Keeping a computer runnig strong in 105 degree weather

[poor scrouge]

I'm not going to be overclocking my future build, but my room hits 105 degrees Fahrenheit during 2 or 3 weeks of the summer . I want to be able to use this thing at stock speeds under high loads in this heat. I figure it's better to get great cooling instead of seeing if my parents want to pay for air conditioning.

I am looking at these parts:
X6 1090T
HAF coolermaster 912
Radeon 5770 or 6850 HD

I have a full build picked out, so if you want to know any other parts, just ask. I just felt it wasn't necessary to post everything.

What should I use to cool this system? Should I choose a different case? I want to cool everything that has the potential to overheat and die. If this means buying a HDD heat sink, I guess I'll be buying a HDD heat sink.

 

[dalauder]

Please post your budget and all parts. Tom's Hardware has a form for this. We'll give you a more efficient use for your money. If you can afford a X6 1090T w/ 6850, you can afford an x4 955 w/5870--a better build. I'd get an MSI 2GB Radeon 6950 ($269 AR on newegg) and unlock it to a 6970 then OC it.

I dunno about the HAF coolermaster 912. My room gets to 90'F and I do well with an overclocked i7-930 and an Azza Solano 1000R case. Is 105'F ambient outside your house? If not, get some fans in your window and hallway.

You're gonna want a very good CPU cooler, a graphics card with external exhaust, and probably a case with a bottom mounting PSU.

 

[dalauder]

You should get a 1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 Hard Drive btw, if you're building a new computer. It's wicked fast.

Also, if heat's that huge of an issue, you might want to consider i3's (dual cores) because of the low TDP as well as Sandy Bridge i5's because of their low heat production.

 

[saint19]

Hi.

Those are high temps, I would go with a case a little higher (HAF 932). The 6850 is a solid GPU and if you want future Crossfire is a good option too.

Regarding the cooling, if you want overclock pass over the air cooling option and start to look for WC components. What HD do you have?, some stores has HD air coolings, cheaps but do an excellent job.

 

[rubix_1011]

I have a front 3x 5.25" bay for my HDD's that runs a 120mm fan. If your HDD cage doesn't have a fan, or you can't fit one in, consider looking for something to keep those drives cool.

Any case with great airflow and good fans should help you out immensely. If you are thinking watercooling (what is your budget for cooling?) please read the links in my signature, below.

 

[dalauder]

The trouble with water cooling is the same as air cooling in 105' weather. Hot water doesn't cool things that much better than hot air. Even if you run at perfect efficiency, you can't cool with water below 40.5'C (ambient). I would try the stock cooler for starters during the spring to see what kind of temps you get. Then decide from there whether better air cooling or water is more what you need.

As far as your hard drives: If you pay attention to air flow, they will never overheat. Make sure you get a case with front fans like the Antec 900 (similar to Azza Solano 1000, but fewer fans). I recommend the bottom mounting PSU because it will allow top exhaust fan--which works great for my setup in hot very humid weather.

Like I said, your 6-core 1090T has a high TDP. You'd do much better in your weather with a dual core like a 565BE. The 565BE also saves you $130 that you can spend on graphics. Or the 955BE (same TDP as 1090T) saves you $80 that you can spend on graphics and falls in the same bracket on gaming performance: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu-core-i5-2500k-amd-e350,2843-6.html

 

[rubix_1011]

Water will hold and move more heat watts at any equivalent ambient temperature over air.

You are correct; you can't go below ambient with watercooling, but unlike air cooling, you have the ability to keep it much closer to ambient with the right setup.

 

[dalauder]

Yeah, but if money's an issue to the point that he's getting a 5770 with a 1090T instead of better graphics--well...I'm just saying he could get something with lower heat production and save the $100 on the Corsair H70 until after he sees what his temps look like. And as a safety, he should have warning and shutdown temps set in the bios.

I really can't recommend a 1090T when an i5-2500K (which matches or beats i7-950's) blows it out of the water for the same price with much lower heat (at least in low CPU usage applications). How much is the motherboard to go with the 1090T? Because there are good 1155 boards for $150.

