Water cooling ???

[StormPC]

Watercooling makes no sense at all unless all you care about is quiet and you do not care what you have to do to get it. Here's why:

1) Water-cooling is not much better than high-performance air (unless you use a chiller which is more noise and trouble than straight water). If you are going to that much trouble you may as well go phase-change which WILL offer much higher performance.

2) The truly silent water systems (like the fanless Zalman) are not as good as high performance air, but they are more quiet. If quiet is your ONLY goal and you're not into maximum performance, and you do not move your computer or mind the extra maintenance, OR you just like to have big blue things next to your case then the Zalman is for you. It gives good performance with very low noise.

3) Good water-cooling is much more expensive and higher maintenance than good air-cooling, and the highest performance water-coolers are not any quieter than the highest performance air-coolers.

The bottom line is that water looks cool but really doesn't perform that much better if you design your air-cooling properly.

[ibmike]

Not looking at that much better performance
I am planning on running a game server on one of my pc's and it will run almost 24/7
And my bed is about 2 feet away so silence is the key

[Butcher]

For quiet air cannot touch water, it's not even in the same league. With correct component selection water is inaudible (my HDDs are noisier than my cooling for instance).

For performance water beats air. A top water cooling system will easily out-perform even the best air cooler. It's all a matter of scale - with water you can have a huge radiator, or multiple rads to disipate the heat. Air coolers are severely limited by the space available. Water is much more efficient for moving heat so you can move the heat out to your big rads without losing performance. Anyone who says high perf air equals water has only seen the cheapy water kits available, and not a real water setup.

If you're serious about water cooling then check out: www.procooling.com and www.xtremesystems.com - there are some real fanatics there.

As for case - whatever you can fit your bits in. A decent water system will perform well in any case really, one of the benefits of water is it's much less dependent on having high airflow through the case.

[ibmike]

For the sake of it silentdeath, i dont think he need a 120.3 for a Xp2600. A beginner kit is fine.

I think this sort of kit is good enuf:

Alphacool NexXxoS HP Pro Socket A £29.99
XSPC R120.1-S Radiator £29.99
Hydor Seltz L30 Pump £27.99
1/2" ID Flexible tubing 2m £5
Angel Eye Clear 4" Fill/Bleed Reservoir £14.99

The first four are from www.watercoolingshop.com, the res is from www.componentsuk.co.uk.

Right looking at this lot then when i go to the CPU block it says 10/8 or 8/6 mm compression blocks
What does it mean ???
Also will i need any other bits barbs or whatever ???
I really am a noob to water cooling

[SilentDeath]

Storm-pc that about sums up the cheap kits (thermaltake, zalman, globalwin, corsair etc..) quite nicely but does not represent proper watercooling atall.

An example of performance with watercooling, this incredibly simple block (which was the first one I made) will compleatly pwn any aircooler that comes out... ever...
http://server2.uploadit.org/files/kbn2k3-wbfin1.JPG
Total cost was under £5. Watercooling is only expensive if you have no technical ability or dont know what you are buying.

Watercooling can infact be done cheaper than air, and still achive much better performance.

[Scarlet Infidel]

Did you put and restriction in that block, or is it really as simple as it looks?

[SilentDeath]

Did you put and restriction in that block, or is it really as simple as it looks?

It is as simple as it looks. 22mm->15mm reducer T pipe fitting (from focus dia), cut at an angle, and soldered onto a flat peice of metal, with the correct hole spacing. www.metalsontheweb.com sell similarly shaped lumps of copper for the base, if you want to attempt one yourself...
The only downside to making your own blocks is lapping. Copper stock is not usually very flat and without the proper tools (i.e. a mill) it will need hand lapping/scraping which does take ages - but unlapped it will still outperform air.
I achived ~480mhz on core with my 9700np @1.75v with that block.

Note that the base is 99.5% industrial grade silver - but that will not noticably affect performance over the same thing made from copper and the only reson I used it, was that it was free and to-hand at the time I decided to make it.

I am using a modified version on my x850XTPE (which is not yet voltmodded) and I am getting 44°c under load from the gpu @ 620mhz core, 1.4v, and thats partly becuase of the hot weather (room temp has been up past 33°c). The stock cooler struggled to keep it at 75°c on full.

