Xtreme Addict's Maximus VII Impact LN2 TIPS

[Xtreme Addict]

Maximus VII Impact is great ITX board and allows to clocks memories better than MATX/ATX boards due to shorter traces inside PCB. That's why with some great tuning, you can achieve best level of efficiency. But because of very small construction, PCB and all components on PCB are very cold and board mostly stops working with LN2 after 15-30 minutes unless you follow my guide.

 

LN2 isolation guide

 

What do you need:

- plastic spray (I recommend Plastik 70, it's 100% removable but you have to use solvent NITRO)

- armaflex + scissors

- vaseline

- paper towel

- some tape for protection during spraying Plastik 70

 

Step 1

 

 

Remove all heat sinks, you don't need them on LN2

 

Step 2

 

 

 

Plastic spray only two sides of CPU power section, remember about protecting dimm slots, fan connectors etcetera with tape, we don't want to plastic spray all ports It's the most important step, cause when CPU PWM will be too cold, board won't power on at all. It's the biggest issue during benching Impact without proper isolation, boards tends to "freeze to death". Plastic spray protects it perfectly from getting too cold.

 

Step 3

 

 

 

Put vaseline on the whole board, up and down, put some armaflex into USB 3.0 connector, we don't want water condensation during benching and risk health of our board

 

Step 4

 

 

 

 

 

Prepare armaflex for the back of board (size of Maximus VII Impact) and cut correct form for socket area and rest of the board (one big piece). Don't put heatsinks on the board. During LN2 I use naked board, cause because of tiny construction, whole board is very cold (even PWM). Also remember to use Asus ROG OC Panel, especially for buttons Power ON/OFF and RESET, cause when we use memories cooled by LN2, buttons can't be used, cause they froze to deatch.

 

 

Also note that Maximus VII Impact has special module with LN2 jumper on it, it's very handy, when you start cooling down cpu to around -20, you just plug in this module into motherboard and do ClearMOS (so LN2 mode will be enabled).

 

 

 

Cut two pieces of armaflex for both sides of PWM.

 

 

 

Put some paper towel in order to gather condensation.

 

 

 

Also when on cold with memory LN2 pot, I use PSU +12V and ATX 24 pin cable extensions with proper isolation from water.

 

 

Picture of my setup after 4 hours of benching, still rocking, stable with memories 2800+ C6! Memories at full pot all the time.

 

TIPS

 

1. Always boot with 100.1 MHz baseclock, Asus boards have bug and 1 per 3 boots will start with lower baseclock (99.8 MHz), even when matching frequency in OS via OC Panel/TurboV Lite), efficiency won't be good.

2. Sometimes when settings are very tight and good, frequency is okay, but still board has very bad efficiency, just ClearMOS and put everything again. I got few times "slow mode boot". Origins from Maximus VI Impact, I haven't found other fix than ClearMOS. Important: don't use saved profile when you had this issue.

3. If you get 03 code, just warm up memories and when board starts training, start pouring LN2.

4. Sometimes you have to wait 4-6 minutes until board "trains" very high or tight settins. If it trains but shutdowns at some point of traning, just let her go for few more minutes. It gives some magic.

5. For Haswell refresh use Fully Manual mode, for old Haswell, I don't recommend it.

 

PSC Tips

 

 

Tight Latency Boundary A&B and Latency Compensation are your friends.

 

 

On some PSC Dram Swizzling Bit 2 you have to put on DISABLE in order to get stability

 

 

Not all PSC like ICS Optimizer

 

 

To play with RTL firstly you have to find good RTL Initial Value

 

 

And at the end some crazy scores:

 

 

Golden CUP in XTU in 4790K category, crazy memory efficiency is the key to great score

Edited September 9, 2014 by Xtreme Addict

[Perica_barii]

Just great...Guide is full of interesting information for sure... Thanks on this one...

[TerraRaptor]

Good guide Michal!

[Gunslinger]

impressive and thorough insulation job bro.

[Gulftown]

Great guide!

[GENiEBEN]

Bookmarked!

[Vivi]

gooood. crazy efficiency.. would love to see submtimings

[MaJ0r]

Awesome work Michal. And I've just realized that I need a cable extension

[Bulshooter]

Thanks Michal for sharing.

[Dancop]

Perfect description!

It's a shame I don't have the time to do so!!!

Great work michal

[8 Pack]

Great guide XA. Impact very efficient for sure.

[der8auer]

Thx for sharing man

[rbuass]

good job as usual Michal... you are the best.

[VSG]

Very nice, just need to get this available for sale in NA now!

[Moose83]

Very nice Micha On z87 Board was happy with ln2 everwhere

[Massman]

Thanks for the share!

[slamms]

Thank you Michal!

[T0lsty]

Nice guide.

Thank you.

[FireKillerGR]

Cool guide mate & nice job

[Guest Bullant]

Very nice XA,do you vas the whole PWM area as well?

 

Never mind I got it sorted

Edited September 20, 2014 by Bullant

[Guest Bullant]

Hey,I can't seem to find this plastik 70 stay in AU,does anyone know of any other plastic spray I can look for and use?

[Dancop]

Plastidip

Is available in spray Form, too

[Guest Bullant]

Thanks Dan,someone did pm me little while ago saying to use the same stuff,seen some on eBay in spray form like you said.Will grab some spray cans of it

 

Thanks man