CEC Warp Core

The Warp Core is a culmination of 4 months of work and over 200 hours of shopping, planning, fitting, building, rebuilding, re-rebuilding, busting, fixing, modding and testing until it was rocksteady and ready to take on the heaviest loads this hardware is capable of on a water loop.
Beautiful, Chaotic, Powerful and an undeniable statement piece; this PC was an absolute pleasure to build and we miss it in the shop every day.
(Below the parts list is detailed build information)

Parts List:

~CPU: Intel i9 9900k 8C/16T
~GPU: EVGA 2080TI SC Ultra 11GB
~RAM: 32GB (4x8) Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 3200mhz, CL16
~Motherboard: ASUS ROG Maximus X Formula
~Storage1: Samsung Evo Plus 1TB NVME M.2
~Storage2: Crucial P2 1TB NVME M.2
~Power Supply: Enermax MaxRevo 1350W 80+ Gold
~Case: GamerStorm Quadsteller (Modified)
~Cable Extensions: LinkUp Orange
~RGB: Corsair DRGB Strips (2 x 4 pack)
~RGB: Corsair DRGB Lighting Node
~RGB: 2 x EZDIY DRGB Diffused Strips
~Fans: 2 x Noctua Chromax Black
~Fans: 3 x AI Aureola Duo 80mm ARGB Ring
~Fans: 7 x Antec Prizm 120ARGB

Waterloop

>CPU Block: EK-Quantum Velocity LGA1151
>GPU Block: EK-Vector 2080TI
>Main Pump: SWIFTECH MCP35X
>Top Pump: XSPC Photon
>Reservoir: 2 x 300mm
>Tubing: PrimoChill PrimoFlex 3/8x5/8 10ft
>Coolant: Corsair XL5 1L Blue x 2
----Fittings----
>BitsPower 15 x 3/8x5/8 Compression Matte Black
>BitsPower 4 x 3/8x5/8 45 DEG Rotary Matte Black
>Bitspower 1 x 3/8x5/8 T-Fitting Matte Black
>BitsPower 2 x 3/8x5/8 MiniValve Matte Black
>BitsPower 6 x 3/8x5/8 Various Extenders
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Build Story and Information:
The Warp Core started out as a motherboard, a case and an idea that quickly turned into sketches, head scratching and many long hours.

Performance Choices:

Motherboard: Honest is; we started this build less than 4 months after establishing our company and we got this Maximus Formula X board for a steal; absolutely certain we could make something stunning with it. The board is performant, stays cool and is beautiful.

CPU: The baddest CPU that can fit on the Z370 chipset; simple as that.

GPU: We started out with an Asus GeForce RTX 2080TI O11G Dual-Fan OC Edition aaaaaaand…. The memory died 😭… we still have it as a memento in our shop. In the end, we settled on the EVGA 2080TI SC Ultra 11GB as a replacement due to the global price spikes and availability issues at the time at building making it extraordinarily difficult to find another ASUS card.

RAM: The Corsair Vengeance Pro RGB is longstanding, reliable RAM that mixes fabulously with the i9 9900k. At 3200mhz and CL16 this RAM just makes sense.

Storage: The most notably performant PCIE 3.0 NVME available was the obvious choice here backed up by some peppy NVME game storage.

Power Supply: 1350W of headspace on a rig that can pull nearly 800W from the wall… yes please.

Aesthetic Choices:

The Case:
We ended up having to Dremel fit the reservoirs, top pump and a few other items in order to get a clean and performant system. The Quadstellar Case underwent further modification with the removal of the front opaque flaps in order to show off our signature RGB styling and to further improve cooling. Working in a 70lb water cooled system on a slant produced further loop issues for draining and filling that we ended up working some creative plumbing magic to fix.

The Lighting:
The Warp Core is equipped with over 200 Addressable LEDs inside 11 x Digital RGB Ring Fans, 9 x DRGB light strips, 4 x DRGB RAM modules, GPU and CPU Water Blocks and motherboard lights. The Warp Core's lighting functionality and customizability is through the roof. We ended up running everything through OpenRGB for full Digital control over multiple inputs: this allowed us to set 9 one-click lighting profiles for hassle-free instant lighting swaps.

The Water Loop:
Our goal here was to provide an alien looking, wild and wildly effective water loop with a true CEC signature look. Our inspiration here is in the name. We wanted it to look imposing, complex and exactly what you’d expect opening up a starship warp drive.
We built in a dual valve system to drain this loop with a chimney. The whole system holds over a half gallon of liquid and including the 28 fittings, dual res and rad; the loop is right at 14ft in length.

Performance Numbers:

The Warp Core’s water loop was set up with an extended and dedicated top loop splitting off of the combined dual reservoir for the GPU. This configuration outputs extra head pressure into the radiator allowing for a distro block level of efficiency without a distro block.

The i9 9900k will turbo on it’s own up to 5.1Ghz all-core without thermal throttling. The 2080TI was able to outperform some lower-end RTX 3080s rocking extremely stable frames and temps while never going above the loop water temp. The GPU maxed out around 65C after 6 hours at 100% full system load while benchmarking at 22.2C ambient room temperature.

In our 100% system load testing, this system pulls a continuous 750W+ from the wall. We maxed out the GPU VRMs at 367W along with the thermal transfer capacity of the 9900k die size sporting our IC-Diamond thermal paste topping out around 85C at 5.1GHz All-Core. At one point we considered de-lidding the 9900k and applying liquid metal, but ultimately decided against it as this was a more sustainable thermal solution.

Summary:

As CEC’s first Ultra Custom, the Warp Core was both a success story and learning experience. We have several more Ultra Custom Rigs in the works and are looking forward to bringing those into the limelight!

If you would like to order a CEC Ultra Custom, feel free to reach out on any of our social media, via www.cec.direct or by shooting us an email at: criticalerrorcomputing@gmail.com.