Who would be interested in a "pre-production" pass

fmah · Post by **fmah** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 11:44 am

Well, I'm still a little bit aways, but I'm working on a passive case (surprise) and am trying to gauge interest in this thing. The design is ATX (+ some extra things) and for Athlon XP format for now. I just would like to see some out in the field to examine the performance of the design. Of course I should mention that I can't give them away.

Anyways, comments would be useful.

vortex222 · Post by **vortex222** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 1:43 pm

have you got any more details about your new design?

i am always interested in somthing that is quieter then what i own. would it be a passive cooled psu as well?

cheers

fmah · Post by **fmah** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 2:26 pm

It doesn't come with a power supply, but you should be able to use any ATX power supply, including the passive ones.

PhilgB · Post by **PhilgB** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 5:37 pm

I started pricing heatpipes to build a case with a cooling design similar to your first article. If you could provide some basic information (without giving away your secret

), as well as an approximate price, we would have a better idea of how interested we are. Im sure everyone here wants a passive case

fmah · Post by **fmah** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 6:32 pm

I didn't realize the topic name was chopped off.

Anyway, the case would basically be for passively cooling a Athlon XP CPU. Not including power supply or anything else, just the basic ATX mounting and drive bays, lights, buttons. Possible option for graphics card cooling. Lightly textured all black, similar to black floppy/CD drive finish. Front bezel would be attached to chassis with screws, I'm not sure if they should be stainless steel or black.

It should be usable with Abit NF-7, Asus A7N8X, Shuttle AN35 (kind of electrically noisy though), and other motherboards with similar socket location.

The cost of a pre-production unit would probably be around $200+ range, and I may make it refundable if people want to return it.

PhilgB · Post by **PhilgB** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 6:50 pm

Well I would prefer a black case

I thought the Abit NF7 was perfect when I saw the centered socket location. Other helpful details might be the number of heatpipes, as well as cooling ability. The price sounds fair. Is it just a generic case? Or have you chosen a specific (or known) model?

fmah · Post by **fmah** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 6:55 pm

PhilgB wrote:Is it just a generic case? Or have you chosen a specific (or known) model?

This is a complete custom unit from the ground up. I'm designing/building everything. This will be a 4 pipe cooler, or 2 pipe (I guess if want to pay less). It is such that various expansions/changes can be made later.

PhilgB · Post by **PhilgB** » Sat Apr 24, 2004 8:17 pm

fmah wrote:This is a complete custom unit from the ground up. I'm designing/building everything.

Beautiful

Custom bezel aswell? If not, which one?

Does it handle NB cooling?

A uATX version would also be nice.

Have you tackled HD mounting? (Suspension/hardmount)

Tigr · Post by **Tigr** » Mon Apr 26, 2004 2:53 pm

Excellent. How about PSU ducting right away?

PhilgB · Post by **PhilgB** » Mon Apr 26, 2004 2:59 pm

Ducting? If youre going to have a passive CPU, you should probably have a passive PSU as well

Tigr · Post by **Tigr** » Mon Apr 26, 2004 3:28 pm

Well, probably you are right.

Ok, so this leaves only the question of HDD suspension and cooling...

fmah · Post by **fmah** » Mon Apr 26, 2004 7:52 pm

PhilgB wrote:
fmah wrote:This is a complete custom unit from the ground up. I'm designing/building everything.

Beautiful

Custom bezel aswell? If not, which one?
Nothing super fancy, since I'm trying to keep cost down, but should be interesting I think.

PhilgB wrote:Does it handle NB cooling?

A uATX version would also be nice.

Have you tackled HD mounting? (Suspension/hardmount)

Maybe NB option in the future, uATX probably not anytime soon. Graphics cooling is probably going to be an option. HD mounting is another main issue to be worked out, but should be interesting. Cool and partly isolated are the goals.

trodas · Post by **trodas** » Sun May 16, 2004 2:10 pm

Most NB could be cooled passively (Zalman ZM47J) and even extreme overclocking beasts could like something like my attempt to NB cooling:

http://ax2.wz.cz/show.php?p=wc&id=60&c=7&d=1&v=v2 - cooper on bottom

http://ax2.wz.cz/show.php?p=wc&id=62&c=7&d=1&v=v2 - beast in place

GPU cooling is IMHO bigger problem that CPU cooling, because the GFX card is into bad position

Of course it can be done, but it will be IMHO hard. One can look at the Zalman pasive case for example what we are facing there

GFX cards are, unlike mobos, not well tightened to the case and using the other side of case for another cooling heatsink is good idea, however is ATM beyond my imagination, how to connect the heatsink there to the GPU card, when the left side of case, where the heatsink is, get closed in order to put the heatsink in place...

Perhaps someting other the just using the case sides to heatsink mounting place could be done, hmmm

But definitively THUMBS UP for this project and his founder, fmah