My Aventum Review!

Well my new Aventum arrived, I'm sorry to report not without problems.
I'm not going to sugar coat this or act like everything went perfectly
because it certainly didn't so bare with me a little.

The day began with the FedEx driver neglecting to be sure the address
was a match with the package. He was about to deliver ten grand worth of
computer to my neighbor across the street before I stopped him. After
securing the package I started unpacking it, the packing was excellent
and top notch. After lifting the lid my first reaction... my oh my it's a lot
more computer than I expected. Approximately 29 1/2"L x 9 1/2"W x 26
1/2"H and over 90 pounds! This is a two person job if you don't happen
to have a dolly to wheel it around. I would suggest to Digital Storm
perhaps offering a well constructed wheel assembly set or rolling dolly
frame to attach to the bottom of the chassis like a TV stand as an
accessory. For anyone considering purchasing the Aventum consider the
fact that it is a big and heavy piece of serious hardware. It's not a
Full Tower this is in a new category a Super Tower! The crate and
packing did it's job protecting as far as I can tell so kudos to the
team for the new and improved packaging.

Before I get into the specifics I just want everyone to know how very
impressed and happy I am with the hard work and effort that went into
the design and build. However I'm not completely satisfied (is anyone
ever really). I want to be part of the solution in building a better
product. I understand this is a new product and it deserves attention
like anything else. Unfortunately some issues with the build have come
up so I have written the following "beta test" type of review on the
Aventum. Oh and any improvements and revisions I am definitely in as a
life long customer in getting my Aventum massaged and reworked with
improvements and upgrades. Fit and finish is overall excellent with some
minor scuffing of the clear window and a few loose fasteners on the
case side covers. Scuffing came from the Aventum signage that probably
could be removed packed separately in the crate prior to shipping and
installed by the customer. I would suggest also to add a double sided
protective film or cardboard cutouts that can be removed and/or peeled
off after the customer receives it to protect the clear acrylic window.

- PCI cards both VGA's and the SSD are significantly bent and misaligned
they are not secured square and tight to the back plate. This problem was due
to shipping after speaking with Digital Storm and improvements in packing is in
the works.

- I've got an accumulation of debris in the two cooling reservoirs the
CPU reservoir has the most debris and is changing to a slight yellow
color. This is probably from the shipping movement loosening the trapped
debris in the cooling loop. Not a big deal and have since received instructions
from DS on how to take care of it.

- I find the need to suggest to reprogram the chassis diagnostic message
LCD display which has a timer stepping through the 3 pages of
information. Needs to be slowed down a few seconds per page from it's current
accelerated rate. As of now it moves between page notifications to quickly.
Hopefully you can come up with a fix. Would be nice to be able to have
diagnostic content and speed adjustment for the display and regarding any
Cryo-Tec or related input and output power control through your com port
DS exe program.

- On the left side lower radiator (opposite of window side) cooling fans
seem to be mounted backwards moving the air outward instead of pulling
the air inward and out through the bottom air duct that flows out to the
back as your Aventum illustration suggests. If I'm understanding the
Aventum air flow diagram description on the product page correctly the
air flow is suppose to pull inward from both lower sides and out through
the bottom center duct to the back of the chassis. The only efficient
way to do this is isolating both radiators from one another in
individual sealed chambers allowing the air flow to flow toward one
another efficiently without incurring any velocity disturbance or
penalty against each other in a shared chamber. The chassis really needs
another look at a possible design change in the lower level if you are
unable to move the air as originally suggested. Having the air moving in
one direction in one side and out the other side is fine and is the
only solution as the case is designed now but I like the original idea
better. After speaking with DS turns out the air flow for Cryo-Tec cooled
units are by design to flow in and out the side instead of the rear. I do
hope they figure out a way of changing it to dump out the back if they
can match or better the thermal.

- When using silent low speed fan setting one of the fans on the left
radiator stops moving completely it's fine otherwise at med., high., and
auto. After speaking with DS this is by design to completely shut off
some of the fans to help reduce noise in silent mode.

- Would like all the punched holes with cooling hoses and wires routing
through having edge softeners. The larger holes have them but the
smaller ones do not. I would like more lighting than one LED strip. Not
enough lighting in this huge case. Slot load DVD is a piece of junk!
CD's are already having trouble ejecting at times and no way to manually
eject that I can find. When your not running in the OS you need a way
to eject the CD from the outside of the case. Update: Found the button
to eject but not very convenient to access it since it is not visible or
easily applied, see my other comments in this thread about it.

Putting these issues a side I'm very happy with the build. It's an amazing desktop computer. I've got pics and stats.

Stats...

