PC Cooling - Air or Liquid?

[goatsniffer]

I just put a Corsair H60 in my setup. Lowered 4.2GHz i7 temps over 10C from my ASUS Lion Square. But LinX benchmark temps went from 79C max to 72C max. The big difference is noise and once load drops temps instantly drop.

I definitely recommend closed loop systems.

[Rippleman]

i could never be bothered to worry about a water cooled system just as much as a water cooled toaster. Its just not needed.

[Mindovermaster Global Moderator]

i could never be bothered to worry about a water cooled system just as much as a water cooled toaster. Its just not needed.

Yea, if you're not overclocking.

[giantpotato]

I recently got a Corsair Hydro H70. I didn't really need it, but it was only $40.

Before: Zalman CNPS-9500 running cpu stock at 100% for 10 minutes

After: Corsair Hydro H70, overclocked 400Mhz, CPU running at 100% for 10 minutes

Sure it's unnecessary, but for $40 it makes a decent difference.

[YounGMessiah]

Cant blame you if it was $40

[1WayJonny]

You should go water cooling but not used a closed system. Air is quick and cheap though.

I run my over clocked i7 / x79 / 32GB with over clocked GPU and when watching movies in the home theater I can not even tell its on. When its time to play games or do something CPU intensive I go to the fan controller and turn up the fans.

Overclocking form 3.6 to 4.5 and with a overclocked GPU my average temperature is only 55c. The case still has its room temperature to it when touched if not cooler.

I have attached a picture of my system and it was worth the extra effort by all means.

[Mindovermaster Global Moderator]

That looks sick, Jonny. (In a good way) :D

[Dan~]

My new pc will have either corsair h100 or nzxt kraken 60, never tried water cooling before so will be interesting

[The Laughing Man]

Liquid cooling is the way to go,I wouldn't recommend a custom loop unless you really know what you are doing.

[chconline Veteran]

Nowadays, you don't really need liquid cooling. A good high-end air cooler will do, save power, and have a lot less headaches down the road. Also, you can probably buy quieter fans than a low noise pump. I'm hardcore into silent computing and I've pretty much only used air for my main desktop. I got a water cooled desktop in my basement and it's too "loud" for my likings, haha. In fact, I've replaced every HDD in my main desktop with SSDs just to cut the motor noise... now I have 3 SSDs in there (OCZ Vector 256GB, OCZ Octane 512GB, and a Patriot Pyro SE 240GB). Yes, in the same computer. All my fans are Noctua PWM fans running at low RPMs in normal conditions, and my PSU is a Seasonic Platinum 1000W.

My main PC is a Core i7-3770K overclocked to 4.6GHz. My 'spare' PC with water cooling is a Core i5-2500K overclocked to 4.5GHz.

[+LogicalApex MVC]

Nowadays, you don't really need liquid cooling. A good high-end air cooler will do, save power, and have a lot less headaches down the road. Also, you can probably buy quieter fans than a low noise pump. I'm hardcore into silent computing and I've pretty much only used air for my main desktop. I got a water cooled desktop in my basement and it's too "loud" for my likings, haha. In fact, I've replaced every HDD in my main desktop with SSDs just to cut the motor noise... now I have 3 SSDs in there (OCZ Vector 256GB, OCZ Octane 512GB, and a Patriot Pyro SE 240GB). Yes, in the same computer. All my fans are Noctua PWM fans running at low RPMs in normal conditions, and my PSU is a Seasonic Platinum 1000W.

My main PC is a Core i7-3770K overclocked to 4.6GHz. My 'spare' PC with water cooling is a Core i5-2500K overclocked to 4.5GHz.

I can believe it. I think one of the biggest misconceptions surrounding water cooling is that it leads to quiet computing.

The heat still needs to be displaced and most water cooling setups have loud fans for this purpose.

The main domain of water cooling has been and should stay over clocking. The benefit of it is increased cooling efficiency at higher temps not in noise reduction.

[dangel]

I can believe it. I think one of the biggest misconceptions surrounding water cooling is that it leads to quiet computing.

The heat still needs to be displaced and most water cooling setups have loud fans for this purpose.

