Build Log - Corsair Obsidian 900D

TeaLeaf · January 31, 2021, 09:30:46 PM

Ok, we're on the same wavelength as I would not be buying an AIO as mine system already has a custom waterloop.

Thanks! :thumbsup:

TeaLeaf · February 13, 2021, 10:40:26 AM

And pause. The upgrade is on hold.

Order placed and paid for with overclockers.co.uk on 29th January.

Current status: Order received - not yet shipped

"we're getting really high volume orders and back-logged at the moment"

With what? They are sure as heck not shipping thousands of graphics cards. :doh:

At least they apologised for the delay and refunded the shipping cost.

Mikep1212 · February 13, 2021, 02:27:50 PM

They have been really poor recenlty. I ordered some new G1/4 fittings for an OLED water temperature monitor and they took a week to process the order!. Unfortunately they were the only place that had what i needed in stock.

TeaLeaf · February 13, 2021, 04:53:53 PM

The delay is bad. It's giving me time to consider replacing the tubing with hard tubing. :norty:

Chaosphere · February 15, 2021, 05:03:29 PM

I hard tubed my current build, definitely worth it for the cosmetics.

TeaLeaf · February 15, 2021, 05:59:48 PM

Had an email from Overclockers today saying that two of the items I ordered were out of stock (motherboard & CPU waterblock). I was not impressed especially seeing as they were in stock on their website when I ordered them and both were added to the basket and paid for - the EPOS system should control that stock number and clearly does not. To rub salt into the wound one of the items allegedly out of stock is still showing as 'in stock' on their website today.

Anyway, I've swapped to a slightly different Aorus motherboard and gone for a slightly nicer waterblock (that covers both the CPU and the VRMs) to cheer myself up a bit! :thumbsup:

[ATTACH=CONFIG]5786[/ATTACH]

I am just scoping out the measurements for hard tubing and am also looking at swapping out my rather large cylindrical reservoir for a distro plate instead to go along with the hard tubing and the newly ordered waterblock. Oh the slippery slope of upgrades, costs always rise.

Chaosphere · February 15, 2021, 06:06:58 PM

I moved OCUK to my 'will never buy from' list after first hand experience of their terrible customer service recently. Done with them.

Only pain in the backside with a distro is filling, but tbh it is a minor annoyance. Not a big deal.

And all cover blocks are great. It never made sense to me to watercool a PC and leave one of the hottest bits out of the loop... especially when it does make a tangible difference to stability when pushing high voltages...

TeaLeaf · February 16, 2021, 02:46:14 PM

I had a nice surprise this morning.

OC apologised for the monumental cock up in handling my order, so I have ended up with not just free shipping, but also a free motherboard upgrade (worth an extra Â£70) and a free waterblock upgrade (worth an extra Â£45).

All in all about about Â£125 of gratis goodness to enjoy! I'd call that a result :thumbsup:

Now to spend that saving immediately on some case mods and hard tubing.... :whistle:

smilodon · February 16, 2021, 03:16:54 PM

They know you too well.

I'm exactly the same "Give him discounts or money off and he'll give it straight back to us anyway."

TeaLeaf · May 28, 2021, 05:32:07 PM

Quote from: TeaLeaf;405275today I had my first ever use of the Quick Connect Shut-Off Couplings that I had built into my water-cooled system.

http://koolance.com/help-quick-disconnect-shutoff-couplings

I removed my reservoir to get better access to some cables I needed to swap. The reservoir has TWO of these (one IN and one OUT) at the bottom of the reservoir. There was ZERO spillage when I disconnected. There was a very small amount of liquid in one of the quick connects, but you could have soaked it up with a single sheet of toilet paper and still had absorption left for your daily ablutions.

I'm very, very impressed with these and highly recommend them for water-cooled systems.

The above comment was from 2015 in a PC I built in 2013. Eight years later in 2021 (today) I found the design life limit for these dry-connects. I was stripping my Obsidian system down to do some upgrading. I had a nice plan to complete the draining of the system before lunch, but instead of having a nice dry disconnect, I ended up with red coolant squirting out all over the kitchen like the morning after a bad king prawn madras. Don't ask why that happens in my kitchen, seriously.

