[Wega!]

I have to ask you guys about this conformal again. I've gotten in contact with a group of danish overclockers, and they are helping me get the stuff that i need to go cold. Things are not as easy to get in Denmark

But they keep saying that the acrylic based conformal is ok to use. They all use it, and none of them have seen any cracks or sigh of pressure on components... Some of them have been using it for years, and say that they have never had problems with it. Would it be totally stupid of me to give it a try? The silicon based conformal is just so hard to get, because the places that sells it, only wants to deal with business 2 business, and i dont have a business

So what do you say, is the acrylic really stupid, or is it "just" not the best solution?

[I.M.O.G.]

I'd say its quite possibly fine... Some people have their opinions, but most people follow suit of what others are doing.

Unless you hear from someone who has used it and believe they killed things as a result... Most people are probably relaying what is typically advised.

Gomeler doesn't use conformal. Just a bit of grease and toilet paper is all he used when benching all day at the XS party.

I don't use conformal... Microcenter didn't have it, and I didn't look real hard for it anywhere else. I use dielectric grease which I get in 3oz tubes at an autoparts store. I put that in the ram slots and in the CPU socket to make sure no air or condensation gets in there.

Otherwise, I just use some paper towels, frost king, and armaflex. Once you go cold, you will get an idea of how good your insulation is. Watch for frost growth in places you haven't insulated. If you notice some, you probably want to stop before too long and remove power to let things dry up... Give it some time to make sure things are good and dry before you power back up then improve your insulation for next time.

I had a RAM slot frost almost entirely over (3rd slot away from CPU socket). I kept running the session until I was done, then made sure I used grease on all the RAM slots after that.

Keep in mind I've only been going cold for a couple weeks now, but this is what has worked for me. I'll be sure to post in full detail when I kill something. But I know with my current insulation method that frost doesn't grow south from the CPU socket area. When I go cold on the GPU, maybe I'll look at using conformal there... But I'll probably insulate well around the GPU, watch for frost growth, then make adjustments if necessary. Generally however if you are insulating well and you have a fan blowing the smoke away from the board you shouldn't have many problems and the conformal wouldn't have any work to do anyways.

[CgS Drone]

Originally Posted by I.M.O.G.

I had a RAM slot frost almost entirely over (3rd slot away from CPU socket). I kept running the session until I was done, then made sure I used grease on all the RAM slots after that.

Did you have a fan blowing on the slots Matt?

[I.M.O.G.]

Yea. It was blowing over the ram sticks and up to blow the LN2 smoke away from the board. The 2nd and 4th slots were in use, so there probably wasn't a lot of of airflow over the frosted over 3rd slot...

Somewhere there is a balance between fans blowing on the board. Keeping it warm might prevent frost growth but if you get frost and it melts, that's probably more dangerous than frost.

My Ram hangs out around 11-16C typically when running LN2, according to a probe stuck in the heatspreaders.

[Wega!]

Originally Posted by I.M.O.G.

I'd say its quite possibly fine... Some people have their opinions, but most people follow suit of what others are doing.

Unless you hear from someone who has used it and believe they killed things as a result... Most people are probably relaying what is typically advised.

Gomeler doesn't use conformal. Just a bit of grease and toilet paper is all he used when benching all day at the XS party.

I don't use conformal... Microcenter didn't have it, and I didn't look real hard for it anywhere else. I use dielectric grease which I get in 3oz tubes at an autoparts store. I put that in the ram slots and in the CPU socket to make sure no air or condensation gets in there.

Otherwise, I just use some paper towels, frost king, and armaflex. Once you go cold, you will get an idea of how good your insulation is. Watch for frost growth in places you haven't insulated. If you notice some, you probably want to stop before too long and remove power to let things dry up... Give it some time to make sure things are good and dry before you power back up then improve your insulation for next time.

I had a RAM slot frost almost entirely over (3rd slot away from CPU socket). I kept running the session until I was done, then made sure I used grease on all the RAM slots after that.

Keep in mind I've only been going cold for a couple weeks now, but this is what has worked for me. I'll be sure to post in full detail when I kill something. But I know with my current insulation method that frost doesn't grow south from the CPU socket area. When I go cold on the GPU, maybe I'll look at using conformal there... But I'll probably insulate well around the GPU, watch for frost growth, then make adjustments if necessary. Generally however if you are insulating well and you have a fan blowing the smoke away from the board you shouldn't have many problems and the conformal wouldn't have any work to do anyways.

