board and components.

I dont agree because if the box is 100% airtight and sealed then condensation is not a problem at all. The only problem is to get the box 100% airtight because the cool temperature creates a vacuum inside the box and this puts pressure from the outside.
 
Outside air doesn't matter, when you introduce heat and cold to a certain degree, you will get condensation.

nope, it is still not correct. this will only occur in an open system because moisture has to come from the outside. When the box is 100% airtight there wont be any condensation that harms your hardware.
 
nope, it is still not correct. this will only occur in an open system because moisture has to come from the outside. When the box is 100% airtight there wont be any condensation that harms your hardware.

I have to attemp a correction.

If it's a sealed box with humid air, and the CPU block is supplied with chilled water, condensation can happen if the hoses and CPU block are below xx temp vs the humidity of the sealed air. Simple dewpoint calculations (7th grade weather class) can determine that.

If it's a sealed box with pure dry nitrogen, oxengen, goober gas, then we'll say condensation is a non issue.
 
For the OP. I think what your saying is you want to put the rad into a cooled stream of air from an AC window unit? It's been done and is viable. Make sure you have air over the rad as normal with fans, and only turn the AC unit on till the PC has been on a bit, you shouldn't have any problems unless your humidity runs over 85% or so. Check your hoses and fittings for condensation tho once you get it up n running.

You can get some awesome temps for overclocking with a bit of care. I'd hate to run a window AC unit 24/7 on high, the room temp could get cold and the electric bill......

I live in Vegas, it got to 100F today, not even warm yet. My house stays at 79-81 for the whole house AC. My PC room with a fan blowing hall air into it 24/7 still got to 89F with a 3 hour load test on the CPU/GPU (rig in sig). I'd love to toss a window AC unit for just my room, but the noise from the thing and a $80 increase in my elec bill keeps me from doing it. I just buy big rads to keep temps on my rig decent. Raddage is cheaper.
 
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hi,
thanks for the advice but why do i have to run the pc first before running the ac unit???

If my pc is overclocked, wouldnt it make more sense to run the Ac unit first to cool the components down and then start my pc? am i missing something?



For the OP. I think what your saying is you want to put the rad into a cooled am of air from an AC window unit? It's been done and is viable. Make sure you have air over the rad as normal with fans, and only turn the AC unit on till the PC has been on a bit, you shouldn't have any problems unless your humidity runs over 85% or so. Check your hoses and fittings for condensation tho once you get it up n running.

You can get some awesome temps for overclocking with a bit of care. I'd hate to run a window AC unit 24/7 on high, the room temp could get cold and the electric bill......

I live in Vegas, it got to 100F today, not even warm yet. My house stays at 79-81 for the whole house AC. My PC room with a fan blowing hall air into it 24/7 still got to 89F with a 3 hour load test on the CPU/GPU (rig in sig). I'd love to toss a window AC unit for just my room, but the noise from the thing and a $80 increase in my elec bill keeps me from doing it. I just buy big rads to keep temps on my rig decent. Raddage is cheaper.
 
I have to attemp a correction.

If it's a sealed box with humid air, and the CPU block is supplied with chilled water, condensation can happen if the hoses and CPU block are below xx temp vs the humidity of the sealed air. Simple dewpoint calculations (7th grade weather class) can determine that.

If it's a sealed box with pure dry nitrogen, oxengen, goober gas, then we'll say condensation is a non issue.

good point but how about using isopropanol instead of ethanol?
 
Cylinders of dry nitrogen run around £10 (minus the cost of renting the cylinder though). If you were hell bent on making an airtight system then purge it with some dry nitrogen first to reduce the risk of condensation. Getting rid of all water in a system is really hard though, so short of sticking your computer in an oven at 150C and then purging the airtight inside while it cools, there will be *some* water inside. Whether that would be enough to cause issues depends on a lot of factors.

I'd favour mineral oil cooling over your proposed idea because making anything airtight isn't always that easy, and as the inside cools its going to want to suck in air through any tiny crack that it can.

Link: http://www.pugetsystems.com/submerged.php
 
Will the electricity bill be high when one uses the chillbox 4-5 hours a day?

OMgoodness. Your using energy in the form of electricity to run a compressor to chill the freon etc to remove the heat from the air and put the air to the PC, it warms up, it goes back to the heat exchanger in the AC unit.

Energy in any form isn't free. Gas, propane, electricity, charcoal for the grill. You use an AC unit to cool anything, you pay ...........
 
OMgoodness. Your using energy in the form of electricity to run a compressor to chill the freon etc to remove the heat from the air and put the air to the PC, it warms up, it goes back to the heat exchanger in the AC unit.

Energy in any form isn't free. Gas, propane, electricity, charcoal for the grill. You use an AC unit to cool anything, you pay ...........

u didnt answer my question... :bang head
 
Will it be high? I dunno. Whats your base KW cost? What size of AC unit you going to run? Whats it wattage rating? How many amps does it pull at max cooling? Whats a high bill to you? I can't answer your question.
 
u didnt answer my question... :bang head

Hey Freak11

Your bill with a small room unit will be about 60~80 bucks higher per month if you ran it for about 8-9 hours a day, a medium size unit it will be about 120~160 a month, and a large unit would be about 160+ and not worth it since it wouldn't matter if you used a small or large AC unit, they almost all cool to the same low temp of 59-60F, so having a big AC wouldnt give you any advantage, a small AC from costco or Homedepot runs about 80 bucks to 100, and will cool it just fine using a lint hose for a dryer hooked up to the front of your computer. I do have to say, I did this about 10 years ago, it worked decent compared to any reasonable cooling solution back then, however it looked ghettofabulous, minus the fabulous!
 
lol :D

For those talking condensation in any PC (open or closed) cooled with AC, it will never happen.. In fact they sell enterprise class units for that very task. Basically the air from an AC unit is dry. If you have AC in your car and get moisture inside sometime, try turning on your AC and see what happens.
 
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