EtherREGEN: Installation, Usage, Difficulty, Questions thread

[Johnnydev]

Is this Realy all necessary?

If i understand correctly, Alex has said that this heat is not a problem?

[alsterfan]

2 hours ago, Johnnydev said:

Is this Realy all necessary?

Hi Johnnydev,

You are right asking this question. For me as a non-technician it is more a matter of taste rather than knowledge about physics. In my mind (and I may be wrong) electronic equipment has a longer span of life if its working at low temperatures.

 

 

[alsterfan]

11 hours ago, Superdad said:

 

Sure, the EtherREGEN case can take the weight.  But unless that heatsink is made of lead I have really hard time believing it weighs 2.6kg. That's almost 6 pounds for a 4-inch square, 1-inch tall piece of aluminum which is mostly cut-out with fins.

Shame on me. I surely did not interpret the technical data sheet correctly.

[jos]

Lately I hear sometimes a short, but rather strong noise for a few seconds, instead of music. Nothing changed in my system except adding the EtherREGEN, replacing my Netgear switch. An other thing I did more recently, was placing an AC IPurifier just in front of my EtherREGEN stock power supply. I will remove the iPurifier to see if it still happens, but if anyone has a better idea, or is experiencing the same, I would be glad to hear.

[jos]

31 minutes ago, jos said:

Lately I hear sometimes a short, but rather strong noise for a few seconds, instead of music. Nothing changed in my system except adding the EtherREGEN, replacing my Netgear switch. An other thing I did more recently, was placing an AC IPurifier just in front of my EtherREGEN stock power supply. I will remove the iPurifier to see if it still happens, but if anyone has a better idea, or is experiencing the same, I would be glad to hear.

Removing te AC iPurifier did not help, after removing it I did hear the short noice again. Next thing I will try is another ethernet cable between my router and the ER, because I removed the shielding from one side of the very short Supra cat8.

[Avalfa]

4 hours ago, Johnnydev said:

Is this Realy all necessary?

If i understand correctly, Alex has said that this heat is not a problem?

I think it depends on the situation.

 

A few weeks ago I had issues for about two days with my ER. Although it's is mentioned it could not be possible, I'm totally convinced the high temperature of the ER was my problem. 

( I promised to come back to it, forgot about it, till now) 

The ER was placed on top of a dvd player, within a closed cabinet, the problem ( interruption ) occurred after I kept the doors closed, and disappeared directly after I placed the ER on a free shelf with more breathing space around it ( a cooler place) no problems anymore since. 

So I ordered a cooling Brick ,however still waiting for the thermal tape.

[alsterfan]

10 hours ago, roman410 said:

Heatsink on top my EtherRegen... Made from pure cooper

Hi Roman410,

Can you provide an address where you bought it?

[roman410]

1 hour ago, alsterfan said:

Hi Roman410,

Can you provide an address where you bought it?

Bought 2 for price of one from ebay. Here are some examples:

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Intel-Xeon-2U-Passive-Heatsink-LGA771-D36871-001-FRJ/192499085210?hash=item2cd1d6ef9a:g:XzIAAOSwv2tawSBH

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1-D38671-001-FJJ-Intel-Xeon-CPU-Cooler-Heatsink-Socket-J-LGA771-COPPER-NEW/392068085689?hash=item5b491437b9:g:rzEAAOSwXkpbKT4l

 

https://www.amazon.com/D36871-001-Original-Intel-Passive-Heatsink/dp/B00AEXLBDI/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=D36871-001&qid=1577026806&sr=8-1

 

I have to drill out the metal raisers, to make bottom of heatsink completely flat. It is made for passive cooling computer processors of 120W TDP.

 

[lpost]

15 hours ago, lpost said:

I might be made of kryptonite!  The nemesis of SuperDad

 

I would guess 150g.  Heat conductive tape is available on Amazon.  I would expect that tape probably isn't as good as thermal paste and certainly not as good as a conductive silicone adhesive.

 

Looks like I might get my ER in January instead of February.  Hope to be pleasantly surprised.

 

Rather 'it' might be made of kryptonite.  Although in retrospect I don't believe kryptonite is all that dense.

[kennyb123]

My ER has been running only warm to the touch.  I think not having a good place on my rack to set it has been helping to keep it from getting hot.

 

I had clamped a pair of these headphone holders onto the back of one of the shelves of my Quadraspire rack to help with cable management.  As a temporary solution, I set the ER between these two holders taking advantage of the stiffness afforded to me by my choice of Ethernet cables.  My thinking had been that I’d find a better place to set the ER, but the complaints about have me thinking that I might have lucked out and already found it (especially if I can do a better job of organizing that mess of cables).  
 

P.S. The arrow is pointing in the wrong direction on the Starlight was addressed since taking that photo.  It’s now pointing in the direction of my Zenith.

 

 

[wizardofoz]

probably hanging in free air is going to help somewhat with heat as its circulation all around. in my case I think the OpticalRendu was also adding to the heat issue as the other ER I had was running much cooler with a smaller heatsink attached too. 

[octaviars]

On 12/22/2019 at 12:00 AM, Johnnydev said:

Is this Realy all necessary?

If i understand correctly, Alex has said that this heat is not a problem?

