Two makes one. Mathematically, no, but take two pieces of one whole piece, and together they make a piece. Singular. It’s all fix-related, and the Grand Master of Fixification is Daniel Rutter. We’ll let him get to it, in the meantime, IOOTM will score themselves an all-wholly MX700.
IOOTM: How cold is too cold?
I: I'm buying a new HSF (Zalman 6000CU) soon and was wondering what to do with my old one. After reading the latest issue I've decided to whack it on my GeForce3 Ti500 and overclock until it bleeds.
Anyway, this extreme cooling got me wondering whether hardware can be too cold. We all know that a CPU fries when it gets too hot, but can a CPU freeze and refuse to run if it gets too cold? Joel Daniels
O: Yes, it's possible to over-cool a CPU, but only in a cryogenics lab. Even then, some other important part of the computer is likely to die by misadventure before you manage to freeze anything into non-functionality.
Ordinary computer chips, including CPUs, will function perfectly well at very low temperatures. Many extreme overclockers have used liquid nitrogen (boiling point at sea level: 195.8 degrees below zero, Celsius; that's 77.2 degrees above absolute zero) to cool CPUs, generally with the assistance of very temporary improvised rigs involving polystyrene foam cups and quantities of gaff tape.
This is no way to run a computer for any length of time, but it is a good way to determine what the maximum overclock the CPU can manage is when temperature is not a factor.
When cooled like this, CPUs aren't actually running at nearly-200-below; they're sitting in the middle of a storm of boiling nitrogen at some hard-to-determine temperature. No motherboard or in-chip thermal probe can be relied upon to give you a good reading this far out of their intended range, but it's safe to say that LN2 on a processor will keep it a long way below zero, provided you keep it topped up.
In the real world, cryogenic computing becomes very difficult very quickly, for several reasons. You either need perfectly dry air around the computer, or you need to waterproof it thoroughly, because condensation is going to be a serious problem whenever the whole board isn't below zero. Condensation and ice crystals inside hard drives (which aren't sealed; they have vent holes with dust filters) are a Very Bad Thing; all of your drives need to be away from the cold area.
Various people have tried long-term cryogenic computing using Eskies and converted fridges and mineral oil immersion and other tricks; something usually ends up rusting or fracturing or delaminating. The CPU generally survives.
Water cooling systems are much more practical. A decently implemented sealed pump, water block and radiator arrangement will cool a CPU a lot better than any air cooler can manage, won't need much maintenance, and should be pretty quiet, too. A good water cooling setup will also generally get you within about 10% of the maximum overclock the processor's capable of with LN2 cooling. The effort needed for really extreme cooling does not match the speed improvement you get.
Up a certain creek
I: One day I turned on my PC, and while I was waiting for it to start I got that 'oh no' feeling -- the feeling you get when the message 'Cannot find x please locate the file' or something like that flashes up.
After many minutes of swearing I decided to put my hard drive in my other PC, and it found it OK, but when I explored it I only found one folder and two files. I then ran Norton Disk Doctor and did a scan; it found most of my files, but they were all unorganised and had names like DIR00000 all the way through to DIR00136. Most of the files were 0kb.
I really want to get my files back as I have a Website to maintain and about 15GB of games and keys for my shareware that I have registered.Is there a program that can fix it?Justin Soldat
O: Sorry, but you're boned. Your hard drive might just have had a major file system conniption and not actually suffered a hardware failure, but your data is still functionally unrecoverable. This is the experience that teaches you to make backups.Remember this mantra: If it's not backed up, it's not data you want to keep.
Tonight, on "Which Solvent?"
I: Much inspired by good ol' Ronny Prouse -- I can call him "Ronny", can't I? -- I decided to cover the hole I was cutting in the side of my Lian Li PC70 with a custom-cut pane of 4mm glass. The window hole I cut was almost identical to the one Mr Prouse cut in the 'Heavy Water Project' in issue 18 -- (unimaginative copy-cat!) -- kinda in a 'P' shape.
I also fixed this glass to the Aluminium side cover with silicone as Ronny, his glazier and my local glazier all suggested and/or confirmed as the best idea for this particular adhesion. Fair 'nuff, said I, until the panel lost balance while I was working on the PC and the glass broke.
To quote Mr Prouse in issue 18 '. . .I was convinced into trying silicone instead. Considering it would be easier to remove if the glass ever shattered. . .'
I've tried all manner of spirits from acetone to petrol to soften that crap, but that silicon isn't going to give before the expensive Aluminium side panel does. The two surfaces are too close to get any kind of blade in under there, and even if I did, the hooks and rolled edges on the panel interior aren't going to allow much working room.
So, please, any suggestions? How the hell do I get that broken glass off my side panel that I spent so much effort into cutting out? Bacchus
O: The solvent usually recommended for cured silicone is 'sandpaper'. But you can do better, if you have a bit of time and the materials involved aren't too touchy -- which they're not, in this case.
Ordinary silicone is not petroleum-proof. It doesn't dissolve instantly when petroleum products touch it, but it will come apart eventually. So if you put the case-side in a shallow tray of some sort and pour, say, petrol on it, then leave it for a week or two, the silicone ought to just fall apart. Briefer immersion would probably be adequate; I haven't done scientific tests, beyond accidentally destroying a silicone rubber exhaust coupler for a model car some years ago.
Pretty much any petroleum product should work for this. Kerosene or light oil, for instance, not to mention various thin solvents of varying levels of ferocity. Heck, Vaseline will eat silicone, but a thin liquid is better if you want it to penetrate.
Once you've removed the glass and the silicone, you'll need to give the panel-side a good scrubbing with detergent to get rid of the petrol residue, but then it should be ready for your next attempt.
There are some brand-name products for this purpose as well -- DAP's 'Silicone-be-gone' and 3M's 'General Purpose Adhesive Cleaner', for instance -- but they're not likely to be easy to use on a sandwiched film of silicone.
Temperature panic
I: I recently discovered that my Athlon XP 2000+ was running a little hotter than I would like it to. At restart it was about 54 degrees Celsius (this is the supplied cooler). Then I checked it with the supplied mobo monitor utility after playing UT2003 for an hour or two only to discover that it was running in the 70 degree area.
I panicked. This was far too hot for my (shamefully) unoverclocked 2000+. In your latest issue I noticed in your Hot Box section that Axeman's Gothosaurus was running the same chip overclocked, running at almost half the temp.
I have now investigated the possibilities of cooling and considered buying a
Issue: 133 | February, 2012