Damn, Vesper... that's pretty slick, man. I'll get there one day... one day.
I have no doubt!
Vesper,
Thanks for sharing... what a great set-up!!!
Thanks, I'm fond of them
Do you like the Prolimatech MK-26 better than liquid cooling? My 16-year-old son is determined to water-cool everything!!!
Long version: I haven't liquid cooled a mining rig, I have done it for a regular sysem. For a mining rig there's a few "sensible" options for liquid cooling, specifically a simple closed-loop system like the
Arctic Accelero Hybrid. There's some DIY setups as well which use the same design for about half the price. Here's how I came about the Prolimatech (
In Silver and
In Black:
My situation wasn't the normal "gamer looking to cool his GPU", I'm looking to cool racks. The stock TwinFrozr III setups started to die slowly, and I was having MSI replace them for free ($10 shipping on my part). But that isn't ideal. And cooling means longevity, and that's what I need in a rig. SO I needed a new cooler. And I needed many of them, at least 12-16 to try out, with the availability to purchase more and more.
The goal was, in this order: Reliability, Cooling, Silence, Ease of installation. The solution also had to support the modular setup of my racks, so it had to be physically tied to the PVC framework in case I moved them. I researched about 100 places with reviews on many coolers. I ran across a forum where a person has dedicated their bank account to reviewing 7950/7970 cards & setups of all brands, along with all possible cooling options. This was cool, and is what led me to my decision.
Basically it boiled down to a closed-loop liquid cooling option, like I linked above, or the Prolimatech MK-26 (The DeepCool Dracula needs mentioning, as it's essentially nearly the same, but is 2x as much and you can't find them anywhere). In every review I could find, the Prolimatech and Hybrid were pretty much dead even for noise level and ability to dissipate heat. In 2 independent reviews, however, the Prolimatech came out quieter than the liquid cooling option as measured by several devices. I started leaning toward it at that point.
Upon further analysis, the decision was clear: Prolimatech. What nailed it for me: It's a universal cooler, it will work for 20+ GPUs, and most future GPU's as well. It comes with a bunch of fittings. So it will be useful beyond the life of the GPU rig. It was $25-75 cheaper than the liquid cooling solution (even the DIY systems), and easier to install.
More important was reliability. If a pump fails on the liquid cooler, the GPU is dead. If a fan fails on the Prolimatech, the cooler is actually capable of dissipating the heat without the fan (up to 300watts without fans -- I checked this myself running them without fans and they stayed on par with the stock cooler).
TLDR; Prolimatech was the clear winner for noise level, cooling, availability, price, ease of installation and ease of maintenance (zero maintenance). It will also fit many other cards. So far I've bought 3 crates of them LOL. Amazon, FrozenCPU, Newegg and various outlets on ebay must wonder what I'm doing with them. When I say it's silent, I'm not joking. You have to put your ear onto the fans to hear them. It gets the wife approval as well.
Curious what temps you run on the 280X's as mine run about 77C-80C... and pretty much everything you said about BAMT was 'greek' to me... I never used a batch file until cgminer a few weeks ago!!
The MSI R9 280x's I just got are currently running at 59*C @ 740kh, one of them is at 68*C because it isn't spread apart from the GPU next to it. The fans are running around 2700rpm which I believe is 85% (in comparison, the Prolimatech fans run at a static 1000rpm). This is with a low gentle breeze of 40*F coming from my cold air fan about 4' away. I'm waiting on my next shipment of risers so I can spread it apart--it would be around 59*C as well if it was spread apart.
The TwinFrozr IV cooling system these come with is very impressive, the cooling is close to the Prolimatech (though still about 5*C shy of the Prolimatech), but it's nowhere near as quiet. It is MUCH quieter than the TwinFrozr III setup though (they sound like jets). This just sounds like a low whir. So I would definitely say the TF4 is probably the superior "stock" GPU cooler out there right now.
But, I like "silent" and the fact the Prolima's can take hardcore abuse and not even require a fan, thus tomorrow I'll be putting some Prolimatech's on them.