Im sure a maze4 gpu block could do better, and they were for sale recently at under £20.

[Scarlet Infidel]

Well, ive just spent a whopping £22.33 on a RDX for my CPU and dont want to add anything more to my loop yet. It was just curiosity.

[StormPC]

When was the last time you saw a water-cooled server or high-end workstation?

Water-cooling is just a toy for those who can't afford a phase-change setup. It makes no sense for 24/7 use. An XP-120 with a 120mm 2800RPM fan will cool as well as a Zalman (probably better) without the maintenance and inconvenience of water (not to mention without the danger of springing a leak).

You'll see. (or maybe not...makes no difference to me)

[Scarlet Infidel]

Hes got a point. The xp-120 and a single radiator watercooling loop will both have a 120mm fan and a similar sized piece of highly conductive, high surface area metal. One uses heat pipes to transfer heat, the other uses pumped water.
Id say the main differences are that an xp-120 is aluminium as opposed to copper like a radiator, its limited to that size wheras as a radiator can be double or triple etc the size. Also with an xp-120 the heat is more localised within the case/cpu area.

Many of these performance 'downfalls' of air cooling can be combatted with a higher speed, noisier fan, more case fans etc.

In my mind watercooling is definately quieter and cooler but at the same time much more expensive requiring much more maintenance. Its more for a hobby then being sensible (but then phase chenge can never be considered
sensible)

To Butcher and enyone else: StormPC is very argumentative and never gives in, id just smile and nod and take your views elswhere

[Butcher]

When was the last time you saw a water-cooled server or high-end workstation?

When I worked at IBM - we had water cooled servers.
Crays were water cooled for years also.
Macs are water cooled - http://www.apple.com/powermac/design.html

Water cooling is no longer just for enthusiasts, major companies are starting to use it now.

To Butcher and enyone else: StormPC is very argumentative and never gives in, id just smile and nod and take your views elswhere

I know, he has just enough knowledge to not sound completely clueless, while lacking the required knowledge to actually have a clue. A dangerous combination. I usually ignore him, no point arguing with someone who doesn't understand what you're saying.

BTW a single 120mm fan kit is low end for water cooling, if you're interested in performance a radiator with space for dual or triple 120mm fans in a better bet. I personally run a single 172mm fan - it's a beast compared to any 120mm you can buy.

[Scarlet Infidel]

silence is the key

Does anyone know how this thermaltake passive kit compares to the Reserator?

[SilentDeath]

Water-cooling is just a toy for those who can't afford a phase-change setup. It makes no sense for 24/7 use. An XP-120 with a 120mm 2800RPM fan will cool as well as a Zalman (probably better) without the maintenance and inconvenience of water (not to mention without the danger of springing a leak).

Danger of springing a leak? That all depends if you know what you are doing. Your car will have watercooling, does that leak? that is if you are even old enough to own a car.

If you cant find something worthwhile to say, please leave the thread.

[ibmike]

When was the last time you saw a water-cooled server or high-end workstation?

Water-cooling is just a toy for those who can't afford a phase-change setup. It makes no sense for 24/7 use. An XP-120 with a 120mm 2800RPM fan will cool as well as a Zalman (probably better) without the maintenance and inconvenience of water (not to mention without the danger of springing a leak).

You'll see. (or maybe not...makes no difference to me)

Dont mean to be rude but have you read all of my posts and questions ???
I am running a game server which will be on almost 24/7 and i need it running as fast as it can but at the same time i need it to be as quiet as possible
My system now has 4Xsilenx 80mm fans and 1X92mm silenx fans on an thermaltake xp-90 it is very quiet but i think it would bug me trying to sleep with it on all night

[Smokey21]

Hey Storm.

Id like to see air cooling be as fast as my rig. I ain't played with my new mobile 3400+ much as my ram is off for RMA, but putting 1.8Volts through i was only hitting 41C load. The 2 previous owners, had to stop putting volts through and settle for less than 3ghz on a XP-120, when the chip can do 3ghz. Iam confident i can 3ghz out of the beast.

Also water is awesome on GPU's. My card did 560/570 on air, now look at it. You telling me water is a waste? Maybe cause you have never used it. I never was impressed with my XP-120, it still can't handle high Volts, and keep the temps down.

My PC is my only PC games machine.