[sdiy] All this cooling and noise stuff

[Batz Goodfortune]

Y-ellow Victor 'n' all.

At 01:20 AM 12/11/06 -0300, Tonelismulas V wrote:
>I have a P4 machine wich I use for recording and editing. Is a good
>computer -for the purpose i use- but is repulsive and vomitively noisy

A vomitive computer? I know what I'll be giving for Christmas this year.


>I have an idea, but i need someone to sacrifice, someone else body to
>experiment with...

I'm sure, even in Argentina you could find a few crack whores that no-one 
would miss.

>I have this AMD K6/266 that i don't use anymore.
>
>Its mothercrap have everything (audio|video|lan) onboard, the only thing
>not soldered to main pcb is a 32Mb dimm.
>I'm planning to replace all connectors -power|kbd|video|etc- with directly
>soldered cables and cover everything with acrylic laquer -several layers
>or by immersion if its necesary- then to a bucket full of water.
>
>Another bucket for the HD. It have a vent orifice, is it necesary?

Ah! An orifice is what you want eh? Now I know what you need the crack 
whores for.

In a word. Don't do it. (I mean the bucket not the crack whores.) I think 
the water would only serve to insulate the box and keep the heat in. The 
reason these things work is because of the flow of liquid that is 
constantly taking the heat away. The reason the New Zealand guys got away 
with is because they shelled out for a couple of litres of fluorinert. 
About 1200 NZ dollars worth if memory serves. Fluorinert is a special 
modified water made by 3M. It is totally, 100% non conductive. They use to 
demo this stuff by filling a big glass container with it and dropping a 
working TV into it. Which of course kept working just fine under the water. 
Then they'd drop a toaster into it and the likes.

Rather than trying to drown your computer, why not just dig a big hole and 
bury it. It would have about the same effect and the dirt won't fill the 
holes as easily.

If you can solve the fan problem, then you're spoilt for choice with 
solutions for the hard drive these days. There are an abundance of 
networked and USB hard drive boxes which you could shove in another room 
somewhere. And of course, there's always serial ATA. So you could keep your 
business end in one room and put the noisy stuff elsewhere.

This would not be so easy for the Power supply however because you need to 
keep the cabling relatively short. But the thought crossed my mind that 
with some severe butchery, you maybe could split the PSU electronics into a 
hot side and a cold side. And keep the two in separate rooms or 
environments. This needs some more thought of course but it might be of 
some interest.

Warning. Switch Mode Power supplies bite.

Can't say that too often.

You're not just dealing with mains voltage. You're dealing with rectified 
mains voltage. Once it grabs you it doesn't let go. Your chances of 
survival are severely diminished.

If you're going to do any of this, I still recommend trying a bar fridge. 
Refrigerators are quieter than most PCs, they don't run all the time and 
the insulation offers a great deal of sound proofing as well. Besides, if 
you do it just right you can tell people it's a super computer. A mini-cray 
perhaps?

Be absolutely icebox.

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