Streacom DB4 — totally passive and completely silent

zdb

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Original poster
Jan 31, 2018
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Components:
No moving parts. Completely silent. Totally passive cooling.



Full write-up here.

First round of thermal testing is complete. Final results (normalised to an ambient temperature of 20⁰C):



Still have more tests to run, but figured I'd share what I have so far.
 
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Phuncz

Lord of the Boards
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May 9, 2015
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I love these cases and the builds people do with them. Well done, it seems like a balanced build !
 
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zdb

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Original poster
Jan 31, 2018
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Well done, it seems like a balanced build !
Thanks! Yes, "balance" was a goal I had in mind.

I wanted this machine to serve as my daily driver for the next seven years, so I tried to ensure that the cooling solution could keep pace with the processors — regardless of how hard I pushed them. Based on the tests I've completed thus far (and several weeks of heavy use) that goal has been achieved.

It's as performant as I need it to be (with headroom available if I want it), 'cool', silent, solid as a rock, and has a reserved, brutalist aesthetic to match. I can't believe it took me this long to finally work out that less is more.
 
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sgtspiff

Caliper Novice
May 25, 2018
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This IS one of my alternatives for my next setup.
I wonder though if I should go with a "T" cpu or whatever I want and buy a LH6? What do you say?
 

zdb

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Jan 31, 2018
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It indicates extra low energy intel cpus with 35w tdp.
Ah, got it.

A 35W TDP CPU would be a walk in the park for the DB4 with stock heat pipes — guaranteed.

Forget the LH6 Cooling Kit — that would be extreme overkill that would do nothing but needlessly limit your motherboard options.

It's all about the cooling capacity. The DB4 can cool a 65W CPU with no drama — so you may as well put a 65W CPU in there and enjoy the performance. :)
 
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sgtspiff

Caliper Novice
May 25, 2018
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Ah, got it.

A 35W TDP CPU would be a walk in the park for the DB4 with stock heat pipes — guaranteed.

Forget the LH6 Cooling Kit — that would be extreme overkill that would do nothing but needlessly limit your motherboard options.

It's all about the cooling capacity. The DB4 can cool a 65W CPU with no drama — so you may as well put a 65W CPU in there and enjoy the performance. :)

Thanks.
Then I Will consider 65w CPUs as well.
Looking like I will go for a DB4 build now as I failed to find a lian Li pc-t (sprider case).
 

axtran

Average Stuffer
Feb 13, 2017
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Passive is a shared dream! I'm very tempted to try out this build for my own. During installation, did you have to bend any heatpipes with that clearance? Looks like a near perfect fit!
 

zdb

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Jan 31, 2018
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During installation, did you have to bend any heatpipes with that clearance? Looks like a near perfect fit!
No, I didn't need to bend any of the pipes — but that's only because of the effort I put in before ordering the parts. I did a huge amount of pre-purchase research and investigation so that I could install the heat pipes without bending them.

As it turns out, the ASRock motherboard was the only one that could accommodate the LH6 Cooling Kit (which has three long heat pipes that run to/over the edge of the board) without having to bend any heat pipes.

This was my first totally passively-cooled build, and the first time I have ever used heat pipes, so I didn't want to have to worry about potentially cracking/flaking the packed copper shavings that exist inside the heat pipes — and crippling a core element of the cooling system.

Having said that, I understand that it is relatively safe to induce small-angle (sub 5°) bends into these heat pipes — so it should be possible to gain a few millimetres of clearance if you really need to.

Streacom has a 'recommended' heat pipe arrangement detailed in the manual. I deviated from this to avoid having a long heat pipe rest on a capacitor. Basically I used short heat pipes where components would be in the way, and long pipes where they weren't. That's another way of avoiding component collisions.

If you are happy to install a 65W CPU then you don't need the additional cooling that the (long) LH6 heat pipes gives you, you can stick with the (short) stock DB4 heat pipes, and then — theoretically — any mITX board would work. The whole problem (of having to deal with component collisions by either bending heat pipes or relocating them) goes away.
 
