Posted 05 December 2011 - 05:30 PM
Alright, so, I'm gonna admit that I love the CM Storm Trooper Case, I mean it's amazing in almost every way. Firstly the connectivity and ease of assembly are outstanding; 2x USB 3.0, a fan speed controller, X-Disk, and more HDD and SSD space then you can shake a stick at, not to mention the 9+1 expansion slots which is frankly staggering. The aesthetics are jaw-dropping, in my opinion anyway, this case with Red-LED fans and a cooling loop would look insane. Not to mention the name, Storm Trooper? Who was the genius who came up with that one?
You know, I'm getting a real Star Wars vibe, first the name, then all the red, can anyone say Sith Lord? Anyways, I'm just starting to sound a little too nerdy
So getting to the point, if CoolerMaster says that it is possible to mount a +400mm radiator vertically by removing the HDD cages, then wouldn't it make sense that by removing one you could mount a vertical radiator in it's place? (With a little modding of course)
Now the cages are cooled by 120mm fans, so it would make sense that you could fit at least a 120mm radiator (maybe a 140mm if I'm lucky) in place of a case, and since I only plan on using four 3.5" HDD's I don't think I'll miss one cage. So this should give me the ability to mount two 2x120mm radiators, one at the top rear, one at the bottom front, and then a single 120mm radiator. So I'm hoping I may be able to get a decent amount of water cooling power out of it without heavy modification.
The best way to increase the efficiency of your water cooling loop is by increasing three things: radiator surfact area, water flow, and airflow through the radiators.
Now, Stoneyboy779 gave me a few suggestions, one was to use XS-PC RX style radiators, thought he was concerned that they would probably be too thick to fit into the Trooper (that sounds kinda dirty). Now, due to the size of the HDD cage I plan on removing I think it should be no problem fitting an RX120 radiator in it's place. The bottom front of the Trooper looks pretty cramped so it's very doubtful I could fit an RX style radiator there, I would probably end up mounting an EX240 there, but the top back of the case looks a lot roomier so it may be possible to mount and RX240 in the space.
He also suggested I use a Swiftech pump, so the MCP655 comes to mind. Now the pumps I were planning on reach about 17Lpm together on a double circuit, but this beast reaches speeds near 21Lpm on it's own at the maximum speed setting.
That covers my first two bases, now there's only one thing left that I can improve on, the fan power. Now this should be fairly easy to take care of by both; getting higher RPM fans that are able to move more air, and putting fans in a push-pull configuration where I have enough room.
Now a lot of this is theory but this is what I'm thinking of as far as a revised cooling loop for the Trooper (and if this still fails it really is time to find a different case sadly).
Reservoir -> Pump (MCP655) -> CPU Water Block -> Memory Water Block -> Radiator (EX240 w/ normal fan config) -> GPU Water Block #1 -> Radiator (RX120 w/ push-pull config) -> GPU Water Block #2 -> Radiator (RX240 possibly w/ push-pull config) -> Reservoir.
If anyone knows if this level of modification on the Trooper case is possible I would greatly appreciate some input. Thanks in advance