continued...
Let's get started by putting together the water-cooling
system. Many of the items used by us for this project were
used simply because we had them. You can argue about the
choice of pump, radiator, or waterblock until you are blue in
the face (and most of the fanatics will), but the fact is that
we already had this stuff and it suited the need, so we used
it. The end results speak for themselves, and it's kind of
hard to argue with that.
After finding a radiator that
fits the dimensions needed, we used a foam gasket that would
help seal the radiator to the back of the case. The purpose of
this is to ensure that the air being pulled (or pushed) is
being drawn through the radiator and not around the edges.
This also aids in noise deadening, since the gasket absorbs
vibration form the fan that will be mounted to the radiator.
A layer of 1/4" foam was laid across the bottom to absorb
vibrations from the reservoir and pump we used. Holes were cut
in the front and back of the file cabinet for the 120mm fans.
We also had to drill line holes to allow the "feed"
and "return" lines to pass through the case. As you
can see, the holes do not have to be anything fancy since they
will be covered by the actual hose fittings and couplings
used.
Using fan covers is simply a must because they serve multiple
purposes on this project. We chose fan grills that were also
filters to keep the dust inside our system to a minimum. The
filters being mounted as they are allow the filter inserts be
serviced (removed and washed) from the outside of the system as
well, making it practical too. The black filters mask the
appearance of the fan holes and help deaden noise produced by
the fans.
You can see how the
edges of the hole we cut are covered by the retention rings.
Positioning your components is, again, a matter of choice. The
reservoir we used fit perfectly under the front 120mm fan, which
kept it from blocking airflow. Certainly this particular setup
can be taken a step further by using ducting, which I am
infamous for using, between the intake and exhaust fans.
I am sure many of
you were wondering exactly how I had planned on supplying power
to the water pump and the two 120mm fans installed in the base
unit. The water pump and both fans require a 12v DC power
source. I chose a small AC/DC adapter I had laying around that
had originally been used to power a CD player. These type of
adapters (110v AC to 12v DC) can be found for well under $7.50,
with most being around $5.00. I simply installed a small black
rocker style switch and wired the three devices and power source
to the switch.
Now that we have the water-cooling base finished, it's time to
work on the waterblock for the CPU. We decided to install only
the CPU waterblock this time around, saving the video card
waterblock for a later update.
Now that we have covered getting the screws out of your Xbox
without breaking the stickers, you will want to turn it upright
and remove the top half of the outer casing. Removal is actually
extremely easy, almost too easy, considering this is a game
console that is NOT meant to be opened by the end user.
You can see how
tight the space is once the unit is open. The Xbox Game DVD
drive and hard drive are mounted in the top of the system on a
special support rack which easily lifted out as a single unit.
The unit can only be lifted a few inches without unplugging the
motherboard connections. The power cords can be left in place,
as you can easily swing the top layer of components out of the
way.
As mentioned earlier in our component list, the waterblock for
this modification was chosen because of the size and ability to
work with the existing heatsink hold-down mechanism. Intel (the
manufacturer of the Xbox's 733MHz CPU) has moved almost all of
its current CPU hold-down devices to a "cantilever"
design. While the cantilever design leaves much to be desired in
the desktop market, it actually worked in our favor for this
mod.
The first photo,
from left to right, shows a cantilever style hold-down clip used
in all newer Intel applications, from CPU heatsinks to
motherboard chipset heatsinks. This particular unit is from an
Intel motherboard chipset application, used here only
to demonstrate the design. The actual stock retention mechanism
from the Xbox was used for this project. You can see, as the
lever is pulled from the open position to the closed position,
the bottom half of the lever comes in contact with the heatsink
(or in this case, waterblock) and pushes it firmly into place.
The height of our waterblock allowed it to be used without
modification with this hold-down device.
It's now time to install the waterblock. . .
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