Chassis: Black OPS Aventum
Motherboard: ASUS Maximus IV Extreme-Z (Z68)
CPU: Intel Core i7 3770K 4.7 GHz
Memory: 16GB DDR3 2133MHz Corsair Dominator GT
Graphics: 2 x EVGA GeForce GTX 580 Classified Ultra Hydro Copper in SLI
Cooling: Cryo-TEC System for CPU + Liquid Cooling for Video Cards + Liquid Cooling for Motherboard
           3 x 420mm Radiators w/ 2 Reservoir loops
Drives: 1 x DVD-RW/CD-RW Sony Slot Load
           1 x 240GB OCZ RevoDrive 3 PCI-E SSD
           2 x 60GB Corsair Force GT Series SATA SSD 6Gbps
           4 x 500GB RE4 Western Digital Enterprise SATA HD 3Gbps
           8 x 2TB Seagate Barracuda Green USB3 HD 6Gbps in a MediaSonic ProBox
PSU's: 2 x 1200watt Corsair Pro Gold Series

Thank you DS Team!...





























































Edited by barbitque - 09 Jul 2012 at 12:27am

HOLY F***!!!!

Congrats dude!!! WOW!

Thanks guys!

Yeah it's ridiculous, utterly sick! DS does not screw around!

WOW!!!!

I'd love to hear whats up with some of these things though. The fan direction, dvd/blue ray issues and glass scratching seem to be common issues to all of the Aventum build reviews that I've seen.

Also, running water cooling tubes through cut metal holes with no softeners is dangerous. Especially if shipping across country, as will be the case for me. Also, the motherboard should not be misaligned..

Congratulations and have fun!

Edited by Err0xx - 24 Jun 2012 at 5:57pm

Glad to hear that the fan direction is normal. The explanation actually makes sense - the air direction won't have any effect on me with mine whatsoever, I was just making sure this wasn't a widespread booboo.

I have to say that, upon looking at these pictures a second time, the internals and externals of the Aventum look pretty freaking spectacular. I've built quite a few watercooled PC's over the years and I have always found watercooling a PAIN to work with because the tubing loves to move exactly where you don't want it. Everything from the wiring to the liquid cooling looks great and really says a lot about the skill of the builders at Digital Storm.

Edited by Err0xx - 25 Jun 2012 at 3:44pm

It's almost there, our QA team takes a few days to check and test everything as well for Aventum builds.

I don't think barbitque said the window was scratched but that it has "minor scuffing." Could that be buffed/rubbed out with an auto polish? I know that is not the forever solution but may work for barbitque.

I fully agree that the slot load DVD is a poor choice. I wouldn't want it on my computer. To me it is a gimmick trying to be different. I don't want to have to stand up every time I want to insert a DVD. In my opinion the slot load DVD is a poor choice and it should be on the front of the computer were it is handy to use with out standing up. This assumes the computer is on a desk.

Thanks barbitque for your excellent and fair review. DS will get you fixed up for sure.

Frank

barbitque,

Originally posted by Black5Lion congratulations! your box even got DIGITALSTORM written on it! :O is your system the lucky one that got pics of it on facebook? :P

I don't know I never visit that website. I will check it out.

Well I went there but have to sign up to see pictures since I'm not interested at all in signing up for facebook I will have to pass.


Edited by barbitque - 28 Jun 2012 at 8:24am

Originally posted by xii Excellent review.  Did I miss the company response on the debris in the water tanks? Your point on that is spot on.  I know -nothing- about liquid cooling and without DS support I wouldn't be able to clean such a thing. I'm curious as to what that might be in your system, how we as a team can stop it from happening in the future and what to do should it appear in my build as well. Oh, your pictures are fantastic - the one with it outside standing up really show the massive size of this tower.. now I wonder, where am i going to put this thing...

The debris in the cooling loops have settled now and is on the bottom of both reservoirs it's not that bad but it would be nice to freshen it up. I will do it.

The Aventum is definitely on a grand scale when you think about an average sized PC. Much larger than I ever expected and the weight is significant. It's a geeks dream to have such a wonderful machine to compute with. I absolutely love it. Although I should have spent the money on my house I just couldn't resist. I will work on the house next year.

I totally forgot about the reservoir situation, can you email them to me? [email protected]

Not a problem at all.

Update! (I updated my original review as well).

Just letting everyone know the problem I had with the video card misalignment happened during shipping. Alex stating that they were indeed properly aligned when it left the facility. Improvements are in the works to help address some of the issues I've had, this will hopefully benefit future customers. I've since repaired the bent cards. I will flush out the coolant to remove the small amount of debris in the reservoirs later on. I'm completely satisfied with the results of the build. I really appreciate Digital Storms willingness to make things right and for clarifying issues. Digital Storm has the best customer service in the business. Thanks! Peace.


Edited by barbitque - 09 Jul 2012 at 12:42am