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sokobanz

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 24, 2013
3
0
Did any one tried to install liquid cooling?
I've just ordered two xeon x5690 to my old middle 2010 Mac Pro and since cooler will be removed any way is there any chance fit some of new liquid cooling system in 5,1?
 

DanielCoffey

macrumors 65816
Nov 15, 2010
1,207
30
Edinburgh, UK
The existing air coolers have all sorts of sensors in and around them... it is likely to protest like heck.

There are vids of a liquid cooled 2008 MP I think.
 

DPUser

macrumors 6502a
Jan 17, 2012
986
298
Rancho Bohemia, California
Did any one tried to install liquid cooling?
I've just ordered two xeon x5690 to my old middle 2010 Mac Pro and since cooler will be removed any way is there any chance fit some of new liquid cooling system in 5,1?

Unless you are looking for silence, you won't need liquid. The MP air cooling is very good. If temps are a little hot, install some fan control software, raise the min fan speeds a tad and be done with it.
 

bax2003

Cancelled
Dec 25, 2011
947
203
Mac Pros Air cooling is enough for every dual 6-core Westemere Xeon, even for dual 3.46 6-Core.

I think that only way to have water cooling on CPUs is to remove every Fan in the chassis, and that is not very smart. This is only way because if any sensor on main or logic board can not detect RPM from any fan and adjust its analog control, other fans automatically go full blast, but if you remove every fan, there is no blast :)

Why this is not smart: you need fan for PSU, HDD bays / PCIe part of chassis to maintain safe air temps for other components.
 
Last edited:

Kissaragi

macrumors 68020
Nov 16, 2006
2,340
370
Would be a serious project. I wouldn't bother unless you really know what your doing.
 

ekiro

macrumors regular
Oct 25, 2013
136
0
Did any one tried to install liquid cooling?
I've just ordered two xeon x5690 to my old middle 2010 Mac Pro and since cooler will be removed any way is there any chance fit some of new liquid cooling system in 5,1?

Nope. Wont work. And it's silly. Your best bet would be to get a clear tube, pump super-cold air from the bottom-up. Then cycle it through again while constantly super-cooling.

MUCH MUCH better than liquid cooling, and it will allow you to overclock the CPU and GPUs and run them at very high temps.

Make sure their super-cooled air has little-to-no moisture.
 

haravikk

macrumors 65816
May 1, 2005
1,499
21
Couldn't you theoretically add liquid cooling to the existing heatsinks? It wouldn't be as good as liquid cooling directly, but the colder the heatsinks are the colder the processors are, which would let the fans run slower or the processors to run hotter.

It'd be a lot of work for limited gain though; a more useful solution might be to just get air-conditioning, either for the room (potentially cool several machines) or just get a portable unit and have it push cold air at the computer. Obviously it cools the whole room, and the computer is going to make the air conditioning unit work harder than it needs to, but the colder the air is coming in, the more effectively it cools. Plus if you get a new machine you don't have to transfer over the liquid cooling or buy a new liquid cooling unit, and if you get especially hot weather then you're not going to mind having some spare air-conditioning :)

If I had a spare room where I could do something like that then it's what I'd do; namely move my computers into a discrete air-conditioned room out of the way, and either setup another machine as a dumb-terminal or see if I can video cables etc. that will work over long enough distances to route them into my various, normal temperature rooms. If you have a basement you could even partition off a part of it, provided it's dry enough.
 

drrbc

macrumors newbie
Oct 29, 2009
24
0
It's been started, other projects got in the way. Give me a couple of more months, but will be sooner rather than later- got to if for no other reason than to clear a lot of the junk from my office!

Already custom fab'd the water blocks to fit the 4,1 procs and Northbridge. Wanted to integrate the vreg's mounts to the proc waterblock mounts before finishing.

If I knew how to post pics from my phone here I'd share.

BTW, my 3.3 Ghz 1,1 has been running on water since 2010. Last time I changed anything in the loop was 3 years ago.

Oh yeah, sorry to resurrect the dead here. If no interest just disregard my post.
 

Maila87

macrumors member
Jan 2, 2010
31
0
I have my MacPro and liquid-cooled HP in a closet that I've routed an AC vent into. Cool and quiet.
Hi, a little bit topic but can you share any info about your water cooled project? I’m thinking about installing setup to my dual Xeon Mac Pro 5,1
 

h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,614
8,545
Hong Kong
Hi, a little bit topic but can you share any info about your water cooled project? I’m thinking about installing setup to my dual Xeon Mac Pro 5,1

May I know what’s the reason to go water cooling? The Xeons can run 24/7 at full speed under the current Mac Pro’s air cool system even in hot (and humid) Asia. There is no way to OC the CPU. And the air cooler is not that noisy.

Water cooling may able to lower the CPU temperature, by doesn’t help in performance point of view. And Xeons has zero problem to run for years even a bit warmer.

However, the associated risk / trouble is very obvious. e.g. the cMP is not using standard mount point. Even installing the water cooler properly is already a challenge. And any liquid cooling system can leak (and probably will leak if not maintain properly).

The protential risk and benefit just doesn’t match up. High risk, low return, IMO.

You want to do it for fun? To prove it can work? Or really want to “use” it?
 

pertusis1

macrumors 6502
Jul 25, 2010
455
161
Texas
May I know what’s the reason to go water cooling?”

Agree with this 100%! I have dual 3.46 (12 core) with stock air cooling. They will run continuously without throttling with all cores chugging away for hours. Sometimes I open Activity Monitor just to watch it as it’s a thing of beauty. Just install the chips and get on with life.
 
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