oil cooled PC advice..

[mistafeesh]

Hi, I want to use an old PC as an entertainment centre. My plan is to sink the mobo and PSU into a tub of sunflower oil, without using any fans, in order to have quiet when the HDD or DVD drive aren't spinning.

It's a touch under a ghz and doesn't, to my memory, run particularly hot. I didn't notice for a long time that the CPU fan wasn't working, for example.


But... I've never done anything like this before, so I'd appreciate any advice. In particular, I'm not sure if the PSU is going to be too high a voltage to risk dunking in he oil along with everything else.

Ta,

Dan

 

[Ste]

You Don't dunk the power supply, just everything else.

I don't have the link, but its been done and well documented, just google Cooking oil Cooled PC.

Found it

 

[mistafeesh]

thanks.

Is there another way to keep the PSU quiet anyone knows of? I was thinking of just keeping it out of the case and removing the fan, but that'll be a bit ugly...

 

[cwiz]

post some pics along the way!
wrap the psu in dynamat? (leave alot of air holes ofcourse)

 

[mistafeesh]

I'll look into the idea of using dynamat.

unfortunately my camera has died, but as soon as I get a replacement I'll post some pics up! It'll probably be in a wooden case, so it might even look a bit pretty... Probably not, though as I'm crap at DIY.

I was thinking of using my old Amiga PSU, which is just a fairly harmless looking beige brick, and doesn't make any noise...

 

[reggie_da_man]

Don't put the optical drives or the hard drive in the oil!

 

[lancec2c30]

well you are trying to oil silent your computer, and all the components that make noise cant go in the oil. So you are really defeating your purpose.

 

[Nitestick]

call me crazy but wouldn't passive cooling be the first thing that springs to most peoples minds when they think silent. it really is not worth it for your purposes to do this.

 

[CrazeD]

Um, do NOT remove the PSU fan. They get pretty hot realllly fast without a fan. You will no doubt fry your PSU without a fan.


Maybe it's just me, but I wouldn't want to stick a thousand dollars worth of electronics in a bin of oil... :-/

 

[Nitestick]

it's only p3 or perhaps early k7 hardware so it's not that valuable. this can be done safely but it is really just done for the sake of it. in this case there is definitely no foreseeable advantage over passive cooling