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[Build Log] Tranquil Stream - A Submerged Streaming PC

Grrizz

TRANQUIL STREAM


Gidday LTT forums I’m going to be putting together a submerged streaming PC for my lounge and here shall be my build log. I’m hoping things will progress at a reasonable pace but it will be very dependent on how work goes as at the moment I can only spare a few hours here and there (a good chunk of which goes to gaming or drinks with friends)… anyway on with the show...

Background: I was originally planning a small water cooled custom gaming PC but as I got further and further into the planning stage work got busier and busier so that had to be shelved, the other project I had rattling around in my head was a file server upgrade but alas for that I needed the case my gaming PC currently resides in :( About this time Steam in-home streaming added support for Nvidia hardware encoding which got me thinking “why don’t I make a low power streaming PC for the lounge?”, pairing that thought with my long time curiosity about mineral oil submerged systems this project was born!

Aim: To create a low power PC that can handle movie and Steam in-home streaming while not being too time consuming.

Hardware: I started by looking around for suitable hardware, after reading that basically any Intel CPU with Quick Sync could handle Steam in-home streaming and with all the noise about the new Pentiums at the time I was thinking this would be a good choice but came to the forums fist looking for input/experiences. After a suggestion from Electronics Wizardy to look at the Baytrail platform I came across the Gigabyte GA-J1900N-D3V, a quad core Celeron with a 10W TDP :D adding to that 8GB of DDR3, a 80W picoPSU, a Samsung 840 120GB SSD and a Hauppauge DVB-T tuner I had lying around I had my base hardware to work off.

Peripherals: There were two main types of controls I would need for this build, the first being a wireless keyboard and mouse for ease of use on the desktop and the second being a couple of gamepads, this being a lounge PC the games will be casual multiplayer games for the most part (Nidhogg, Mortal combat, console emulators, etc.).
After looking around a bit I found a nice clean looking keyboard with a built in trackpad so I wouldn’t have to fumble around with a mouse on the couch, it’s the Rapoo E9180P. The controllers will be Xbox ones because I find my current 360 one very comfortable, I was hoping to get Xbox One controllers but at this point there is no wireless option for the PC :( so unless they come out before I finish I’ll be settling with a pair of Xbox 360 controllers.

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Design and housing: After the core components were decided upon I could get into finding a suitable aquarium to build around and nut out a design. I ended up settling on a Dymax IQ5 aquarium (including pump) because it was a nice size for a mITX build, admittedly it was a little taller and deeper then I would have liked but those are things I could work around and it happened to be on special at the time.

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A while later I had come up with this:

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This is still a bit of a WIP and I’m crap at doing natural forms (rock and drift wood)… well that and I don’t have the time to spend gussying everything up, even the motherboard was pulled from my gaming PC design (ASRock Z77) but it’s enough to get me going. The dimensions are 280D x 230W x 315H.
In the meantime I ran around trying to find the elusive white mineral oil without having to get it shipped from overseas (the cost of shipping on several Kg of oil was never going to be pleasant), buying 60 x 200ml bottles of baby oil or something impractical like that. I also looked at air pumps, bubblers, gravel and liveries. As luck would have it I managed to find some mineral oil locally (a company called Canadian Oil of all things ;)), after going in to collect a 20L bottle and having a bit of a chat to the lady at the warehouse about what I intended to do with it I managed to get a decent cash discount which helped keep the budget in check :D

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Some of the considerations while designing the case were:

  • Wicking/siphoning – Due to the aquarium being slightly taller than I would have liked I wanted to have the I/O under the water line to keep the board more central, this is something you generally try to avoid due to the cables wicking and ultimately siphoning the oil out of the case so to get around this I will be building a custom I/O PCB at the back of the box with some short run cables creating a break point between the inside and outside of the box. This panel will also have some convenience items like power/reset/clear CMOS switches and light/pump control.
  • Mineral oil resistance – Some materials don’t respond well to mineral oil so I am trying to soak samples of everything I intend to put in it from tubing to bubblers for at least a week to see how they hold up. So far everything has gone well with the exception of plasti dip… because the memory and picoPSU I have are on green PCBs I had intended to plasti dip them black but after putting a small length of plasti dipped tube into my soaking jug and waiting a couple of days the plasti dip coating had turned to jelly so the next step will be trying regular spray paint.
  • Heat – Because of the low power system heat isn’t a concern so no additional radiator etc. would be required however I am considering adding a fan to the CPU heat sink purely for aesthetics.
  • Stickers – All stickers on the parts will have to be removed as the oil will dissolve the glue and leave me with barcode fish swimming around in my tank :wacko:
  • Check valve – A check valve on the air line is necessary to prevent any siphoning when the air pump is turned off which would likely be a common occurrence to both mute the sound and visual distraction when watching movies etc.
  • Bubblers – I wasn’t sure how much air pressure I would need and if I wanted to go with a bubble wall or air stone so I picked up both a wall and stone and grabbed the weakest air pump for a starter (Blue Planet Bubbilo SP100) as in theory it would also be the quietest with the thought I could keep one upping it until I had a satisfactory flow. As luck would have it the pump was more than enough, I now just have to decide on whether I prefer a column of bubbles off to one side or a wall across the front of the motherboard… at the moment I’m leaning towards the wall but am concerned it might be a bit much?

