For this, you need to purchase a special case to house your entire PC.
This case will have a tank of LN2 in it, which must be replenished
every once in awhile. Also included will be plates that have tubes
through them. These will be connected to your processor, GPU (graphics
processing unit), memory and perhaps other places on your mainboard.
These cases cannot be built using commonly found hardware, as the LN2
will freeze and damage the pipes, leading to leaks inside the case.
I would advise against this unless you need EXTREME performance
(meaning you need to overclock your CPU by a large factor). Even so, it
will be very expensive to maintain, since you will need to purchase a
container capable of carrying LN2 in, as well as purchasing the LN2.
Also, cases that support this are VERY expensive (a couple hundred US
dollars, typically). Overclocking using LN2 usually yields
approximately 20% better performance than with good air cooling, and
maybe 10% over water and other exotic cooling techniques. (Extremely
cooling the processor's transistors does yield the best performance
possible, but overcooling will make them nonfunctional.)
I would suggest something a little less overboard if possible, such
as water or peltier cooling, which is much safer in general, though
also very dangerous if done incorrectly. Especially Peltier cooling,
which takes advantage of the Peltier effect (where electricity is run
through a metal plate and one side gets very cool and the other very
hot). Water and peltier coolers have been known to short out CPUs.
Direct LN2 exposure would put the components in your system well below
operating specs and also short the components. Check out
Koolance's
site for more info on water cooling cases, or just use the money that
you'd spend on LN2 cooling to get a faster CPU and a more stable
motherboard.
-Jeff
(published on 10/22/2007)
