Desktop PC Overhaul

I was having some temperature and blue screen issues on my desktop recently. For one the original fan on my Cooler Master V8 CPU cooler died on me. I performed a little surgery and replaced its fan with a non-PWM case fan I had as a temporary solution (without removing the CPU cooler). I was regularly sitting at ~40 C idle which was rather warm.
So, I decided it was time for a CPU cooler change and figured I would try one of those close loop liquid systems. After reading lots of reviews, forum posts, comparisons, and so on I elected to go with the Corsair Hydro Series H110i because it used the CoolIt water pump and had good performance reviews, even if deemed a bit noisy.
One problem though is I use a Cooler Master HAF X full tower case. This case has been fun so far, but one issue for this particular cooler (which I knew when I ordered the cooler) is that this case only has holes for mounting 120 mm radiators at the top, not 140 mm radiators. So, some light modding would be involved.
I apologize for the image quality, lighting in the room was not great and I was doing this late at night and also had to use flash on a lot of shots. Thinking about it I should have taken of the circular polarizing filter as it would have let more light in.
Corsair Hydro Series H110i  box:

Inside the box it comes with: 1) Hydro Series H110i Liquid CPU Cooler; 2) Mounting kit for all modern CPU sockets; 3) Two SP140L High Torque 140mm Fans; 4) USB cable for Corsair Link™ Integration; 5) Fan and radiator mounting screws; 6) Thermal compound (pre-applied); and 7) Quick Start Guide.

Before you remove your current CPU cooler (or install this in a new build) connect it to your power supply via the SATA power connector on the pump and let it run for a bit. Make sure you hear the pump running and then check along the hoses and connectors for any fluid leaks. You do not want to install a leaky water cooling system into your PC. Best to test while it is out of the case first.

Here is a picture of the inside of my case before I started work, it is a dusty mess in there. Also, that copper looking PSU at the bottom is a PC Power & Cooling Silencer 750 W Copper that is 9 or 10 years old now and still going strong.

I did a lot of vacuuming and blowing out with a compressed air can. Much cleaner now. I also removed the Cooler Master V8 CPU cooler and the RAM. The back bracket for the CPU cooler was a bit difficult to remove due to where the gap is behind the CPU, but with an extra pair of hands holding the CPU cooler, and removing the central fan first, I was able to get everything off.

To drill the holes for the radiator and to install it you need to remove the top of the case and the fans there. The top of the Cooler Master HAF X is held by three plastic tabs on each side that need to be gently released by pulling them toward the outside of the case. Also the top panel has a grounding wire to the case which you will need to unscrew otherwise you might not have enough slack to move the top panel out of the way.

Because I am drilling into the case, which results in metal dust and shards flying about, I protected the exposed CPU and RAM slots by taping a piece of paper towel as a drop cloth.

I taped a piece of paper to the radiator, traced the brackets, and marked the screw holes on a sheet of paper. I then used that piece of paper as my drilling stencil after making sure the drill locations all matched well with metal supports for the radiator. On the CM HAF X a H110i will only be mounted using four screws unless you add your own brackets, which I did not.

I drilled the holes using my drill. I first used a 5/32" drill bit but ended up re-drilling using a 3/16" bit to have a bit more room for alignment. Even then I was only good on 3 out of 4 holes and ended up re-drilling the bottom right hole. I wish I had a good metal file. Instead I used course Emory Cloth to sand the holes, it left some scratches on the case. Also, I vacuumed after the drilling multiple times to get rid of all the metal filings.

A common them of reviews of the Corsair H110i is fan vibration noise. A lot of purchasers wished that Corsair had included fans with rubber dampeners. I went to Home Depot and bought a Danco 200 Assorted Plumbing O-Rings (Home Depot's site says 100, the box says 200, the price and model match, go figure) and 00 Flat Washers 1/2" O.D.. I was actually hoping to buy the Danco 100-Piece  Assorted Flat Washer Set but they were out of stock on the shelf and it was close to closing time.

When mounting the fans to the radiator I used the #5 O-Ring, from the assorted O-Ring kit, as a rubber damper. So far, a week after install (when I am writing this post, even though I back date it to the date the work was done) I have had no vibration noise issues. The whole unit is quite quiet. The included fans are being used as push, pushing air through the radiator and out the top of the case.

Then when mounting the radiator to the case I used the provided metal washers on the top side of the case and the 00 Flat Washers between the case and the radiator as further vibration damping.

The final mounting looked like this on top. This introduced a new problem because the rounded screws all sat proud on the case, and since I was not using a 120 mm X 240 mm screw patterned radiator the screws were not in the nice factor recesses.

