cpu cooling - water, is it worth it?

[phill21]

hi
im a keen pc guy who likes to try and get the best from what i have.. make it fast as possible and just basically buy new as and when i have too..
i have been looking into water cooling mainly for noise, effiency etc as i have about 3 or 4 fans in my system and it does get a bit on the noisy side..
the only problems i have with water is with electric side of things, they dont go well together..
could someone tell me a bit more about it? i dont really know whether or not it would be worth to do anything more about it.. plus, as my x01800 is holding back my lovely ati 9700 pro, i would like to do something about it..
thanks for the help!

if all else fails... kick it and if it goes wrong, say it wasnt you...

 

[o1die]

I built a p4 system about 3 months ago for quiet. The mobo is the asus p4s533 ($66 refurb at newegg) with an onboard temp monitor for cpu fan and power supply fan speed. It keeps them running slower until the temp rises. Even at the higher speeds, it remains pretty quiet. The case is an enlight desktop with 300 watt ps that has the temp monitor built in to work with the mobo sensor. Water cooling works well, but isn't totally silent. You've still got to put the fan somewhere on the radiator, inside or out of the case. The p4 retail boxed cpu fan is only running at about 3000 rpm, about 1/3 slower than the retail amd fan. You'll notice the difference. You can get the 1.8a and a cheap sis 645dx board for about the same price as a water cooled setup, and can usually run it at 2400 (133fsb instead of 100) with the stock heatsink. Check mwave, newegg, or googlegear for good pricing. I used amd for 4 years before switching to the p4, and still have an amd rig for backup.

 

[johnoh]

o1die what speed is your cpu running at?

John A

 

[Col_Kiwi]

water is nice cuz its quiet.... but as whoever said a few posts up you don't need to bother usually!
-Col.Kiwi

 

[ejsmith2]

Yeah.

Water is the quietest thing you can do. You still need a couple of case fans to cool down the videocard, northbridge, and hard disks.

But that's actually it. You don't *have* to put a fan on your radiator if you use a fairly large resevoir, or two radiators, or a really large radiator. And if you get a magpump, you can't even hear the pump over the fans.

But if you're wanting your case portable (Lan parties), then you've got to have one radiator and a 120mm fan blowing through it. But you can buy a really quiet 120mm fan.

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