 


What do you all think? A column of bubbles coming up from behind the driftwood or a wall across the front of the motherboard (back of the chamber)?

UPDATES:
UPDATE #1: I/O and control board
UPDATE #2: Ready, steady, bake!
UPDATE #3: Pew, pew lasers…

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That is going to look sweet. How did you remove the stickers?

Intel 4790k | Asus Z97 Maximus VII Impact | Corsair Vengeance Pro Series 16 GB 1866Mhz | Asus Strix GTX 980 | CoolerMaster G550 |Samsung Evo 250GB | Synology DS215j (NAS) | Logitech G502 |

 

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Can't wait! Everyone follow this topic!

My Car: http://linustechtips.com/main/topic/274320-the-long-awaited-car-thread/?p=4442206


CPU: i5 4590 |Motherboard: ASRock H97M PRO4|Memory: Corsair Vengance 8gbs|Storage: WD Caviar Blue 1TB|GPU: ZOTAC GTX 760 2gb|PSU: Thermaltech TR2 500W|Monitors: LG24M35 24" & Dual 19"|Mouse:Razer DeathAdder 2013 with SteelSeries Qck mini|Keyboard: Ducky DK2087 Zero MX Red|Headset: HyperX Cloud|Cooling: Corsair 120mm blue LED, Lepa vortex 120mm, stock 120mm|Case:Enermax Ostrog Blue Windowed


 

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Thanks for the positive feedback guys :wub:

 

Finally someone took the magic J1900 ^_^

Such a nice little platform that seems to get overlooked a lot (by myself included ;)), it'll definitely go on my parts list for future "parent" builds etc.

 

That is going to look sweet. How did you remove the stickers?

So far they have all pulled off fairly easily, I just follow up with a rag with some oil on it to remove the leftover sticker glue. If I do come across anything stubborn that wont just pull off I will likely soak the part in some oil overnight and that should free it up, I only need ~10L of the 20L I bought so I've got a bit to play with :)

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Thanks for the positive feedback guys :wub:

 

Such a nice little platform that seems to get overlooked a lot (by myself included ;)), it'll definitely go on my parts list for future "parent" builds etc.

 

So far they have all pulled off fairly easily, I just follow up with a rag with some oil on it to remove the leftover sticker glue. If I do come across anything stubborn that wont just pull off I will likely soak the part in some oil overnight and that should free it up, I only need ~10L of the 20L I bought so I've got a bit to play with :)

 

I never knew stickers can be removed with oil. I got some plastic parts with sticker stuff one them. It is worth a try :D

Intel 4790k | Asus Z97 Maximus VII Impact | Corsair Vengeance Pro Series 16 GB 1866Mhz | Asus Strix GTX 980 | CoolerMaster G550 |Samsung Evo 250GB | Synology DS215j (NAS) | Logitech G502 |

 

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Wish I had some throwaway money to waste on an oil pc. always wanted to do it but never the cash to waste on it if it went wrong.

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Wish I had some throwaway money to waste on an oil pc. always wanted to do it but never the cash to waste on it if it went wrong.

 

I can't imagine what can go wrong

Intel 4790k | Asus Z97 Maximus VII Impact | Corsair Vengeance Pro Series 16 GB 1866Mhz | Asus Strix GTX 980 | CoolerMaster G550 |Samsung Evo 250GB | Synology DS215j (NAS) | Logitech G502 |

 

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Wish I had some throwaway money to waste on an oil pc. always wanted to do it but never the cash to waste on it if it went wrong.

As long as you do you homework there's not too much that can go wrong, the wicking/siphoning thing is a real unexpected gotcha that people don't see coming but your right that its definitely not the cheapest nor most practical way of going about building a computer. This is something I've been keen to do since the early 2000s/late 90s ever since I saw OCTools build (those guys were real pioneers, Kiwi guys too :D) but its never managed to get to the top of my to-do list, which has probably been a blessing in disguise as over the years of people trying it there have been several cravats discovered through trial and error which will save me from some of the headaches I may have encountered :)

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Where will the radiatior be?

n0ah1897, on 05 Mar 2014 - 2:08 PM, said:  "Computers are like girls. It's whats in the inside that matters.  I don't know about you, but I like my girls like I like my cases. Just as beautiful on the inside as the outside."

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Where will the radiatior be?

 

He may not need one...

 

EDIT: Yep, in his post it says he will not have a radiator, and I think he should be fine...

