A User Adds Liquid Cooling to the Steam Machine, Lowering Temperatures by Up to 30 Degrees

Valve’s Steam Machine, a Mini PC with SteamOS, uses a carefully designed cooling system to keep temperatures under control based on the demands of the machine. However, one user has gone a step further and managed to build a custom water block to cool the Steam Machine with liquid.

Reddit user techmagnet has shared the project, which uses a custom water block made with CNC machining. The block is made from a machined copper plate and a transparent acrylic cover for the CPU and GPU. The Steam Machine’s case also had to be modified for the cooling system, as flexible tubes are connected to a pump, radiator, and fan placed outside the machine.

Modder Builds Custom Water Block to Cool Steam Machine CPU and GPU

Tests carried out by the user show a clear improvement in the temperatures of both the CPU and GPU. Temperatures dropped by between 20 and 30 degrees under full load. Although the user says this provides plenty of room for overclocking, the Steam Machine does not currently support this feature.

With these good temperatures achieved, Reddit user techmagnet wants to continue expanding the project and has chosen the machine’s VRMs as the next target. These components are small and are already running close to their maximum temperature, so he will have to find a way to modify the project and include them in the liquid-cooling system as well.

We hope to soon see the progress this user makes in improving the overall temperatures of the most critical components inside his Steam Machine.