Oil submerged Servers

[fooltain]

I have several 8 core 8+ HD Servers running at my House, I'm a consultant and do a lot of VMware images for my different sandboxes, and I make the servers available to my clients at times, thus they need to be on 24/7.

That said the spare bedroom is LOUD as **** and rather warm, mainly warm because we keep the door shut because of the noise.

So my goal is not to overclock but to kill the noise, but you over clockers seem to be the experts in this area. <bows head to the experts>

I would like to know is how long will the MB, PS, and cables last submerged in say mineral oil, has anyone run one these longer than the http://www.pugetsystems.com/submerged.php#update5 system?

I wish I could afford the SSDs so they could be submerged, but that would be cost prohibitive for my data volumes.

So I think a hybrid approach would be my best approach, MB -Mother Board and PS Power Supply submerged and use blocks like http://www.frozencpu.com/products/7500/ex-blc-487/Koolance_HD-60_Hard_Drive_Liquid_Cooling_Block.html?tl=g30c203 to cool the HD - Hard Drives.

I have experience working with Acrylic, and enjoy working with it as a hobby.

So anyone out there know of a system that has been running for years?

 

[Jayeldog]

I've got my home pc sitting in an acrylic tank with about 11.5 gallons of mineral oil. With no radiator cooling the oil will heat up enough to freeze the system. Adding a rad without fans will allow it to run close to max temp (62C) though I bet a heavy load would heat the oil too much again. Adding a large fan to the rad I can run the system just fine for normal use (movies/games etc..) and hardly go above 50C. For reference, my ambient temp is 38C when first turning the computer on.

No fan setup is almost silent. With the fan its not very loud either, but I can crank it up if needed.

System has been working since building it in early march 2009.

 

[fooltain]

You guys want to pick out the cooling blocks for this MB? P.S. I'll fill it with RAM.

SUPERMICRO MBD-X8DAH+-F-O Dual LGA 1366 Intel 5520 Extended ATX Dual Intel Xeon 5500

 

[Conumdrum]

Get two Swiftech GTZ CPU blocks. Any more cooling for the NB or mosfets is gonna be pretty hard to find since it's a very uncommon board for watercooling. Probably going to have to stick with fans for that. There is no reason to WC the ram.

It's a standard 1366 , so any cooler will fit, but you want something good, something proven, something easy.

 

[Shadow703793]

^+1.

 

[Conumdrum]

I take back my recommendation for those CPU blocks. Now that your going to cool the server room why do you even need water? A good Air HS would be plenty and also MUCH cheaper. You won't be worried about noise anymore and the AC will hopefully keep the room in the 60's or even 50's, so water isn't needed.

Your looking at $100 or less to cool the Mobo on air vs $300+ on water. Your not overclocking, so you don't even need water at ALL.

 

[Shadow703793]

^He didn't say he's going with AC. Just said he's getting quotes for it. Eitherway, he still wants a quiet PC, so going WCing he may be able to passively cool it (or use very few fans?)?

 

[Conumdrum]

If it's in a seperate room then quiet isn't an issue. An AC unit isn't that quiet anyway.

 

[Shadow703793]

^Good point. But anyways, will the OP be able to go with passive cooling on the rads(320/480) with an AC?

 

[Conumdrum]

I'll try to make this more clear. Why does he need any rads at all when he's got cool air across the rigs? He's not looking to overclock either. He can go air cooled heatsinks for much much less money. He originally wanted to go oil or water because of the heat buildup. Once he understood the heat isn't going to be any less in the room with oil or water cooling, he decided to look into AC.

Since he's looking at a seperate room for housing the servers, why worry about the noise?

 

[Shadow703793]

^ I see what you mean now, if OP's housing it in a different room, noise shouldn't be an issue and therefor no need for WCing.

 

[calinkula]

I would totally forget about submerging servers in oil. It's messy and too much of a hassle when you have to do repairs or want to upgrade. The oil will still get hot and cause problems if it gets too warm. So you end up cooling the oil instead of the servers, it just adds another annoying layer to the problem.

Water cooling is probably not a good choice either, it's kinda expensive and something will eventually leak. I know someone is going to reply that my water cooling never leaks and it been running for blah, blah, blah...... Something will always fail eventually when you have enough equipment and have it running 24/7 for years. I wouldn't risk my business on a line leaking at the top of the rack and possibly taking out every thing underneath it. Which will conveniently happen when you are out of town.

I have a separate air conditioned server room at the office so I don't care about noise, but at home I replaced everything with Scythe S-Flex fans because I hated the hair dryer level sound coming from the old fans. There is still a low hum, but still quieter than the aquarium that's in the same room.

Liquid bearing fans(like Scythe S-Flex) will be your best bet. At least on NewEgg, I couldn't find anything smaller than 80mm which could be too big. The noisiest fans I found are those cheap 40mm whiny fans manufactures use. Most of the time they are at the end of the thin case blowing/pushing air. So they won't fit inside, but maybe mounting them on the outside would work. Anyone ever try that?

 

[Shadow703793]

fail eventually when you have enough equipment and have it running 24/7 for years

You NEVER run an WCed system for more than 6 -12 months with out re-doing the loop.

 

[Conumdrum]

Peeps do, some get away with it, some don't.

Most times WC is a hobby, so the 6 month drain is fun and part of having a perfect running loop.

Some just build and forget. It's their stuff, no worries. The plus to peeps like that is reading the fun posts.

 

[Houndsteeth]

I've had a loop running for nearly 2 years now without having to drain the loop once. All I've had to do is add fluid lost due to osmotic loss through the PVC tubing. Granted, I used Fluid XP+ when I filled the loop last (mostly to test the stuff out) and it has been biotic-free since it was first filled. I guess I could drain it just to see if there is any biotic growth at all, but it looks as clear in the tube as the day I first bled the air out two years ago.

As far as reducing overall noise, if you don't want to go though the hassle and expense of oil or water cooling, then air cooling with quieter fans is the only viable option.