Owner of a top of the line 13" MacBook Pro with Retina Display (Dual Boot OS X El Capitan & Win 10):
Core i7-4558U @ 3.2GHz II Intel Iris @ 1200MHz II 1TB Apple/Samsung SSD II 16 GB RAM @ 1600MHz

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Woah dude, build it faster haha

[spoiler= My "gaming rig" ]

  • CPU: Intel i5 2500
  • Motherboard: Asrock B75M-GL R2.0
  • RAM: 1x4 GB 1333 Mhz Kingston, 1x4 GB 1333 Mhz Transcend
  • GPU: MSI GTX 770 Gaming OC 2 GB
  • Case: Zalman Z3 plus white
  • Storage: WD Blue 500 GB, WD Black 1 TB
  • PSU: LC POWER 650W ATX v2.3 80+ bronze
  • Display(s): Acer V223HQ
  • Cooling: Scythe SCKTN-3000
  • Keyboard: CoolerMaster QuickFire TK MX blue
  • Mouse: Sharkoon Fireglider Laser Mouse
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Interesting :D

NZXT H440   //   MSI Z87 MPOWER MAX AC   //   i5 4670K   //   MSI GTX 780 Lightning 3GB   //   HyperX Beast 8GB 2400mhz   //   OCZ Agility

 

 

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To all Germans, this build wird laufen wie geschmiert  :D  :D

 

Really bad joke about oil and lubricants

Intel 4790k | Asus Z97 Maximus VII Impact | Corsair Vengeance Pro Series 16 GB 1866Mhz | Asus Strix GTX 980 | CoolerMaster G550 |Samsung Evo 250GB | Synology DS215j (NAS) | Logitech G502 |

 

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To all Germans, this build wird laufen wie geschmiert  :D  :D

 

Really bad joke about oil and lubricants

LEL! 

Owner of a top of the line 13" MacBook Pro with Retina Display (Dual Boot OS X El Capitan & Win 10):
Core i7-4558U @ 3.2GHz II Intel Iris @ 1200MHz II 1TB Apple/Samsung SSD II 16 GB RAM @ 1600MHz

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Thanks for the comments guys :)

Over the long weekend I had some time to get started on the I/O and control circuit so here's a little preview:

 

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I need to add a mains input and SSR to control the air pump, I also intend to move the DC jack over to the right side to make routing easier but the basics are there.

 

Where will the radiatior be?

There wont be an external radiator as the surface area should be more then enough to dissipate the heat with the CPU having a 10W TDP, the bubbler and fluid pump will help keep the oil circulating and there will be a bit of an overflow behind the motherboard down to the pump area which will also aid in circulation and cooling.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Update #1: I/O and control board


Little bit of an update :) The design for the I/O board and controller is done and parts have started to roll in.

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I’m still waiting on a few things and am giving the PCB layout a bit of time to marinate before I place the order, something I like to do because when I come back to something after few days I often see things I may have missed in the heat of the moment or just have a fresh perspective with new ideas. I will probably put the order in this weekend so as to get the ball rolling though.

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NOTE: This is outdated and has had some important alterations if you are using it as a reference, for more information please look at the note here


The rear I/O was selected with the lounge in mind so I went with optical and coaxial audio outputs, I adapted the DVI to HDMI, brought the Ethernet and 4x USB3.0 headers out and the controller will connect to the internal USB2.0 header on the motherboard. Those USB3.0 headers were an absolute nightmare to route too, so many wires in such a tight space with the through hole pins taking up a lot of board real-estate all the while having to be mindful of the tracer pairs - it’s probably not that important over such a short distance but better safe the sorry right? ;)

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I have mainly been working on lighting control lately, I have a test board with an RGB LED strip setup and have put together a control GUI that will allow you to adjust how the LEDs behave and set their colours, it will also allow you to turn the air pump on and off.
The current LED behaviour options are:

  • Off
  • Solid
  • Breathing
  • 2 colour fade
  • RGB cycle
  • HDD activity

 
I may add an option for the ‘HDD activity’ mode to allow it to change between hard cuts like in the video and various integration levels so the intensity/speed of the colour change is controlled by how active the drives are… I may also need to change it to ‘Drive activity’ mode too being there are no HDDs in this build ;)

There are an additional two hardware switches on the back for basic controller functionality if you want to turn either the lights or the air pump on or off quickly and don’t want to login or boot up if the computers off to do it. The controller stores settings in an EEPROM so if the power is lost it will still boot to the last used settings and if you turn the lights on with the button on the back they will load back into their last set state.
The oil pump is setup to automatically turn on or off with the PC so it doesn’t have to be running when it’s not needed but the air pump and lights are independent of the PCs state because they are there for aesthetics.
The other buttons on the board are a rear exposed power button, an internal reset button and a clear CMOS button so I don’t have to go swimming if something does go wrong.
I have also left some spare ADCs exposed via a header in case I want to add to the board later, things like temperature sensors might be a bit of fun to have control the lighting etc. but that isn’t in the plan just yet… though thinking about it now it would be kinda cool and wouldn’t take much effort…

Other than that I have just updated the model a bit and have been figuring out wire and tubing routes, putting a model of the motherboard I am actually using in was a really good move as it made me realise my original I/O board layout was really impractical from a wiring point of view so I’m glad I took the time to do that even if it is a fairly incomplete model.

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