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Is Liquid Cooling Worth It?

Tags:
  • NZXT
  • Water Cooling
  • Cases
  • Corsair
  • Components
Last response: in Components
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October 9, 2013 5:31:01 PM

I am either getting the NZXT Phantom 530/620/820 or the Corsair 750D case, and I was wondering if liquid cooling is even worth the bother. I could have eight fans in the Corsair case.. So fans or liquid?
Here is my system: (without cooler)

i7-3770k
GTX 780
Corsair Vengeance Pro (2 x 4GB) DDR3 2133
Gigabyte GA Z77X-UD3H ATX LGA 1155
Samsung 840 Series 120GB SSD x2
Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200rpm HDD
Corsair Professional 80 Plus Gold Certified ATX12V / ESP12V Power Supply

More about : liquid cooling worth

October 9, 2013 5:48:50 PM

Heres the choice you make, do you want it to look cooler, run cooler, and be quieter? If so go for it. If you are satisfied with the temps you have you dont need to. It all comes down to how happy you are with it. Me personally would keep the air because I dont trust myself.
October 9, 2013 6:04:14 PM

Gam3r01 said:
Heres the choice you make, do you want it to look cooler, run cooler, and be quieter? If so go for it. If you are satisfied with the temps you have you dont need to. It all comes down to how happy you are with it. Me personally would keep the air because I dont trust myself.


I don't know why but that last sentence made me laugh, and I'm not sure I trust myself with water either.. I'll have to think about it, but that's for the input.
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October 9, 2013 6:06:31 PM

It is worth it in the long run, but its alot of work. Once I get some quality components and some cash Ill watercool with a nice side window setup.
October 9, 2013 11:47:34 PM

Depends on what angle is worth it to you.

Price to performance, don't touch water-cooling with a 10ft pole. It simply cant get anywhere near Air cooling for value.
Outright performance, until your going for exotic solutions like LN2 and Peltiers, Custom water is the best you can get.
Aesthetics, damn its good looking.
Noise, depends what you do with it, but it can be very quiet.
October 10, 2013 4:13:28 PM

Gam3r01 said:
It is worth it in the long run, but its alot of work. Once I get some quality components and some cash Ill watercool with a nice side window setup.


Besides it being water next to electrical components, what makes it a lot of work?
October 10, 2013 4:14:37 PM

manofchalk said:
Depends on what angle is worth it to you.

Price to performance, don't touch water-cooling with a 10ft pole. It simply cant get anywhere near Air cooling for value.
Outright performance, until your going for exotic solutions like LN2 and Peltiers, Custom water is the best you can get.
Aesthetics, damn its good looking.
Noise, depends what you do with it, but it can be very quiet.


So if I had my system decked in fans I shouldn't really worry about it then?
October 10, 2013 4:38:25 PM

Bleeding lines, measuring tubes keeping enough liquid in the system, constant adjustment.
October 10, 2013 7:48:16 PM

Gam3r01 said:
Bleeding lines, measuring tubes keeping enough liquid in the system, constant adjustment.


You just convinced me to go air so that's what I'm going to do lol. Thanks
October 10, 2013 8:03:00 PM

Closed loops dont require that though, I should have been more clear. The close loops just get installed and thats it, like air. Either is good. Anything below an H80 though air will beat.
October 10, 2013 8:48:29 PM

More airflow through the case to a point wont achieve any additional cooling. A large part of why water-cooling is better is that you arent constrained in how much heatsink you can have attached to your CPU or graphics card. That and water being pumped is inherently more effective at moving heat than the convection that happens within heat-pipes.

Gam3r01, have you built a water loop?
A Custom water loop really doesn't require as much maintenance or planning as you imply here. Maintanence can be reduced to changing the water every 6months provided you don't use dyes or additives, and I certainly never measured tubing length to ensure there is the "correct" amount of water in the thing.

Water-cooling if your so inclined can just be a large initial time investment when you first build it and then you can almost never have to touch it again.
October 11, 2013 8:26:32 AM

I have ruffly $1200 in just my loop alone. Just to give you an idea. ;) 
October 11, 2013 10:36:33 AM

Alright, so it really isn't that bad.. If I get a better-than-decent liquid cooler it will work well with fans also. And it really doesn't take that much maintenance. @ BaBa BoeY You can spend $1200 on a water cooler??
October 11, 2013 10:46:20 AM

Easily, compression fittings can be anywhere from $6-14. Blocks, multiple rads, pump. Adds up quickly, everything is reusable when upgrading, unless you switch to a newer video card for example.
October 11, 2013 10:57:35 AM

BaBa BoeY said:
Easily, compression fittings can be anywhere from $6-14. Blocks, multiple rads, pump. Adds up quickly, everything is reusable when upgrading, unless you switch to a newer video card for example.


How difficult is it to build a nice water cooler? Money isn't a problem. And where would I look to learn how to do it?
October 11, 2013 12:57:25 PM

Np! Good luck!
!