So eight years down the line these things fail. Especially if they are running on eight year old coolant, which might, perhaps, become a little more 'sticky' than it is meant to be and cause the valves to stick in the open position instead of the wonderful spring-loaded and dry 'closed' position.

Anyway, it has been a bugger of a day because after Noah's ark floated through on a crimson tide (with not a bloody dove in sight) the thumbscrews on the 2 x GTX770 graphics cards decided they had fused to the case - and of course the Obsidian case is possibly one of the worst in the world for access to those thumbscrews with anything other than small hands, you can't even fit a screwdriver into the gap, the angle is that bad it does not bite into the screwhead. One wrench later and the mechanic's cold steel won and the Obsidian case lost both the battle and a little bit of structural integrity.

So my quick lunchtime upgrade has turned into a distro plate-based, hard-tubing (PETG) system rebuild in a completely different case. :frusty:

Every cloud, eh? :whistle:

TeaLeaf · June 12, 2021, 05:42:55 PM

Well it's been a complete cluster of problems which are far too boring to list. But at last it has a pulse now.

Leak testing in progress and then I'll decide if I am going to take the patient off bypass and power it up again.

Chaosphere · June 13, 2021, 04:52:40 PM

Looking good, and glad to see the smaller fittings worked out.

Are there fans underneath the bottom rad, for push?

Either way, if you're looking for performance (and thus low noise) above all else, make sure to use the bottom rad for intake...

I have both of mine set as exhausts, and the case starves as a result. I did this for aesthetic reasons (finding reversible RPG fans is tricky), but I get temp drops of 10+ degrees when I take my side panels off... fortunately it is 'good enough' even when starved for air.

Eventually I will turn the bottom into an intake, but for now it works well enough that I can't be bothered!

albert · June 13, 2021, 05:27:54 PM

Did you get the 3080 you were after TL?

TeaLeaf · June 13, 2021, 05:49:58 PM

Quote from: Chaosphere;445850Looking good, and glad to see the smaller fittings worked out.

Yeah, the flush fitting was infinitely better than the originals I had selected which had the 'cup' for the tubing which was causing the problem. The only place I had to swap the gold connectors was on the distro plate as somewhat unbelievably, you can't fit standard width fittings into the CPU in/out as the fittings overlap by just under 1mm. So I found some fittings (the black ones) which were 2mm smaller diameter and they went in no problem.

Quote from: Chaosphere;445850Are there fans underneath the bottom rad, for push?

Either way, if you're looking for performance (and thus low noise) above all else, make sure to use the bottom rad for intake...

Yes, the fans on the bottom are intake, fans at the top are exit. I have one more exit fan to add on the rear side of the case to make sure, so it will end up being 3 in, 4 out, but the top radiator dust cover is a little more restrictive than the bottom, so I reckon it will balance nicely.

And yes Albert, all sorted on the graphics front now. I'm now dealing with third world problems, like my daily drive 30" monitor is so old that it only has VGA and DVI-I connections, so I had to order an adapter as the gfx outs are DP or HDMI only :roflmao: Prime day is very soon though, so a nice new monitor might be in order.

Chaosphere · June 13, 2021, 06:24:51 PM

[ATTACH=CONFIG]5923[/ATTACH]

I kept both of mine as exhausts so the fans were visible, as in the photo. Turning them the other way around (so pull on the bottom rad) spoils the lighting, sadly, due to the location of the actual LEDs.

I also built in the standard O-11, not the XL, so no room for a 120 on the back for me. I don't like 'dead space' in a case, so opted for the smaller chassis with big chunky (60mm) rads to fill up the room.

Likely when I next upgrade I'll buy some reversed RGB fans so I can sort it, but for now temps are good enough with no noise from the pump or fans until I start gaming, so not the end of the world!

Interesting you had an issue with the CPU in/out fittings. Not something I noticed, but looking now yes the ports are very close indeed - I think I just got lucky with the fitting I went with as they caused no real issues!