[SOLVED] Water cooled PC Desk Build - Looking for advice

Mar 12, 2022
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Hi all,

I am looking to build a water cooled pc desk. Going for sleek quite operation.
Parts
  • MSI x570s Gaming Carbon EK X
  • Ryzen 9 5900x
  • AMD 6900xt with EK Waterblock
  • 2 480mm Radiators
  • 8 120mm fans
  • 4 80mm fans
  • 850w SFX psu
Desk size is about 58in x 32in x 4in. The center is covered with 38in x 23in x 1/4in tempered glass. The side compartments would be seal off from the center. Radiators would take in air from the bottom and exhaust out the side. There would be fans in the front to take air in and 4 x 80mm fans to help move air to the back.

Wanted to get back feedback on air flow design to insure cool components and quite operation.

Thanks in advance!



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Solution
Fans are generally 25mm (1"). Thinner rads are 30mm (1-1/4"). That at best puts the rads less than 2" from the glass, prolly closer to 1-1/2". That's going to make for some toasty fingers during heavier usage. Better usage would be venting the sides of the table and underneath the rads, and running them as exhaust instead, not intake. Fans push or pull makes no difference.

An 850w is going to struggle with a 6900xt. The spike power draws from that card are unpredictable and excessive. I'd be looking at the Silverstone SX1000 SFX-L Platinum instead, with fan down intake through cutout in bottom of the desk.

Food for thought, it's a series, but goes through what you will deal with.
View...
Fans are generally 25mm (1"). Thinner rads are 30mm (1-1/4"). That at best puts the rads less than 2" from the glass, prolly closer to 1-1/2". That's going to make for some toasty fingers during heavier usage. Better usage would be venting the sides of the table and underneath the rads, and running them as exhaust instead, not intake. Fans push or pull makes no difference.

An 850w is going to struggle with a 6900xt. The spike power draws from that card are unpredictable and excessive. I'd be looking at the Silverstone SX1000 SFX-L Platinum instead, with fan down intake through cutout in bottom of the desk.

Food for thought, it's a series, but goes through what you will deal with.
View: https://youtu.be/DS3zCN4NsQY
 
Solution
Fans are generally 25mm (1"). Thinner rads are 30mm (1-1/4"). That at best puts the rads less than 2" from the glass, prolly closer to 1-1/2". That's going to make for some toasty fingers during heavier usage. Better usage would be venting the sides of the table and underneath the rads, and running them as exhaust instead, not intake. Fans push or pull makes no difference.

An 850w is going to struggle with a 6900xt. The spike power draws from that card are unpredictable and excessive. I'd be looking at the Silverstone SX1000 SFX-L Platinum instead, with fan down intake through cutout in bottom of the desk.

Food for thought, it's a series, but goes through what you will deal with.
View: https://youtu.be/DS3zCN4NsQY
The Radiators would not be under the glass. They would be in a sealed side channels. with Air coming in from the bottom and out the sides. I would not expect to much heat to under the glass.

Thanks for advice on the PSU. Already bought the PSU, but the GPU has been purchased yet.

Linus does have a great series on that. I have seen it.

Thanks again for the conversation and advice. Love this community!
 
A desk drawer is not much different than a regular PC case.
Maybe thinner, but thats it.

Airflow is the same - In one end, out the other.
Thanks for the feedback. I was thinking the same thing. I don't think it would be overly complicated. Just need to get air in, over components or through the rads, and then out the desk.
 
Most of it will be clearances. That includes exactly where you will end up putting port extensions, wiring etc. And make sure to splurge for the pcie4.0 not the cheaper pcie3.0 cable, those higher end amd cards really don't like being stifled with bandwidth.
 
Most of it will be clearances. That includes exactly where you will end up putting port extensions, wiring etc. And make sure to splurge for the pcie4.0 not the cheaper pcie3.0 cable, those higher end amd cards really don't like being stifled with bandwidth.
You are very much correct. I think the next step I need to do is to trace out the actual loop and the routing of the cables/wires. I didn't take care to make sure I am getting the pcie4.0 riser cable. Looking at a 400mm length one. Was wondering if performance is lost over a long riser cable?