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shaman1307

What's an ITX?
Jun 10, 2018
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I have very similar config:
Case: Streacom DB4
MB: Gigabyte GIGABYTE Z370N WIFI
RAM: G.Skill Trident Z DDR4, 2x16GB, 3200MHz, CL16
CPU: Intel Core i7-8700, 3.20GHz, 12MB
CPU Cooling: Stock DB4 heat pipes + Streacom LH6 Cooling Kit
GPU: EVGA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti SC GAMING 4GB GDDR5
GPU Cooling: Streacom DB4 GPU Cooling Kit
SSD: Samsung 970 EVO 1TB PCIe x4 NVMe
PSU: Streacom ZF240

But Intel Core i7-8700 only as nominal has TDP 65W. Real TDP about 105W. That is why I have 100C of CPU temperature after only 10 minutes on 100% CPU loading.
I replaced stock termal tape on Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut, (TG-K-030-R), but still it is not enough. 2 of case sides warms up to 70C when CPU has 100C. I use Core Temp https://www.alcpu.com/CoreTemp/ for CPU temperature monitoring.
I think heat sink should be fitted to case sides more tightly than design can alow . Universal brackets are too fexible and also, case sides still have small gaps between each other :-(

What is your temperature of the case surface during 100% CPU loading?
 

zdb

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Original poster
Jan 31, 2018
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But Intel Core i7-8700 only as nominal has TDP 65W. Real TDP about 105W. That is why I have 100C of CPU temperature after only 10 minutes on 100% CPU loading.
Those numbers are crazy! You're not overclocking the CPU are you? If not, then either Intel lied about the TDP or there's something seriously wrong with your cooler setup.

I replaced stock termal tape on Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut, (TG-K-030-R), but still it is not enough. 2 of case sides warms up to 70C when CPU has 100C.
I just used regular thermal paste everywhere — a combination of the stuff that came with the DB4 and LH6, some Arctic Silver 5, and Noctua NT-H1. Probably 30g all-up (for CPU and GPU combined). I coated the inside of all of the channels that heat pipes would slot into, and applied liberal amounts to the exposed pipes and the spreader sections between them. I probably over-did the TIM — to be honest — but it seems to have worked.

If your walls are getting to 70°C then it would seem that your cooler setup is actually working (if it wasn't, then the CPU would be hot, but the walls would be cool). That would suggest even more strongly that Intel just lied about the TDP figure.

I think heat sink should be fitted to case sides more tightly than design can alow . Universal brackets are too fexible and also, case sides still have small gaps between each other :-(
I just popped the cover off my DB4 and inspected the heat spreaders. They are all nicely and evenly bonded to the walls. Nothing seems to have moved since I put it all together. The brackets are snug and seem to be doing their job (of holding spreaders in place) just fine.

I'm not sure what you mean by gaps between the sides of the case. Mine interlock very, very tightly — you couldn't slip a sheet of paper between them even if you tried.

What is your temperature of the case surface during 100% CPU loading?
I wrote a couple of articles about the thermals, starting with: Passively-cooled CPU Thermals

Short answer: In a 20°C room, sustained 100% CPU loads result in the CPU stabilising at 58°C and the hottest part of the hottest exterior wall reaches 42°C. The graphs only show a one-hour test period, but since then I've had overnight jobs (~6 hours @ 100% load) and the results are the same.

The hottest wall is the one that cools the CPU using the three short (stock) heatpipes (i.e. the wall directly opposite the CPU). Unsurprisingly, the hottest part of that wall is immediately on the other side of the heat spreader. Measuring even a few centimetres away from this point results in temperatures that are much lower.


Based on what you've written, it would seem that heat is getting to the walls, so the cooling system is working as it is supposed to. Rather than try to blame the case for the high temperatures, maybe it's time to consider the increasingly-likely possibility that Intel simply lied to you about the TDP of the 8700K?

Last month I attached a power meter to my computer to measure power consumption in various states and under various loads. At 100% CPU load the entire system draws ~75W. Given that our systems are very similar, you should be able to do the same test and get a very similar result. If your system draws substantially more than 75W then the problem's not the cooling or the case, it's the CPU. A power meter reading » 75W would prove that Intel lied.
 
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zdb

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Jan 31, 2018
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Ahh, yep — Intel lied about the TDP. Hardware Unboxed just covered the issue, and specifically mentioned the 8700:

 
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