Anybody familiar with T.E.Cs ?? i need help

[Killer Munkey]

well i got my 110w TEC in the mail yesterday and managed to fit it underneith my sp-97 and still have the retention mechanism apply pressure (although it seem to bend the board so i'm gonna find some new screws to use)

i made sure the cold side of the TEC was on the proc and the hot was on teh heatsink but it would only boot up for about 10 seconds before heat would hit the limit (65C) and it would shut down. so i'm kinda wondering if the TEC needs to be "warmed up" before it can function correctly cause when i tested it for hot and cold sides both sides were warm for at least a minute till i started to notice one side colder than the other. so would hooking up a differnt psu be my ownly solution to **** problem or is there a way to have the TEC start up and the computer not?

second question i have is that i'm kinda out of idea's and looking for some input on how to make my own do it yourself retintion mechanism to keep pressure on the TEC with teh sp-97 and not screw up the board as it would if i try it again the way i did it before. the current method of attachment is through 4 spring loaded screws that screw into a back plate . i'm wondering if it might be possible to pull of the springs off the screws and move them to slightly longer screws (current lenght plus height of TEC) so that the pressure on the proc isn't any different than normal. but i'm open to other ideas too.

thanks in advance
~Killer Munkey, the not so experienced TEC cooling noob

[evilangel]

Ok I dont know if this bit will help you but here is a guide written by ramil tranquilino from OCTools.com (http://www.octools.com/index.cgi?caller=articles/howto/pep66/howto.html) it covers installing under an alpha pep66. Also another idea is to see if you can buy a mounting kit for a danger den maze4 block fromm DD as this comes with fairly long threaded rods and some nylon nuts and washers which also may help you with the height problem of the cold plate, pelt and heatsink combo or you could try and source the threaded rod and nylon nuts and washers from your local engineering supplier, also it may also be an idea if you did run the pelt on a separate psu and rig up a jumpstart on the atx plug so you can power up the pelt before powering up the computer but you would also need to have the fan powered by the psu for the pelt aswell or you would have no cooling fans running while waiting for the peltier to chill the coldplate down, I have never used pelts before so i am only going by what i have read on the internet,

[Killer Munkey]

thanks for the info. i was pretty sure i'd need to run it on a seperate psu just to get things working before my main rig could start running and that only water cooling could properly pull enough heat off of it to make it work. hmm, the DD maze block has those screws...... i was gonna get the swiftech 6002A block but now i'm not sure if the DDmaze4 is better than it. i'll have to look around and find a review.

[Hawk]

Second power supply is a good idea, because the TEK's pull alotta juice. Biggest problem I ever had with the TEK's was condensation. Make sure you have awsome cooling for the hot side of the TEK, or put it through a water based system.

[Killer Munkey]

it's winter where i am now so condensation isn't a big threat atm. i got a sp-97 with detla fan atm for cooling but need to get bigger screws so that the board doesn't get bent with the tech between the proc and sp-97.

its not so much that i need a different psu to handle the TEC power reqs. (as the 520w powerstream should be able to do it) but then again i'm not to sure what the error that i got was.

basically it'd boot up at 10x200 @1.45v for long enough for me to get into the bios and not be able to do anything else after that cause it would shutdown. but it wasn't a normal shutdown as it continue making a long beep noise every few seconds until i pull the power from it completely. i'll have to consult my manual to find out what that beep code is.

[Killer Munkey]

ah, i'm pretty sure i was right, found out what short continous beep means. it measn a power supply problem. so i guess i am stressing the psu to much with the TEC. although the leds on the back of the psu didn't turn red they stayed green so......... :beat: i'll ask in the psu support forum to see if the leds would go red immediately or later on.