The main domain of water cooling has been and should stay over clocking. The benefit of it is increased cooling efficiency at higher temps not in noise reduction.

Heh, well it did lead to quieter computing for me - you have the option of a very large rad with big slow spinning fans - the heat is displaced by the large surface area. As I said I tried my 670's on air for a day and it drove me nuts. For me it's quieter, better overclocking headroom and has the nice kicker of dumping all my heat externally to the case too. I don't find pump noise as issue either - it's entirely silent when mounted with appropriate deadening material. Again, YMMV but this is my current setup and i'm very happy with the result as a noise-intolerant individual - but to reiterate i'd steer people clear of it because it's expensive and a lot work. It can lead to very quiet computing but then that's entirely implementation specific - there's a vast range of rads, pumps, fans (or passive), layouts and techniques to consider. In all the years of WCing I don't think i remember every having what i'd term as a loud fan and I think i've only had undervolted fans too.

I've been very impressed with the leaps and bounds air has taken over the years though.

I wouldn't say i'm a bleeding edge overclocker - but when I do need to ramp up the GPUs it's nice to have temps half that of air (at load) as starting point :)

[Sjokkel]

I have a H80i on a i7 2600K running at 4.5 Ghz. Idle temps are mostly 30-33?C. Under load i'm in the mid 50's. I'm a happy camper.

[YounGMessiah]

Ordered my Noctua NH-D14 and Arctic Accelero Hybrid GPU cooler :D, cant wait till they come in

[neeldenn]

I'd always go for one of the corsair water cooling systems, since they're so easy to install and do such a great job! :)

[Dan~]

I wanted the Noctua NH-d14, but got scared about bending motherboards and it's so damn big, and interferes with ram etc, so too many negatives for me

[stereopixels]

I got an NH-D14 after a bad experience with a Corsair H80 (it leaked... ruined my board). I had the same issue, Dan, but my system supports the massive NH-D14 just fine without flexing the board, and the RAM slots on my board are well-spaced enough, though one stick does sit underneath the huge cooler. I'm using it inside a Fractal R3 mini case and despite the smaller, MATX case size it fits just fine with enough room for everything else.

[compl3x]

i could never be bothered to worry about a water cooled system just as much as a water cooled toaster. Its just not needed.

Of course, why would you want to cool something that has been specifically designed to be hot. :rofl:

[YounGMessiah]

Xoxide sucks FYI, sent me the freaking wrong CPU cooler when its clearly distinguishable.... Now with their crappy support and no answers, I dont even know when I will see my CPU cooler...

Anyways my GPU cooler should be in a few hours :)

[1ON]

I've got an H60 closed water cooler on top of a AMD Piledriver 8350 - 4.0GHz - idles around 30 degrees c. Very good under load!

[YounGMessiah]

Thermal Glue that came with Arctic was dried up and going to have to wait till tomorrow to try and get some.

Sucks I had almost enough to complete all my heatsinks :(

[YounGMessiah]

Okay got the Arctic Accelero Hybrid installed and running perfectly!

Installation was what I call intermediate, but it went good. I had to come up with my own way on the "adhesive tape and washers".

The thermal glue was dried out about 1/4 through the bottle, but I went and bought some.

My setup is:

i5-3570K on stock cooler for now, awaiting my DH-14

EVGA GTX 680 4GB

Dont mind my crappy quality photos, I plan on tidying the inside once I get my CPU cooler, to plan the space more.

The parts and GTX 680 before it gets taken apart

Plates are off

PCB

Some heatsinks installed

Rest of them installed

Unit installed pic from back view

Front view

Front view 2

In the tower.. sorry for quality and sideways

[articuno1au]

Very nice :D

How're you finding it?

[YounGMessiah]

Idle temps are now 28-35 degrees Celsius, before was always around 35.

On games like Crysis 3 pretty much maxed out it goes to 40-45 degrees Celcius, before 65-80

Same things with most high demand games I have now

Tried this program called Heaven Benchmark 4 and got it pushed up to close to 60 degress Celsius

Oh it is quieter all throughout especially on heavy processing than the stock.

Overall happy so far