Water Cooling Fan control.

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MgARBITER

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Al-right! So, i plan to water cool my system later on down the road when funds become more available. Details on parts arnt too important at the moment, but in the loop i plan to have a CPU block, and two R9 290x blocks. Maybe WAY later on 3. My question is fan control for the radiators. I PLANNED to use this nifty gadget ( http://www.frozencpu.com/products/20988/ele-1196/Swiftech_8-Way_PWM_Cable_Splitter_-_SATA_Power_8W-PWM-SPL-ST.html ) to control all the PWM corsair High static pressure fans i plan to get. With two rads, one 360 rad up top and one 280 rad up front (in push/pull), that would be 7 fans total. The issue is that spliter works off the CPU_fan header so i guess is controlled by cpu temps. My concern is GPU controlled fans. Would that not be better as those cards in particular get hotter? Or IS it better to just have it all on the CPU_fan header? What do most water cooling peeps (first time) base the fan speed on, GPU or CPU, and which is better? Id also like tp make a fan curve with something like MSI afterbunner. I hope my questions are not too confusing! :D
 
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Jake Fister

Jake Fister

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I use that exact same fan splitter in my set up (one CPU and one GPU). I use the software that came with my ASUS motherboard to control my fan speeds. Since I have all my fans hooked up to that little hub, and the hub is hooked into my CPU fan spot, I just have the fans go to 100% earlier than normal. For instance, instead of having my CPU fan go to 100% at 40 degrees C, it goes to 100% at 35 degrees C. That gives the GPU a little leeway. My setup is already pretty quiet so I'm not really concerned with noise, so my fans are almost always 100% unless I'm just browsing the interwebs or idling. Hope that helps! =)
 
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Karsten75

Karsten75

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You mention two radiators - does that imply two loops, one for the CPU and one for the GPUs?

If the loops are discrete, then obviously you cannot use the CPU fan control for the GPU loop. If the loops are interconnected, then I surmise that the temps will rise uniformly, and thus the CPU will sense it is heating up and try to spin it's fans faster - thus cooling all the components better.

That solution would make me very uncomfortable. :)

I would prefer to control GPU cooling based on GPU temps, and not wait for my CPU to heat up to indirectly cool the GPUs.
 
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MgARBITER

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One loop, and yeah, that was my initial thought as at any one point in the loop is supposed to be uniform in temps within a couple degrees Celsius. As for what Jake Fister said i could just have the fans get a head start when temps do rise.

 
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MgARBITER

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I have no clue. I THINK NZXTs cam software can, but that's just a guess. Now that you mention it how would one base fan speed on GPU temps without some crazy software or temp sensor to fan controller? See, lol, this is why i posted here.
 
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MgARBITER

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That's a good point, but is it a 3-pin or 4-pin? Even so i think it would be a pain to try to use the GPUs fan header. Plus, id rather try to keep it all one loop as it would be my first build and want to keep cost down plus not screw up by trying to do more than my knowledge can handle. lol
 
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MgARBITER

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It does seem the easiest and i don't think it would affect the temps THAT much, but those cards get HOT. Even with Tri-x cards i still get around 75c at load (Not bad though). Like Karsten said heating the CPU up to get the fans to spin up to cool the GPU seems silly. I guess a lot of enthusiast just use like a drive bay fan controller and manually control fans based in Temps/load or idle.Id prefer something more automated.
 
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MgARBITER

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Oh, btw, for water cooling two GPUs whats the easiest way to connect them. Seems like a tiny place to fit tubing. I see something about parallel, but can be hard to do apparently. Not sure on the route to take there either.
 
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Jake Fister

Jake Fister

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What do you mean? That's not what I was proposing, I was saying that I turn up fan speeds at lower CPU temps because the GPU get's hotter earlier. It's going to cool the CPU as well.

 
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Karsten75

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Perhaps I misread it, but you did say this:




SO it seems you monitor CPU temps and if they increase, then you know to increase cooling. Indirectly, if the GPUs heat up, then the CPU heats up and you notice the increase and fans go faster. What do I not understand?

 
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Jake Fister

Jake Fister

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That's right, but I'm not increasing CPU temps to cool my GPU. I guess I'm not understanding what you mean. My CPU only heats up as much as any other CPU would on a single closed loop that has both the CPU and GPU on it. I just start spinning the fans faster, earlier than if I only had the CPU on the loop.
 
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Jake Fister

Jake Fister

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Oh yes. Well any component that isn't the hottest in the loop will technically lose heat shedding capability to the hottest component in the loop. There's no way to get around that in a closed loop.
 
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