Water cooling for silence?

[Locut0s]

I'm saving up for my next big system upgrade and while that won't be for some time yet I am seriously thinking of using water cooling despite the fact that I will never OC the system. I plan on spending a few bucks on this system as I like to build powerful systems but money is still an issue. The reason I'm interested in water cooling is that I'm looking into making the system super quiet. My current system is not a jet engine but I have it on 24/7 and after a while even it's hum gets to me.

So the question is, is water cooling for the purposes of quiet computing practical or is it just a waste of money if you aren't OCing? I would probably be looking at getting one of the water cooling kits you can buy.

 

[Sokratz]

I personally don't think you sould bother w/a WC setup if you don't want to OC. The drawbacks and hassle far outweigh any slieght noise edge you could possible get, and that's IF you get the exactly correct equipment and set it up right. You can get pretty dang silent now for cheap on air if you're not pushing it. imo

 

[Operandi]

I would consider the Zalman Reserator 1. Having said that you can get impressive results from air cooling.

 

[Locut0s]

Originally posted by: Operandi
I would consider the Zalman Reserator 1. Having said that you can get impressive results from air cooling.

Interesting, I have heard of fanless cooling towers and the design does fit my idea of water sooling for silence. The RESERATOR 1 Plus model even comes with a vga and northbridge water blocks. However 200-300 bucks US is pushing it a bit. I'll have to think this over more. Particularly if I can find a REALLY quiet fan/air setup.

 

[eincrazybiker]

Yeah. Like they said. i wouldn't do it. It's a huge hassle. And i ended up spending 600.00 dollars in the end on just water cooling..... And.. it's not totally silent. You still have to have your chipset fan....... Video card!! which is usually the loudest in the whole system. and then you have a radiator fan.. not to mention the occasional sound of water bubbles and stuff.... not worth it unless your going to overclock. Just get a really good heatsink and get a fan controller for it.. Simple as that. They also have noise dampening materials. But... it can raise the temps a few degrees. Look into it. If you have a windows the noise dampening won't work as well. Hopefully i helped.

 

[ericlala]

I don't think it is worth it either. You can get blocks for vga, chipset, and cpu and use a silent 120mm fan for radiator but your opticals and hard drives will still have slight noise when idling.

 

[walkman]

Be careful if you do. I tried a water cooling solution that had the cpu and video card. The dang waterpump made an irritating racket after a while and it was just a hassle to worry about the cableing and such whenever I opened up my case.

The reserator doesn't use a pump so it shouldn't be a problem. But you do have to worry about the hoses coming out of the case - especially when you need to move it.


I'll stick with air cooling from now on -- especially since heat pipes are leading to a lot of improvements.

 

[source189]

any beside this >?

 

[source189]

Originally posted by: Operandi
I would consider the Zalman Reserator 1. Having said that you can get impressive results from air cooling.

any beside this ?

 

[llars]

Originally posted by: walkman
Be careful if you do. I tried a water cooling solution that had the cpu and video card. The dang waterpump made an irritating racket after a while and it was just a hassle to worry about the cableing and such whenever I opened up my case.

The reserator doesn't use a pump so it shouldn't be a problem. But you do have to worry about the hoses coming out of the case - especially when you need to move it.


I'll stick with air cooling from now on -- especially since heat pipes are leading to a lot of improvements.

The reserator has a pump built into the base.

 

[Mrvile]

Watercooling is usually louder than aircooling. The pump itself is probably louder than all the fans in your case put together. You can spend under 100 bucks and get a bunch of quiet case fans, a quiet heatsink/fan, and a quiet VGA cooler, and it'll definately be quieter than any watercooling setup (except maybe the Reserator).

 

[Greenman]

Same thoughts as everyone else, water was a fun project to build, but you still have pumps and fans, and temps aren't all that much lower than air. I wish I'd spent the money on a better vid card.

 

[Mrvile]

Originally posted by: Greenman
Same thoughts as everyone else, water was a fun project to build, but you still have pumps and fans, and temps aren't all that much lower than air. I wish I'd spent the money on a better vid card.

Temps are definately lower than air...but the real question is, does that help the OC? If you hit your CPU's limit on air, there's no point in going water.

 

[Locut0s]

Thanks for the replies. I believe I will stay away from water cooling for now. As Greenman mentioned I'm sure I'd have loads of fun building a water cooled system but I'd also probably end up wishing I'd spent the money elsewhere. I also have a number of other side projects that could use the money, home theater stuff and a digital SLR for example.