exotic cooling Looking for advice how to sub-zero a 24/7 'Gaming' Server.

Michael0100 · November 21, 2020

Hi everyone, this is my first post on LTT Forums,

I have been looking forward to building a server using a 5950x to host possible multiple games servers at a time between me and my friends and whomever and want to overclock the wazoo out of it, because... Why not.
My catch is, I don't want to be spending more than £700 at maximum realistically

I have a half server rack in my bedroom available to mount & such, so space isn't an issue, noise isn't much of a concern either as I can sound proof it too. (I could reasonably fit 18 360mm Radiators into the cabinet and 30+ if I wanted to maximize it.)

At the start of this month, I made plans to build a server and give it crazy cooling, but wanted it to be safe for non-stop operation without requiring daily service with reasonable redundancy (Bi-weekly is acceptable), I have done small amounts of research, but have found more opinions than facts on whether something is effective or not and come up short in a lot of other areas.

My currently plan (Crappy diagram below) is to use 2 x 360mm Radiators to cool down the water from the CPU to a very reasonable, if not ambient temperature, then use a 1 x 360mm Radiator to cooler each 200w TEC (Two)

I did see a video of Linus pushing nearly 1kw through a TEC cooler but I could immediately see multiple inefficiencies and just problems with the plan because they overwhelmed their TEC is a CPU, and put so much power through it that they would've been unable to dissipate the heat from the TEC, let alone the CPU.

In turn, it would mean I have double the surface area & half the heat to remove, in theory giving me 4 times the efficiency of the TEC's, additionally the water is already pre-cooled to a reasonable temperature so I hope the water could be cooled to sub-zero temperatures. (I'm aiming for around... -30 to -15)

I know condensation maybe an issue, but I plan to have extremely high airflow being forced through the case with up to 650~ CFM on the intake if condensation remains an issue.

I was looking into Single Phase cooling, but every time I looked was like a slap in the face, road block after road block of seeing stuff, but never getting a price or power usage, or websites being missing from years ago.

Would you guys consider this a reasonable idea or something plausible?
Would this work as I intend it to?
What other sub-zero cooling solutions are there?

I'm not set in any specific path and want to hear what other people have to say.

P.S If anyone wants to know how I'm mounting it, what it looks like and parts ect, just drop a comment of what you want to know.

Links:

Case: https://www.logic-case.com/products/rackmount-chassis/4u/4u-standard-chassis-10-x-35-hdd-+-1-x-25-hddssd-+-3-x-525-bays-sc-416a/

Planned Build: PCPartPicker Part List

Spoiler

Type	Item	Price
CPU	AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 3.4 GHz 16-Core Processor	£750.00
CPU Cooler	ARCTIC Alpine 64 GT 25.6 CFM CPU Cooler	£500.00
Motherboard	MSI X570-A PRO ATX AM4 Motherboard	£147.99 @ AWD-IT
Memory	G.Skill Trident Z Neo 32 GB (4 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 CL16 Memory	£241.37 @ Newegg UK
Storage	Crucial P2 500 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive	£47.99 @ Amazon UK
Storage	Crucial P2 500 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive	£47.99 @ Amazon UK
Video Card	MSI GeForce GT 1030 2 GB Video Card	£62.64 @ Amazon UK
Case	Xigmatek Elysium Black Server Edition ATX Full Tower Case	Purchased For £82.00
Power Supply	GameMax RGB Rainbow 1050 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	£114.99 @ Amazon UK
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	£1994.97
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-11-21 21:26 GMT+0000

LyondellBasell · November 27, 2020

On 11/21/2020 at 3:26 PM, Michael0100 said:

My catch is, I don't want to be spending more than £700 at maximum realistically

I know condensation maybe an issue,

Would you guys consider this a reasonable idea or something plausible?

I think you can make a great cooling setup for less than £700.

I don't believe there's any reason to even bother with sub-zero.

You have a server-size space, and noise isn't a factor.

Get some great radiators, and use some server-grade fans to pump as much air as you can through the system. If the server space is properly ventilated, you'll keep everything close to ambient and you can do it indefinitely with yearly maintenance.