 

I dont think anyone wrote that this is necessary.

 

I can only talk for my own system and with the eR in my cabinet the temp went up and runing the eR around 49C 24/7 over many years I feel more comfortable runing it around 40C.

 

 

There is 120mm fan under the PSU that moves air in to the cabinet and out through a vent in the door.

 

[Johnnydev]

3 hours ago, octaviars said:

 

I dont think anyone wrote that this is necessary.

 

I can only talk for my own system and with the eR in my cabinet the temp went up and runing the eR around 49C 24/7 over many years I feel more comfortable runing it around 40C.

 

 

There is 120mm fan under the PSU that moves air in to the cabinet and out through a vent in the door.

 

 

looks very neat

[BlueDL]

7 hours ago, octaviars said:

 

I dont think anyone wrote that this is necessary.

 

I can only talk for my own system and with the eR in my cabinet the temp went up and runing the eR around 49C 24/7 over many years I feel more comfortable runing it around 40C.

 

 

There is 120mm fan under the PSU that moves air in to the cabinet and out through a vent in the door.

 

Could you tell me the dimensions of the thermal tape you used? It looks a very neat job there by the way!

I couldn’t find the tape on the Reichelt website. Cheers.

[bailyhill]

This is one of the most professional and neat installations I have seen.  Great Job.  For me, if it looks right, it probably will

sound right.  I have a hard time with a ball of spaghetti.  Thanks for sharing.  

[octaviars]

2 hours ago, BlueDL said:

Could you tell me the dimensions of the thermal tape you used?

 

This is the tape WL FOLIE 404 12 it is one larger piece 200x100mm and I cut two smaller pieces that fit the heatsinks. 

 

https://www.reichelt.com/se/en/double-sided-adhesive-thermal-conductive-foil-100x200-mm-wl-folie-404-12-p112270.html?&trstct=pos_0

[BlueDL]

16 minutes ago, octaviars said:

 

This is the tape WL FOLIE 404 12 it is one larger piece and I cut two smaller pieces that fit the heatsinks. 

 

Thanks, that’s really helpful. I was struggling to find an option that doesn’t rely on clamping force. I may also do this with my OpticalRendu - another item that gets a little warmer than I’d like!

[octaviars]

2 hours ago, bailyhill said:

This is one of the most professional and neat installations I have seen.  Great Job.  For me, if it looks right, it probably will

sound right.

 

Thanks for the kind words

[jean-michel6]

I have been running my er for several weeks now with great sq results. 
 

i am ready now to experiment with power supply . I have a very nice dual rail 12v psu designed by Sean Jacobs. 
i am using one rail already to power the server side of my dual pc set up. 

I would like to use the second rail to power the er , is it ok to do like that ? 
 

The server will be connected to the er on the A side .

[octaviars]

8 hours ago, jean-michel6 said:

I would like to use the second rail to power the er , is it ok to do like that ? 

 

Yes that is ok. To power the eR and other stuff on the A-side will not defeat the isolation. It is when you power stuff on both the A-side and B-side with the same powersupply that there might be broblems if they share -0V for example on their outputs.

[Bones13]

I have deployed the eR for a couple of weeks as well. Last weekend, I changed the switch feeding the eR to one with an SFP cage, and connected via optical to the eR. No hitches with installation, and it all got started up without drauma.

Ubiquiti U Fiber Multi-Mode SFP 1G

As predicted, there was no immediate SQ changes from the optical link to side A. Overall, there has been a decent amount of SQ improvement by the eR, and I am happy with the purpose, and the new setup.

[jean-michel6]

15 hours ago, octaviars said:

 

Yes that is ok. To power the eR and other stuff on the A-side will not defeat the isolation. It is when you power stuff on both the A-side and B-side with the same powersupply that there might be broblems if they share -0V for example on their outputs.

Thank’s and Merry Christmas.

[Ponkbutler]

I have been getting very impressive results from two daisychained Etherregens (for anyone reading who’s interested, the difference is much more subtle than other switches, testifying to the design) and will be getting a dual rail Sean Jacobs power supply made for them. Which voltage would you most recommend for performance and/or cooler running?

 

MTIA

 

Mike

[JohnSwenson]

6 minutes ago, Ponkbutler said:

I have been getting very impressive results from two daisychained Etherregens (for anyone reading who’s interested, the difference is much more subtle than other switches, testifying to the design) and will be getting a dual rail Sean Jacobs power supply made for them. Which voltage would you most recommend for performance and/or cooler running?

 

MTIA

 

Mike

Are the two rails completely isolated from each other?

 

An EtherREGEN runs nicely at 12V, there is almost no difference heat wise from 7v to 12V so I would go with 12V it will pull less current from the supply, reducing any voltage drop across the DC cable from the supply.

 

John S.

[Ponkbutler]

22 minutes ago, JohnSwenson said:

Are the two rails completely isolated from each other?

Hi John,

 

thanks for the amazingly prompt and helpful reply!

 

As far as I am aware they are isolated and separately regulated. I am assuming the isolation is necessary/desirable, is that correct?

 

They are custom supplies, so as long as I know what to ask for I can get everything exactly right.

 

Is there anything else I need to know (in addition to the above and -ve to AC earth)?

 

Many thanks for your help!

 

Mike