Hardcore Reactor – Total Liquid Submersion
It’s been a few months now since the launch, but I just found this yesterday. This is by far the coolest PC that I’ve seen in a while. All of the components are totally immersed in non-conductive liquid coolant.
CORE COOLANT
Core Coolant is a mineral-oil-like substance that’s approximately 750 times denser than air and can store twice as much heat per unit of mass. In other words, Core Coolant has tremendous heat capacity—the maximum amount of heat containable in an entire air-cooled PC tower can be stored in 1 cubic inch of Core Coolant. Unlike water, Core Coolant is non-conductive and doesn’t harbor microorganisms. Fluids like Core Coolant have cooled electronics for decades in the transformer industry.
WHAT WE COOL AND HOW
Reactor’s active components are fully submerged in Core Coolant. Our Total Liquid Submersion technology cools in two ways: natural convection (described above) and forced convection (pumped coolant). Core Coolant circulates through Reactor’s radiator at 2.5 gallons per minute. Most internal components cool via natural convection, but these items get coolant pumped directly to them:
1. CPU (has a heat sink)
2. Northbridge (has a heat sink)
3. GPU (has a heat sink)
4. Power supplies
Reactor’s direct cooling plumbing track ends at the heat sinks, where the directed Core Coolant disperses and
integrates with the fluid in the tank.
For any heat sink to work effectively, thermal interface material performance is paramount. On Reactor, the thermal interface between the CPU and its heat sink is made of indium, which is simple to install and transfers heat extremely well.
Now, for the bad news:
Reactor Price: $3108.00
Reactor Pro Price: $3936.00
Reactor Extreme Price: $9167.00
The base price isn’t to bad, but I think the only problem is that everything is proprietary and there’s not much room for personal customizations. What do you think?
More Information:
Hardcore Computer
Gadget Pr0n Review
Maximum PC Review
Build your own PC air filter
If your computer is anything like mine, it sucks in a lot of air and with that air comes a lot of dust. I’ve got two 80mm fans in the front and two 80mm fans in the back plus the 120mm PSU fan. Since the side of my computer has a Plexiglas window, I can see all the dust that accumulates inside the case. Not only is it ugly, but it’s really not good for your computer’s parts. When dust gets around the processor, power supply and other components, it blocks the vents and overheats the computer. As it works harder to keep itself cool, it slowly degrades hardware performance which shortens the life of the computer.
Every couple of months, I like to take my computer outside and blow it out with bottles of compressed air, but I wanted to figure out a way to cut down on the dust even more. With my computer case, there’s a recessed area in the front panel that’s in front of my intake fans. This provided an excellent area for a custom air filter.
I went to Lowe’s and picked up a cheap furnace filter and cut it to fit. You can see in the picture below how it fits in there. I’m not sure if it makes a difference, but I put the wire mesh side on the outside.
Now, most of the intake air is pulled through the air filter before it enters my computer case. There’s still some places that the dust sneaks in, but this catches a majority of it. You can see a comparison in the picture below. The air filter on the bottom is brand new and uncut and the one on top was used in my computer for about two months.
If your case isn’t designed like mine, you may have design a air filter with a different size/shape. I hope this helps someone else keep their computer clean, cool and happy!
Useful Links:
Attack of the Killer Dust Bunnies
Create a Dust-Free Environment
Custom LED Lighting
Years ago when I started building my computer, case lighting wasn’t as popular as it is now. There are so many options now for illuminating the inside of your case. Anyways, I purchased a blue cold cathode for my case. I liked the color and everything looked great until I came across this article about one exploding inside a case. After reading that, I pulled it from my case, but I still wanted to have the inside lights. I decided to create a custom LED light bar. Keep in mind that this was about four years ago, so I’m not going to go into every minor detail about this project.
To make the front part of the project, I cut a piece of pvc long ways as shown here. This gave it a nice rounded edge where the LEDs would be mounted. I only used 1/4 of the pvc, but depending on your design, you could do whatever you want. For the back, bottom and sides I used plexiglass, but that step comes after all the wiring is done.
Once I got that piece cut, I drilled 10 holes about an inch apart for the 5mm LED clips in each hole. After those were inserted and the LEDs were installed, it was time for the wiring. Below is rough wiring diagram showing how I did it.
For all the LEDs, I cut the positive lead (longer one) down to shorten it and then soldered the resistor to the newly shortened lead. Then I cut the negative lead (shorter one) down and soldered a short wire to each one. After that, I connected all wires with a long wire, covering each soldered joint with heat shrink tubing. I used an old molex connector to easily provide power. (yellow = 12v / red = 5v / black = ground)
That was about four years ago and they’re still shining bright!
If you have any questions, feel free to post a comment.
Useful Links:
Resistor Calculator for LEDs
Frozen CPU – LED Lighting
LED Light Bars
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