Thanks IMOG, I think I'll just try with the acrylic then. Then I'll be the one that can report back if it's really bad.
I think I'll go totally crazy and over-isolate, because it's the first time I try it Also some of these guys have access to Ln2, so if I'm lucky I might try that as well. So I'm just going to insulate so that it's good enough for Ln2 also, then I should be on the safe side if I only use DICE

[CgS Drone]

Originally Posted by I.M.O.G.

Somewhere there is a balance between fans blowing on the board. Keeping it warm might prevent frost growth but if you get frost and it melts, that's probably more dangerous than frost.

My Ram hangs out around 11-16C typically when running LN2, according to a probe stuck in the heatspreaders.

This and what Miah is doing has me curious if going cold on the RAM is going to give practical differences in benching. My main concern right now would be when I go to LN2 for the first time and worrying about the frost conducting on the RAM. I would have to give it a shot and see but if it looked like it was going to be an issue I was thinking of removing the heat spreaders and taping over the gold pins and using conformal on the RAM then place the heat spreaders back on and just use die electric grease in the slots to try to prevent any frost from being able to get into there and causing an issue.

[m0r7if3r]

Originally Posted by CgS Drone

This and what Miah is doing has me curious if going cold on the RAM is going to give practical differences in benching. My main concern right now would be when I go to LN2 for the first time and worrying about the frost conducting on the RAM. I would have to give it a shot and see but if it looked like it was going to be an issue I was thinking of removing the heat spreaders and taping over the gold pins and using conformal on the RAM then place the heat spreaders back on and just use die electric grease in the slots to try to prevent any frost from being able to get into there and causing an issue.

I've seen data that it does but I can't find it now...sufficient to say, it helps, though it varies by the stick and the ram will coldbug (I seem to remember optimal temperature for the testing I saw being somewhere around -60C

[Brolloks]

Originally Posted by I.M.O.G.

Yea. It was blowing over the ram sticks and up to blow the LN2 smoke away from the board. The 2nd and 4th slots were in use, so there probably wasn't a lot of of airflow over the frosted over 3rd slot...

Somewhere there is a balance between fans blowing on the board. Keeping it warm might prevent frost growth but if you get frost and it melts, that's probably more dangerous than frost.

My Ram hangs out around 11-16C typically when running LN2, according to a probe stuck in the heatspreaders.

Exactly, that is why I keep fans away from the pot as airflow around the pot causes frost/ice to melt and the water will run down to wherever, rather let the frost build up , that way it stays on the pot and only melts after you done benching

[xsuperbgx]

I have a tip from my last dry ice session, after benching a few hours and I still needed to do more benching. My acetone was not working very good because I had knocked in so much frost from around the top that it was starting to freeze. I let the dry ice mostly melt then I stuffed some paper towels down into the pot to soak up the acetone then refilled with fresh acetone.

[Brolloks]

Originally Posted by xsuperbgx

I have a tip from my last dry ice session, after benching a few hours and I still needed to do more benching. My acetone was not working very good because I had knocked in so much frost from around the top that it was starting to freeze. I let the dry ice mostly melt then I stuffed some paper towels down into the pot to soak up the acetone then refilled with fresh acetone.

Yep, use fresh acetone every time

[mikealaska]

Originally Posted by Voidn

Great write up! Welcome to dice land, Now crank those volts!

20-25lbs would last me 2 days on single and dual cores. I burned through almost 40lbs dice'ing a 920 last weekend .

I bought 2 boxes of eraser from this place. They offer bulk discounts.

link is broken , what am i looking for ?

Faber-Castel @ the hobby shop,,http://www.erasersworld.com/eng/faber.htm

[Bobnova]

That's the stuff!

[Seebs]

Originally Posted by mikealaska

link is broken , what am i looking for ?

Faber-Castel @ the hobby shop,,http://www.erasersworld.com/eng/faber.htm

There you go....
http://www.dickblick.com/products/de...ubber-erasers/

[mikealaska]

ok ! got it , slowing getting my list of materials and tools , this is gonna be fun!!

whats interesting is Dolk is benching our board .

[DR650SE]

I just piced up some of that stuff from Micheals. Now I just need to get some hardware and get started

Eraser, Check
Dice pot, check (en-route)
Hardware...I'll get back to you on that