 

[dalauder]

DO NOT PURCHASE SANDY BRIDGE MOTHERBOARDS UNTIL MARCH! They are working out some kinks in the chipset relating to degraded SATA II performance over time.

 

[mavroxur]

What should I use to cool this system?

A freakin' windows unit, the smaller ones are cheap, get a 5000BTU one for $99 for just your room, and screw the rest of the house

 

[poor scrouge]

This build is for video editing and future proof medium-high gaming (5770 was looking like the best a few months ago, but now I think the 6850 looks like the good choice). Unless someone can show me a better way to spend $430 for video editing & some gaming, I think I'll be going with the 1090T and a 6850.

Funnily enough, spending $25 on extra fans for the case, and getting a $100 air conditioner sounds like a good idea. Could mavroxur suggest a good $100 air conditioner? What would it cost to have one installed?

 

[mavroxur]

I've always heard LG window units tend to be inexpensive and work good. In this part of the country, you always see 5000BTU window units on sale for $99 in the summer, and all different brands. Everyone does it to compete I guess. How big is the room you're trying to cool, how good is the insulation, and what part of the country do you live in?

 

[saint19]

This build is for video editing and future proof medium-high gaming (5770 was looking like the best a few months ago, but now I think the 6850 looks like the good choice). Unless someone can show me a better way to spend $430 for video editing & some gaming, I think I'll be going with the 1090T and a 6850.

Funnily enough, spending $25 on extra fans for the case, and getting a $100 air conditioner sounds like a good idea. Could mavroxur suggest a good $100 air conditioner? What would it cost to have one installed?

Do you really know that an air conditioner CAN'T cool a rig?

 

[dalauder]

Oh--video editing. If you'd said that sooner I would've shut up about recommending fewer cores. You shouldn't need extra case fans if you just buy one like an Antec 300 Illusion that has plenty to start.

 

[mavroxur]

Do you really know that an air conditioner CAN'T cool a rig?

No, but it can bring the ambient temperature of the room down from 105F to something more reasonable to run a computer in. Even 80F would be worlds better than 105F. Air conditioners can do that, remember? Ever been in a data center? Ours sits at 60F 24/7 and is cooled by 2 chilled water air handlers, and two 6 ton AC units. I wasn't suggesting that he attach the AC to his computer......

 

[dalauder]

No, but it can bring the ambient temperature of the room down from 105F to something more reasonable to run a computer in.

I'm not sure that that was what he was asking (since the language was confusing). I've put box fans on my case instead of the side panel. He COULD put an AC on it...haha...post a pic if you do that. I'd go with the AC on the window though to drop it to 85F or something less crazy.

 

[mavroxur]

I'm not sure that that was what he was asking (since the language was confusing). I've put box fans on my case instead of the side panel. He COULD put an AC on it...haha...post a pic if you do that. I'd go with the AC on the window though to drop it to 85F or something less crazy.

I've always pondered using an AC to directly cool an extreme system. Seal the entire system so all air goes through the window unit. The AC would dehumidify the air (obviously) and cool it to whatever the lower limit is for the window unit is (a lot of window units have expansion valves set to kick in around 50F). If the entire system was sealed, you'd have a low chance of any condensation inside the system. The outside of the system would be another story though. I guess you could construct the entire system inside a foam ice chest and plumb it with some dryer flex duct, and put the drives outside the ice chest Would be a wild system for sure, and window unit AC's are cheap. Obviously i'm not going to recommend he jump in and do this himself, but would be neat none the less


But yeah, if I had to sit in a a 105F room while i gamed or whatever, i'd have bought a window unit a looooooooong time ago.

 

[saint19]

No, but it can bring the ambient temperature of the room down from 105F to something more reasonable to run a computer in. Even 80F would be worlds better than 105F. Air conditioners can do that, remember? Ever been in a data center? Ours sits at 60F 24/7 and is cooled by 2 chilled water air handlers, and two 6 ton AC units. I wasn't suggesting that he attach the AC to his computer......

