August 05, 2008 | Comments Comments

Water cooling…leaking!

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I moved into my new flat in July, which of course includes moving big furniture , a bunch of boxes and of course, all the fragile computers equipment.

Everything went well, except for a scratch on the wooden floor. Nothing else was broken in the process or so I thought. I’ve used my laptop for most of the month to write on the blog, browse the web and such. My desktop was just sitting there in my living room, waiting to be installed.

So about a week ago, I decided to open up the case and take a look to see if everything was fine. Now if your average person would see this computer open, their jaw would probably drop to the floor.

It was built from scratch by me, using only parts that I chose myself. The most exotic thing in it though would be the water-cooling. Yes, water-cooling for a computer, in a similar way that how most cars are cooled. What do I cool with my water-cooling setup? I cool my cpu (An Intel E6300) and my video card (A Radeon X1950 Pro). It might not seem like much, but with both overclocked, they both put out quite a lot of heat.

So, in the setup, I have:

  • A pump
  • A 3×120mm radiator
  • A water block for the cpu
  • A water block for the video card
  • A reservoir
  • 6 fans: 3 on each side of the radiator

Every one of those components have 2 fittings, one to allow water in and the other for the water that goes out. Which gives you a total of 10 fittings. Still following me? Good.

So back to my case that I just opened. First thing that I noticed was that the water level of my reservoir was much lower than usual, about 1/3 filled, compared to the usual 4/5 filled or so. That cooling liquid(water+anti-algae solution) had to be somewhere right? So I took a quick look at the bottom of my case.

Disaster! The bottom of the case wasn’t humid; it was flooded! Cooling liquid did get into the power supply and leaked behind the case too. At that point, I was afraid that the power supply was damaged and wouldn’t work again. Before I could check that out though, I had to remove the power supply, clean the mess and double-check all the connections to find the one that was leaking.

So I cleaned the mess, removed the power supply, removed all the cooling liquid from it, found the leaking connection and fixed it (It was the one that exits my video card water-block). I also took a can of compressed air and blew the inside of the power supply with it, to get the remaining cooling liquid out of it.

After that a few hours had passed to let everything dry, I plugged everything back. Plugged the power cord to the power supply. The decisive moment arrived. Will it blend start, that is, without making sparks…

It did start, but I had nothing showing up on my screen. After trying a few solutions, I figured out that it was two things:

  1. My bios that needed to be fully cleared (Unplug all power, remove battery and leave the cmos jumper at clear for 24 hours)
  2. My motherboard that wouldn’t start with the two sticks of ram, as the default voltage is 1.8v for ddr2 and my sticks need 2.1v to operate.

So I cleared my bios and removed a stick of ram in the meantime and there you go! It works!
My power supply that has been flooded was working again, without a problem!

I obviously did a few tests to check if the voltage were normal, if they were not spiking, if my computer was stable under full load and yes, everything was perfectly fine! At the end of the day, I was playing Need for Speed: Prostreet and I was clearly happy that my computer survived a water leak and that it was in working order!

Let me ask you: What’s the worst thing that happened to your computer and were you able to fix it or you had to order a new part? For those of you who wants to see some pictures of my own computer and want to have more details about my specs or my water-cooling setup, let me know ;)

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  • nourah8
    good job
    Certainly we wait for pictures
  • Cokehead
    I've had tons of issues with my computer. I'm decent with hardware in desktops, but I have super shaky hands, so shortcuts have to be made and in the end, my cases will always be a mess of cables.

    The worst that's happened so far was a bizarre CPU failure. It was literally working one day and not the next. I assumed it was the motherboard (since my other spare processor wouldn't work either, but that turned out to be dead too. Luck, eh?) and sent it back. One month later, I get it back from XFX with them having tested it to work fine.

    I had my friend test out the CPU in his machine, and as it turns out, it was indeed dead. He asked if he could borrow it for awhile; I told him he could, because it wasn't work anyway.

    He works at an auto shop. So he has access to a bunch of fun chemicals. As it turns out, putting that CPU in electric cleaner and then cleaning it off carefully with some of the materials they had around the shop, made it work! I didn't believe it, but after putting the CPU in the motherboard, it started right up, no problems. Totally startling - he essentially saved me $100 on a hunch. I was quite pleased, to say the least.

    The second largest issue I've had with this build is with my PSU. It's been running about 2 years now or so, a 750W OCZ PSU. I always buy brands with warranties: you don't want your PSU failing on you, because it can take everything else with it if you're not careful (and I'm not careful). There was a storm surge while I was away from it talking to my mother (I'm out of here for college in a few months, so shush), which took out my PSU. I didn't have any spares laying around. Luckily for me though, my OCZ came with a 3 year warranty. Sending it out to OCZ, they kindly found it was dead and sent me a new PSU of the same model, with another 3 year warranty.

    I love your page about getting a cheap gaming machine, by the way. Only two issues I take with it, though:

    1. I'm a hardcore nVidia fan. But, that's a fanboy thing, and nobody likes fanboy things :P
    2. You recommend a random case with a random PSU. Noting my experience above (and several other horror stories you could easily locate), why don't you at least note that a brand name PSU will work out much better? While they are much more expensive ($30 for a 700W on ebay vs my $100 700W from OCZ), they're more reliable, they have warranties, and the voltage they send out the cables is usually more reliable and stable.

    Also, the case you mentioned only has a few 80mm fans. Since you've went with a dual core and a pretty good graphics card, wouldn't it be more wise to have a few more fans, or at least a 120mm? For about $40 more, you can get a Raidmax Smilodon, which is so much easier to work with, and it has plenty of fannage at stock. For around the same price, you could also get an Antec Three Hundred, which has been getting great reviews as a cheap midtower.

    -Cokehead
  • Cokehead
    I've had tons of issues with my computer. I'm decent with hardware in desktops, but I have super shaky hands, so shortcuts have to be made and in the end, my cases will always be a mess of cables.

    The worst that's happened so far was a bizarre CPU failure. It was literally working one day and not the next. I assumed it was the motherboard (since my other spare processor wouldn't work either, but that turned out to be dead too. Luck, eh?) and sent it back. One month later, I get it back from XFX with them having tested it to work fine.

    I had my friend test out the CPU in his machine, and as it turns out, it was indeed dead. He asked if he could borrow it for awhile; I told him he could, because it wasn't work anyway.

    He works at an auto shop. So he has access to a bunch of fun chemicals. As it turns out, putting that CPU in electric cleaner and then cleaning it off carefully with some of the materials they had around the shop, made it work! I didn't believe it, but after putting the CPU in the motherboard, it started right up, no problems. Totally startling - he essentially saved me $100 on a hunch. I was quite pleased, to say the least.

    The second largest issue I've had with this build is with my PSU. It's been running about 2 years now or so, a 750W OCZ PSU. I always buy brands with warranties: you don't want your PSU failing on you, because it can take everything else with it if you're not careful (and I'm not careful). So,
  • Mathieu
    @Gareth: Alright, I'll take some pictures of my rig when I get back home this week. I don't remember if I'm a member of overclock.net, I'm a member of a few overclocking forums, but I'm more the lurker type. I'll see if I can participate more in a close future, if I have enough time!
  • gareth
    Love to see some pictures of your rig, and secondly are you a member of overclock.net?
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