So far, so good. Another image of the mounted radiator:

This is what it looks like from the inside. Notice that there is plenty of room for a 280 mm radiator (actually 322 mm long) without interfering with the rear 140 mm exhaust fan or the two optical drives.

Now, because the radiator screws were sticking up I was having issues when test spinning the blades of the top mounted 200 mm exhaust fans. I ended up using a #8 O-Ring, from the assorted O-Ring kit,at each corner of each fan as a spacer. As a side effect these already quiet fans make even less noise with the additional rubber dampening.

I then did my final cleaning and preparation of the CPU and the water pump block using ArctiClean 1 and ArctiClean 2. ArctiClean 1 has a strong citrus / orange scent like the FastOrange hand cleaner I use for cleaning up from automotive work. The ArctiClean 1 was a lot more effective and faster than my normal usage of Isopropyl alcohol, so I may need to buy more in the future.

The bracket to hold the Corsair H110i on a AMD CPU is the stock AMD bracket so that was reinstalled.

I put a single line of Arctic Silver 5 thermal compound down the side of the CPU.

I then spread it by dragging it across the CPU with an old cancelled credit card to get a nice thin and even layer.

I then installed the Corsair H110i. I ran the USD header based Corsair Link cable down underneath the graphics card and sound card, the same route I have my CPU power cable. This necessitated removing and putting back the sound and graphics cards but also provided a good opportunity for a more thorough cleaning.

I also installed a new 512 GB Samsung SSD 850 Pro as my new OS drive. People complain these do not contain requisite mounting hardware for desktops. Since I like to build my desktops on my own I have a few boxes of organized spare parts that came with the purchase of the case and other components meaning I have 2.5" disk drive holders and my old stock AMD AM3 back plate and mounting hardware and so on.

This involved running a new SATA cable and getting rid of the eSATA connection for my front ports, which I have not used in the 5 or 6 years I have had this build.

I also ran the cables for the radiator fans, which had a lot of slack, up over the mother board tray and behind the radiator to keep things looking clean, this necessitated the use of a new zip tie.

I then added back in the graphics card duct fan, which had been acting as my temporary CPU fan in the Cooler Master V8 I replaced. When installed the fan back in the duct I added a #5 O-Ring at each corner because vibration damping seems to be a theme here and I have a lot of extras.

Then I put the whole case back together. That side 200 mm fan's filter is really dusty.

Tools needed:
Long Philips screw driver, show Philips screw driver, previous HSF hardware (for removal), drill and bits. Compressed air cans and vacuum suggested.

This is all running quite well and was a simple mod.
The software that came with the Samsung SSD cloned my old OS HDD and has been working great since.
I have seen an idle drop of CPU temperatures of about 5-9 C. So this is very good.
Everything is much quieter.
If it had not been so late and I had been smarter what I should have done it gone through and remounted the front, rear exhaust, and side fans with rubber O-rings as vibration dampers and probably done the same for the HDDs as there are four of them, plus the SSD.

Ultimately I am really happy with the outcome.

Here are the current specifications for the build:
Desktop: Custom
Case: Cooler Master HAF X 942 (Fans: 1x 230 mm front, 1x 140 mm rear, 2x 200 mm top, 1x 200mm side, 1x 140 mm to GFX card, custom wiring, modded for 280 mm x 140 mm top mounted radiator)
MB: ASUS Crosshair IV Formula AM3 AMD 890FX
CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz Socket AM3 125W (running with slight OC at 3.7 GHz)
HSF: Corsair Hydro Series H110i
RAM: 4x 4GB G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 [16 GB total]
GPU: 1x Sapphire Vapor-X Radeon R9 270X (2 GB GDDR5)
Sound: Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer Fatal1ty Pro
PSU: PC Power & Cooling Silnence 750 (Copper)
HDD: 1x Samsung SSD 850 Pro (OS)
HDD: 1x WD RE4 500 GB SATA 3.0 Gb/s (OS)
HDD: 1x WD RE4 500 GB SATA 3.0 Gb/s (Spare)
HDD: 1x WD Caviar Black 1TB  SATA 6.0Gb/s (Backup + Media)
HDD: 1x WD Caviar Black 1TB  SATA 6.0Gb/s (Backup + Media)
Networking: Dual Gigabit
Optical: LITE-ON 24X DVD Writer Black SATA LightScribe
Optical: LG Black 10X Blu-ray Burner SATA LightScribe
Primary Monitor: Samsung SyncMaster P2770HD 27" Widescreen w/ TV Tuner
Secondary Monitor: Samsung T220 Rose-Black 22" Widescreen
OS: Windows 7 Ultimate x64

I use twice daily Microsoft SyncToy tasks to backup all the data onto the backup drives, an external HDD, and a NAS. I am a stickler for cloning my data.

If you have any questions or comments leave them below and I will do my best to respond.