Air is better than water
Where there is a will, there is a way
this post was submitted on 20 Nov 2023
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Kind of beautiful
It's definitely easier, simpler and cheaper.
Water cooling can be quieter, though. Some big radiators and you can cool a gaming PC with hardly any airflow.
Yep, it’s the GPU fans that are the real noisy ones. I can tolerate a noctua CPU cooler but GPU’s are like jet engines under load.
I use a PowerEdge T620 as my daily driver, let me assure you the CPU fans at full speed can be heard clearly through 3 closed doors :P
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Nothing like a gamer sandwich
I think it depends on the use case. Personally, I simply don't jive with the idea of conductive liquids swirling inside my expensive PC.
You're supposed to use distilled water which is not conductive. At least that used to be the case last I saw liquid cooling.
In the end it's simply not worth it for me. You still need to radiate the heat out, which usually means a big fan, which most air coolers nowadays have anyways.
I think water is rather rare as a coolant these days. Organics (chemical sense not farming sense) like propylene glycol or some kind of glyme aren't potentially corrosive to metals if spilled, are harder to grow shit in, have lower volatility, and have a higher thermal limit. Maybe also with a little bit of antifouling agent thrown in. My main gripe with them is that if you do spill them, they don't evaporate and you're slipping over the floor for the next few days because you missed a spot.
But yeah, air cooling ftw
Liquid coolers are by definition just an extra heat exchange step unless you're venting heat into the ocean or something like a nuclear plant. Otherwise, the atmosphere is your final heat sink either way.
Unless a liquid cooling radiator is significantly larger than the air cooler that would fit directly on the CPU there's no point whatsoever.
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No coolant is non-conductive after it leaks. It will mix with dust that has built up on the surfaces of the components and become conductive.
The main reason for distilled water is to prevent corrosion and deposits forming inside the loop.
It's simple for me. Points of failures of air cooling: fans. Failure states: fan fails, system heat protection kicks in and shuts down.
Water cooling? Points of failure: fans, pumps, tubbings, fittings. Failure states: fan fails (best case), worst case? Liquid goes over electronics while they are powered.
Remember kids, if you're ever feeling useless, you'll always be more useful than a 120mm AIO.
It's a fun thing to do. I like my setup (O11 dynamic XL, two 360mm rads, dual pumps, both CPU and GPU blocks), but I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to anyone. It's a lot of effort and expense for a little gain. But it's a hobby on top of a hobby, and that's fine if you want to go for it.
Yeah, I'm CPU/GPU cooled for a good while now (4-5y). It's a lot of efforts and make it harder to upgrade. You gain a bit of silence, but it's really not worth for most people. Like you said, it's more of a hobbit than anything.
it’s more of a hobbit than anything.
Bilbo Fannings
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I like not having to worry about a leak destroying all my expensive hardware.
I once had a PC with watercooling. It died because I was drinking with a friend and wanted to show it off. So I removed the sidepanel and my drunken self tipped the beer bottle which promptly spilled over the running mainboard. Welp, it was some form of water that killed my PC I guess.
Molten Salt cooling. That can handle CPU temperatures of several million degrees. Your CPU may not handle that, but that's not my problem.
Not necessarily, but one, it's a lot cheaper, two, air leaks are not a problem.
the bigger the air leak the better the cooling 🗿
Yes, this is the best argument in favor of air cooling. Air cooling has less points of failure.
With water cooling there's tons of potential problems that "haha wind go brrrr cooling" just doesn't produce: Water block gummed up with mold? Take a performance hit. Pump dead? Sucks to be you. Leak in the system? Enjoy replacing your motherboard.
Main issue you might encounter in air cooling is just "fan died, replace fan". (Obviously not counting thermal interface materials since they are required for both cooling solutions)
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Technically, no, air is a much worse thermal conductor, and most liquids are significantly better. It's a pretty efficient thermal INSULATOR, however.
The practical applications, however, make the movement of air OUT of your system an efficient cooling method.
Not trying to be contrarian or a smart-ass, but aren't water cooled systems kinda just air cooled systems with the radiator moved elsewhere?
Yes. The advantage is that you can make the surface area of the air cooling part much, much larger. I had a water cooled system that could do web browsing and other basic tasks with zero fan speed (though it was better to leave it on very low speed to avoid hunting behavior).
Also, there's some benefits to thermal mass. Short term spikes can be absorbed by the water without increasing fan speed.
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Every liquid cooling system is pretty much that. Eventually you need to give it to the outside and the outside is usually air. Heck even river cooling for Power plants ends up "air cooling" through the rivers surface.
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Quieter, less point's of failure, and in many cases taking up less space. I have compressed air for dust. In the consumer sphere and almost any enthusiast sphere, air cooling > > > water cooling
Don't use compressed air on your fans while they're plugged into the board! It generates current that feeds into your mobo. Usually nothing bad happens but there can be problems associated with it.
That "usually nothing bad happens" will have to do.
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A big ass CPU heat sync and fan like that is usually at least as good as most water cooling options. Often times it scores higher on performance tests. It depends on your exact hardware of course.
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Yes thank you. I went through a water cooling phase, what a pain in the ass. Worrying about the pump, algae, topping off reservoir, leaks ruining your motherboard. The concept is nice, but the reality is high fucking maintenance for no added value.
yea but whatercooling is a complete new space in the whole building process, when building alone gets boring it opens a whole new door to customization, dedication and „learning“ (its not a really usefull skill), but if its something that pleases you, its just freakin cool, even tho it sucks compared to air cooling its a huge subspace in the custom pc scene. its an enthusiast thing for people who are a bit freaky :) i love it and im always happy when i look at my machine
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The only true path to water cooling is eliminating the air gaps between your block and CPU surface via full submersion.
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Just bought one of those brown monsters for a new build, can't wait to try it
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I literally just installed an NHD-15 and it dropped my idle temps 10 degrees vs my old AIO. Load temps are about 5-10 degrees cooler, too.
IMO, if you aren't using at least a 360mm radiator there's not a lot of point water cooling.
The point of water cooling is that you can transfer the heat from the heat producing component out to a large surface area by physically moving the hot liquid. 2x 360mm radiators give you a ton of cooling capacity. 1x 240mm? You can do almost as well for much less money with a really nice air cooler.
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Small form factor computers are a lot easier with water cooling. That way the GPU can be put right next to the motherboard, and the CPU radiator moved away from that area.
It's all fun and games until you want a beefy setup in an ITX form factor.
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