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Thread: Air cooling vs Water cooling

  1. #1
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    Air cooling vs Water cooling

    I'm a little undecided on CPU cooling.

    While air coolers seem to do well on actual cooling and noise, they are a little bit large, heavy and not that attractive.

    The Phanteks PH-TC12DX doesn't look too bad:
    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/phant...-intel-and-amd

    The coloured heatsink looks quite nice and it seems to have decent memory compatibility.
    Still pretty massive of course, but might look quite pretty with different fans.

    But I'm still quite tempted by an AIO liquid cooler, mainly to keep the motherboard nice and open/clean looking.

    H55
    Cheap and gets the job done

    H80i
    Better cooling and I quite the idea of Corsair Link

    H100i
    Not really any more powerful, nor much more expensive, but I quite like that it doubles as a top exhaust?

    Thoughts? Alternatives?

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    Supermarket Generic Brand AETAaAS's Avatar
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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    What is your setup and what are you planning to do with it? Most people are served perfectly well with a single fan tower cooler like the CM Hyper 212 Evo, even if they do some overclocking. Most high end coolers chase numbers for its own sake, and most end users won't benefit that much. Even if you drop a couple degrees in a burn test, what does that translate to in normal use scenarios? Is the cost and potential noise worth it?

    If you are going for bragging rights or looks however, then that is a different story entirely. I myself am partial to 240mm rads to serve dual duty of CPU cooling and extraction as you pointed out and I personally don't like the look of a fat 120mm dual-fan rad on the back panel. It obscures the motherboard and really clutters the look.

    Summary: if you want to be fairly sensible, something like a Hyper 212 Evo or Silverstone Argon. If you want to go big, Corsair H100 series or Thermaltake Water 2.0 Extreme (fatter rad and more spaced fins, for lower RPM fans and hopefully quieter, on the downside it may be so fat, yo mama... *ahem* sorry uhm, that some cases may not fit it without catching your RAM or tall VRMs.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    Yeah, I'm not that worried about keeping temps super low, not worried about bragging rights either.
    Noise is important, but I figure most things are quiet if you just turn the fans down?

    Looks are a factor, I'd like something quite elegant.

    Planning a Haswell build, probably 4770k but won't know until launch.
    Power consumption looks to be down on IB, but I'd like to know more about overclocking Haswell.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    Quote Originally Posted by Willzzz View Post
    Power consumption looks to be down on IB, but I'd like to know more about overclocking Haswell.
    IIRC, this was not going to be the case because of the expanded GPU and that they moved voltage regulators on chip which pushed the TDP to 84W, as opposed to the 77W on the 3770k. These are still very low wattages compared to say a AMD 1100T which has a TDP of 125W.

    Most fans are quiet if you turn them down but it depends on your tolerances for how warm you want things to run. On the front of elegance, I'm afraid that is probably something you are going to have to judge for yourself, as tastes vary. In general however, that probably leans towards top or front mount rads.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    Well I won't be using the IGP so you can discount that TDP.
    Overall power consumption is down, although as you say that could be a motherboard reduction rather than a CPU reduction.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    Thermaltake CLW0215 Water 2.0 is a very good AIO cooler, got good personal experience with it. Keeps a i5-3470K at the lowest fan settings (both fans installed in push-pull configuration) around 35-38 degrees at normal load (no conversion, long gaming sessions or stress testing) and very quiet.
    Last edited by Bonebreaker777; 20-07-2013 at 08:43 AM.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    I recently had the debate over air v water cooling since im getting a new haswell chip and they seem to be running hot. IN the end I opted for an alpenfohn brocken 2 air cooler with an additional fan as I wanted a quiet system, the noise levels on the self contained water loops seem to high currently.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    I just bought the Phanteks PH-TC12DX last night so it should come on Monday. I'll tell you how it is when i get it installed

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    depends if you want something you can just stick on and forget or something that will do a better job but takes a little building ...
    if you want whisper quiet and good low temps .. then a double rad or triple small pump ,res and a good block ..
    I have a complete w/c system... nb cpu gpu and fans run below 1000rpm so can't hear a thing .. the psu makes all the noise and that an't much ..
    temps even in this heat never go above 47 deg c load and everything is o/c cpu runs 5.4 gig
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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    I'm currently looking at a new Haswell build but I'm not keen on using water cooling myself. There are some good air cooling solutions which are very quiet and get the job done.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    If you really want to consider all of your cooling options, don't forget the Asetek VapoChill! (still fits for AMD AFAIK)

    You are better off saving your money as the stock intel heatsink will do you fine up to 4GHz on all cores though which is all you really need.
    Last edited by AJRDLawrence; 17-07-2013 at 04:53 PM.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    The biggest benefit from watercooling, IMO, is noise control. If you have a CPU/GPU/Chipset loop with a couple of 240 rads, you can set a nice comfortably quiet fan speed and that's it. Even if you're stressing your rig, the noise level remains constant - sure, the temps will rise, but it'll be well within the limits, and still below the air cooled alternatives.

    You still have the option, via a fan controller, to ramp up the fans if you're benching at really high clocks too.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    Haswell i5-4670K with passive cooling at Auto core voltage and 4Ghz can stay under 55°C even under long term load (4h at Prime95). With good case cooling. And Thor's Hammer. Can't get more quiet then that.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    if you want engineering to look right as well as cool right, then you'll be case restricted.

    some air coolers are beautiful.... but massive. I agree that they can be too large sometimes... but not always.

    case air flow is as important as the cooler.... don't forget that. even with water cooling.... because you still need air going into the case as same speed as it's being drawn out through the water radiator.... rear or top mounted... makes no difference.

    don't forget too your power supply unit draws air from inside the case, out through itself.

    so noise, efficiency and effective ness all blend.

    buying the right cpu is key too.... don't spend fortunes on cooling to get a cheap CPU to go fast can be a false economy.

    I'm back to air cooling. Kama Angle ... with noctua fan and it's aimed to pull air through to top vent. My PSU is at bottom.

    hard disc's have slow fan on them. it's near silent and keeps hex core AMD at default chilled.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    If you are pushing your CPU to a high clock then I would use water cooling. If just a midrange overclock with not too many volts then a good air cooler will do the job. I quite like the look of the Phanteks cooler. I use one myself on my 3930k @ 4.7 and using a fan controller I can make it virtually silent yet with very effective cooling. At full whack they are too loud for my ears.

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    Re: Air cooling vs Water cooling

    Air cooling is probably better considering cost vs performance ratios unless you go for the 280mm CLC or a custom loop I'd say, but honestly water coolers are so compact, easy to install and make systems look pretty nice and a lot of the time that makes the difference.

    If you don't care about looks/size though and just want the best bang for buck, just get a massive Noctua or Phantek solution IMO.

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