So, what sort of advantages will I see with liquid cooling?

desura

Diamond Member
Mar 22, 2013
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I...impulse-bought a H60 Corsair cooling system.

Currently have an ivy bridge i5 3450 processor. Stock speed, I don't even know how to begin overclocking, and I have cheapo RAM anyways so likely won't have much room to OC.

Anyways, I currently have basically an 212 cooler on it (not exactly, but similar).

So, what sort of advantages would I see? Or would I simply see...no advantages, and all of the annoyances of water cooling (slightly less reliable b/c of possible cooling pump breaking, noise, slightly mroe power consumption)
 

veri745

Golden Member
Oct 11, 2007
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Cooler temperatures?

What kind of advantages would you hope to get?
 

PliotronX

Diamond Member
Oct 17, 1999
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Ideally the radiator can be mounted externally so that it is independent of the temps inside the chassis and puts out heat that doesn't affect the system either. You can also use larger quiet fans more effectively because you are not restricted by the chassis. Temps will not rise as violently either. You can include the GPU in the loop and so with the two major sources of heat piped out of the chassis the rest of the system will run cooler. It's just overall more efficient.
 

NTMBK

Lifer
Nov 14, 2011
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Unfortunately you don't have a processor that's very good at overclocking. You should have got a "K-series" CPU, like the i5-3570k- they have an unlocked multiplier, and overclock much better.
 

desura

Diamond Member
Mar 22, 2013
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Ideally the radiator can be mounted externally so that it is independent of the temps inside the chassis and puts out heat that doesn't affect the system either. You can also use larger quiet fans more effectively because you are not restricted by the chassis. Temps will not rise as violently either. You can include the GPU in the loop and so with the two major sources of heat piped out of the chassis the rest of the system will run cooler. It's just overall more efficient.

how would I put the GPU into the loop?

The GPU is easily the most power hungry part of the system.
 

Essence_of_War

Platinum Member
Feb 21, 2013
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how would I put the GPU into the loop?

The GPU is easily the most power hungry part of the system.

With a closed loop cooler like the H60, you wouldn't. The H60 is supposed to do exactly one thing, liquid cool a CPU.

Now, if you had a custom water cooling loop, you could replace the GPU's cooler with a watercooling block, and build it into your custom loop. Or you could swap the GPU's current cooling system with a closed loop cooler of its own.
 

Yuriman

Diamond Member
Jun 25, 2004
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I don't think you'll see much (any?) advantage with a liquid cooler on a multiplier locked chip.
 

scannall

Golden Member
Jan 1, 2012
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No real advantage for your uses. Just more risk. Air doesn't short out components.
 

podspi

Golden Member
Jan 11, 2011
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desura, this is clearly an opportunity for you to upgrade that CPU to one of the fancy 'K' versions :D
 

LOUISSSSS

Diamond Member
Dec 5, 2005
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water cooling has the ability to "absorb" more heat. At the CPU/GPU's upper limits of temperature where the air cooling will struggle and max out temps. I'm talking 70 for CPU, 80 for GPU. The water cooling will be able to hold the temps down lower, in my cases my CPU would never go over 50C GPU would never go over 55C in heavy usage (gaming/benchmarking)

Water cooling may not be worth it for you unless you want to take it as a learning experience. My water cooling setup was over $400 and took me about 1-2 weeks to clean out everything, test the loop outside the computer, install, test inside the computer, then do an actual run. Then i re-did the loop maybe 2 times. My computer was down for that period of time. You got time? money? then go for water cooling.

I used it for my 8800gt (overclocked past 8800gtx speeds) and Q6600 @ 1.4vcore and 3.6ghz. Was never temperature limited was always stability limited.

I still have my water cooling parts... they're just sitting in a box behind me now.
 

birthdaymonkey

Golden Member
Oct 4, 2010
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In most cases, the H60 would have no real advantages over a Hyper212. Performance would be pretty much the same, and the 212 would likely be quieter, as the pumps on those small units often rattle and make noise.

Small closed-loop coolers really shine in applications where a tower cooler won't fit a case or motherboard.
 

PliotronX

Diamond Member
Oct 17, 1999
8,883
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In most cases, the H60 would have no real advantages over a Hyper212. Performance would be pretty much the same, and the 212 would likely be quieter, as the pumps on those small units often rattle and make noise.

Small closed-loop coolers really shine in applications where a tower cooler won't fit a case or motherboard.
True that, sorry when I talk liquid cooling I think custom loops. Closed loops have never warranted the space and cost in my eyes. What if the radiator's tubing doesn't reach that perfect spot to mount it?
 

desura

Diamond Member
Mar 22, 2013
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Blah, it looks like it isn't worth the effort then.

Hmm...well, I've always wanted to stock an AMD fusion chip into an ITX box, water-cool and OC the hell out of it.

Another day :)
 

terente

Junior Member
Apr 2, 2013
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Prebuilt watercooling systems are not performance, but cost oriented. If you want a watercooling setup that will actually dissipate some heat you need to build it yourself.
 

Ed1

Senior member
Jan 8, 2001
453
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With Intel and Nvidia cards/chips they just don't generate a lot of heat unless you are cranking up voltage .Ivy CPU even midly OC to 4.2 with 212evo and easly be below 70, probably no more than low 60's (I get around 64c in prime at 4.2 ). Then in real app it only 50-55c aprox depending on app/game.

Same goes for Kepler chips they run pretty cool especially if you have 3rd party cooling , keeping below 70c is easy . I keep the MSI 660ti PE/OC around 60c under load with slight OC .
 
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dma0991

Platinum Member
Mar 17, 2011
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AIOs are not made to blow away air coolers in terms of performance. Its an alternative and is applicable to setups where space is constrained and still give you similar performance to a large air cooler. The only way you'll see the benefit of watercooling is by making a custom loop. Bigger radiators, better pump, better blocks. The biggest difference can be felt(noise and temps) if the GPU is included in the loop.