Those two things make a HUGE difference.

 

[rubix_1011]

I've always pondered using an AC to directly cool an extreme system. Seal the entire system so all air goes through the window unit. The AC would dehumidify the air (obviously) and cool it to whatever the lower limit is for the window unit is (a lot of window units have expansion valves set to kick in around 50F). If the entire system was sealed, you'd have a low chance of any condensation inside the system. The outside of the system would be another story though. I guess you could construct the entire system inside a foam ice chest and plumb it with some dryer flex duct, and put the drives outside the ice chest Would be a wild system for sure, and window unit AC's are cheap. Obviously i'm not going to recommend he jump in and do this himself, but would be neat none the less

You'd be much better off using the compressor to cool the CPU below ambient. This takes some know-how and some DIY.

This thread is starting to get ridiculous.

 

[poor scrouge]

Do you really know that an air conditioner CAN'T cool a rig?

I know, and this will not be an overclocked rig. I shouldn't need anything more than a few extra fans, at most. I'm just worried about high ambient temps added with high loads on the CPU. If I cool the air around the machine too say, 85, then I will still be better off as long as the fans can keep it from going over 105. I'd be getting the same level of cooling+cooling for my bedroom for the same price (this is going off the assumption that watercooling is fairly costly, seeing as newegg's cheapest watercooler ~$50). Which would be nice...

My science friend is suggesting stacking water tanks along my walls, since water is a great insulator. Why else would the lake water still be cold in august? Seems far fetched to me at the moment.

 

[rubix_1011]

My science friend is suggesting stacking water tanks along my walls, since water is a great insulator. Why else would the lake water still be cold in august? Seems far fetched to me at the moment.

Until that water reaches ambient air temps...then that 'insulator' will be acting like an oven.

The reason lake water is cold in summer, is because it is constantly fed by streams, as well as the vast majority of it being below ground level.

 

[mavroxur]

Those two things make a HUGE difference.

He's not cooling a data center with 6 racks of servers, and 4 racks of switches, vpn gateways, and telecom equipment. He's cooling one computer.

 

[saint19]

He's not cooling a data center with 6 racks of servers, and 4 racks of switches, vpn gateways, and telecom equipment. He's cooling one computer.

I don't want be rough, but I suggest you use Google to look for the differences between a Data center and a home room.

 

[dalauder]

This thread is starting to get ridiculous.

"The reason lake water is cold in summer, is because it is constantly fed by streams, as well as the vast majority of it being below ground level."
Maybe he should reroute some snow melts to run through his PC?

Much less ridiculous: I get ambient temps of 85'F here in Guam all the time--sometimes closer to 90'F and very humid. I can run an overclocked i7-930 here without any problems because 90'F is sooo much lower than 80'C--which is the thermal limit. I do idle at 40'C on a hot day though. And I will not run Prime95 for more than a couple minutes. I instead test each component individually (Memtest86+ for RAM, LinX for CPU, Gaming Benches for Graphics) and over time.

The point is--you CAN run a modern AND overclocked PC in 90'F ambient temps--I do it. BUT, you must have excellent air flow, a decent aftermarket cooler, and do some temp monitoring when breaking the system in.

 

[rubix_1011]

I never said you couldn't...

I was commenting on his statement about his buddy telling him to put a bunch of water tanks in his room. Water in a container in a hot room vs. water in a lake are completely different; the water in the container will eventually reach equilibrium and be at room temps. The lake water is continually cooled by the incoming streams and cold water from below being circulated by currents.

Some people have gone the route of plumbing their house water through their water loop, but this really only works well if you have a continuous flow (if you turn the water off in your house, it sits stationary in the pipes) which in turn, adds to your water bill. There are better ways to incorporate watercooling, if that is your idea of the best solution.

Worst comes to worst, open the side of the case and blow a box fan into the side of your case.

OP- Get a good case, with great airflow and a decent air cooler. You should be fine.