How to Cool Your PC with Dry Ice

Ant writes "This Madshrimps article is a complete guide to working with dry ice so you can reach sub-zero temperatures with your CPU and graphics card. Details on building containers, where to buy dry ice and important tips and tricks. (Seen on Blue's News.)"

WHY?!

[gotpaint32]

That device looks unweildy and is undoubtedly exceeding the max weight limit intel or amd would want you to use for a heat sink. Quite frankly i don't see the point of a computer that requires you to fill it daily in order to run it. Overclocking should only go so far, they have some nice professional compressor based solutions that should be able to achieve similar performance without the hassle of purchasing dry ice on a regular basis. One I know is called vapochill. Dry ice with no load is around -75 C whereas the vapochill should be around -45 C

http://www.hothardware.com/viewarticle.cfm?article id=565&cid=9 [hothardware.com]

And if you were to go the dry ice route, since AFAIK dry ice isnt conductive, why don't they just build the entire computer into an icebox (not the hard drive), and put a regular passive heat sink on the processor rather than construct that monstrosity of plumbing. I would think the overclocked memory and chipset would benefit equally as well. Oh and of course throw in some sacks of silica gel in there, don't want to have condensation now.:]

Re:WHY?!

[CortoMaltese]

Why? Hack value [catb.org].

Re:Slashdotted?

[cd_serek]

Grab it off mirrordot [mirrordot.org].

Thermoelectric coolers

[Anonymous Coward]

You can achieve a temperature of less than -100 F just using a big stack of (LARGE) thermoelectric coolers. With TECs, you can keep your CPU that cool 24/7 without using up dry ice!! The hot end of the stack generates an incredible amount of heat though -- A large fan is needed to dissipate the heat from the monsterous heat sink. Your computer could be used as a space heater in the winter!

Dangerous Stuff - Injuries!

[dawnread]

Check out what this guy did to his head with dry ice!

Link [dryiceinfo.com]

And how he did it...

Link [dryiceinfo.com]

CO2 build up?

[mlush]

I'd certainally not use this in a confined space! A Cooling system that can make you feel crap and sleepy? No thanks!

Re:Buy Dry Ice? Can't I make it?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure. If your freezer goes to 11.

Or more exactly, if your freezer goes down to -110 F.

(Actually, it's usually done by pressure liquification of CO2, followed by evaporative cooling. If you have a source of LCO2, you can buy a gizmo [ebay.com] to make it at home; cheaper models from other companies exist. Commercial production machines are a lot more pricey.)

Re:cheaper and easier

[xenoandroid]

Remember the PowerPC is not made by Apple, it's made by IBM.

Re:cheaper and easier

[Pandion]

Maybe you didn't notice this on the apple site:

"The Power Mac G5's enclosure houses four discrete thermal zones to compartmentalize the primary heat-producing components. Fans in the zones spin at very low speeds, creating an environment that minimizes distraction. Dual 2.7GHz systems also include an innovative closed-loop liquid cooling system that draws away heat quietly and efficiently."

yeah those PowerPC's, so cheap and cool...

You mean like this?

[nathan s]

Seems like it's been done [designtechnica.com].