[boshuter]

I've never run a pelt before but I have an old one laying around here I got in a box of cooling parts I traded for one time. I hooked it up to a psu to test it and there was no waiting for it to do anything..... I was holding it in my fingers and when I powered it up it immediatley got hot/cold.... so fast it burned my finger that was on the hot side :yikes:

I did some research on them a while back and came to the conclusion that they weren't for me. From what I understand, it's like Hawk said, you almost need water cooling to make them do well. I'm following this thread with interest... still have that one laying here ;)

BTW: don't the TEC coolers usually come with some kind of controller for the pelt, maybe that's what delays the system start up? Seem to be kind of risky playing with it on an AMD system, don't the AMD cpu's burn up fairly quickly if they are started with no cooling?

[evilangel]

yeah the AMD does get hot very fast with lack of cooling, i was reading an AMD vs intel thermal throttling article and every time the AMD had it's cooling source taken away the AMD cpu would not throttle down it's speed quick enough to reduce the heat output and incidentally died where as the intel had it's cooling source taken away and it throttled very fast and no damage was caused.

If you want a review on the Maze 4 water blocks here is one from OCTools.com (http://www.octools.com/index.cgi?caller=articles/dangerden/amd/maze4rbx/maze4rbx.html)

[Killer Munkey]

that rbx block looks like a good choice, i'm probably gonna go with that cause just like the maze4 it bolts into the board so therefore i can probably adjust the screws or to fit the peltier underneith it. steveOCZ is helping me trouble shoot getting power to the TEC with my powerstream psu so hopefully that problem goes away. Then all i got to do is wait for christmas time when i'll probably be buying the water cooling parts or getting them as gifts.

[Shayd]

KM,

I have the RBX and unless you are going external I'd recommend the TDX if you are planning on doing more then the CPU eventually. Reason is that with 2 discharge couplers you have to Y them back together and depending on the flexibility of your tubing could be quite long to get the bends in there.
I have the RBX and the NV6800 WB's and have at this point setup my system where I have the pressure side of the pump going straight to the RBX (#3), one return side I have dumping into my NV6800 WB(pretty tight bend to get over to it), the outlet of the NV6800 joins the second outlet on the RBX using a Y connector and then dumps into the reservior that is outside the case (due to me cracking one of the fittings and the problems of the standard tubing not being very flexible), which then feeds the pump and starts the cycle again. I would have prefered that the two outlets of the rbx join up to feed the NV6800, but I'd have had to do curlyques with the tubing inside the case to get it where the tubing wouldn't collapse. I opted out on that.

Anyways, hope that experiance helps.

PS. there was a great article on some tubing linked in one of our boards. I got the 20' of the red and blue tubing and it is Soooo much more pliable, once I get my new reservior in I'll redo my whole system.

[evilangel]

Another good type of tubing to look at is tygon it may be expensive but it is very soft and pliable but the only cons that it has is the fact it is expensive and also it can kink very easily. Once i have got my watercooling ready to install i will be going for the silicon tubing from the local hardware store, also try and avoid the wire reinforced tubing as it is a real pest to work with and it has a tendancy of putting pressure on the waterblock mounts when you bend it.

[Killer Munkey]

thanks for the feed back shayd and evil. i've seen that tygon tubing stuff online but at first i was gonna go find some thick walled tubing from a local hardware store and use that to see if it does what i need cause at first i'm only gonna be cooling the cpu then later next year i'll grab a gpu water block for my 9700pro.

i'll check out that TDX water block cause i'm probably gonna want interal hook up but may have my resivoir external if i end up building it to large. I'm planning to use some clear material , plexiglass or some other other material whose name I forgot and make my own box like resivior, sealing it, and putting holes at top for power cord, water returning to the system and water dumping into the tank.

hopefully what i'm building will be enough to properly use a TEC

[evilangel]

I mentioned this thread to ramil from octools a couple of days ago when i picked up my res from him and he has actually said that aircooling of peltiers is only sufficient on peltiers under 100watts anything above needs to be water cooled

[Killer Munkey]

i c

so air cooling any peltier for a proc is almost a waste of time cause most OCed procs put off more than 100ws of power.

good info, thanks evil