So it is time for a new motherboard and CPU which thanks to Hard Choices has been relatively simple. I do however require a new CPU cooler for a Socket 1155 motherboard specifically the Asus P8Z77-V DELUXE.
I am looking for something in the £25-£35 range that hits a decent balance between cooling and sound but any recommendations and experiences are welcome.
You should give watercooling a shot. For low noise cooling i.e doesn't turn into a blow dryer when cpu is on full load, the Antec Kuhler 920 is a great choice. Another nice thing about watercooling kits is that they don't become dangerously inefficient with dust buildup the way air coolers get. It's a bit over your proposed budget, but in the long run it's worth it.
EDIT: If you have space for a dual fan radiator in your case, the Corsair H100 is an amazing choice: able to cool an extreme core i7 3960x to 4.5ghz at the lowest fan settings.
Last edited by mashakos; 01-10-2012 at 07:03 PM.
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Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo. Don't waste your time and money on watercooling.
"Don't waste your time and money on watercooling"
Rubbish - Watercooling kits nowadays take just as long to fit, they're around the same price, too. What Mashakos says is *mostly* right.
"They don't become dangerously inefficient with dust buildup" is something to be wary of; as they're still getting rid of heat via a radiator with a fan on, you'll still need to clean the radiator now and then. Not so much as normal, but I've got a few friends who haven't touched the radiator since installation, and their temps are way higher than they should be.
I didn't say that you should never clean your radiator! :DOriginally Posted by Alex Bakke
Temps will be 10c - 15c higher on a radiator with a lot of dust buildup, which is of course not a great situation to have, but it's still safer than a blocked fan on an air cooler. I've seen several cases where friends ask me why their PCs keep shutting off. You guessed it, air cooler with clogged fans leading to extremely high - sometimes damage inducing - overheats.
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The LCS Mashakos recommended costs three times as much as the air cooler I recommended. There is also the complication of radiator compatibility and installation (not that it's rocket science).
hm, according to this review:
core i7 930 overclocked to 3.9ghz (weak overclock BTW):
idle temperature = 45C
load temperature = 84.25C
WTF! Nice choice you got there!!!
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Maximum PC, eh? Okay, not a reliable review site at all, but I'll bite.
Here's their updated review. Notice the burn temperatures - Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo: 74 degrees, Corsair H100: 69.2 degrees. So you pay 200% more for ~12% better cooling performance.
I'm with water cooling is a risky waste of time. Water cooling doesn't even push air on tertiary components like storage drives or ram, leaving your less aggressively heat outputting areas to cook,
I'm failing to writing a blog, specifically about playing games the wrong way
http://playingitwrong.wordpress.com/
that's not an updated review, that's a review of a revised version of the cooler. So you need to buy this cooler twice if you're an early adopter. Nice.
what? lol. You pay for delta performance. In other words, how well the cooler reacts to sudden spikes in temperature. Get the TDP above 180W and any air cooler will be useless. The Corsair H100 and other pre-built dual radiator kits reach 75C at 4.8Ghz overclocks, while an air cooler is barely stable at 4.2Ghz.
wrong on so many levels...
remember kids, water cooling uses AIR to cool. Figure that riddle out for yourself :)
Really amusing that I'm being told that I have been a daredevil risk taker for 6 years straight!
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It's an update prompted by a minor revision changing the mounting to include socket LGA 2011 support. This doesn't affect cooling performance in any way whatsoever.
Okay, now you pay for delta performance rather than temperatures? There are no socket LGA 1155 processors with a TDP above 180W by the way, so you're not making any sense there.
As for the air a water cooler uses, it's sucked through a radiator that is typically mounted where case fans would normally go. So it doesn't provide the same component cooling as a CPU cooler, but just an inferior version of a case fan.
Hi guys cheers for the recommendations, I should probably have added any water cooler would probably have to sit outside my case anyway which is not really ideal. I have been using an air cooler on my current CPU for 4+ years and what little dust build up there has been has never been enough to push the temperatures to anything approaching unpleasant so I don't think I will be going with watercooling for the present.
Dare Devil? No, it's more like not chewing crisps properly (potato chips to yanks) when you are eating them.
I'm failing to writing a blog, specifically about playing games the wrong way
http://playingitwrong.wordpress.com/
Depends on priorities. As has been mentioned above, the TDP draw is unlikely to be great nowadays unless you're going in for massively overclocked i7s or something. Standard i5-2500k runs 95w TDP.
In my experience (which extends to about 3 years with an external radiator with GPU/CPU/chipset waterblocks - I've now reverted to air) then watercooling is noisier than air. As has been pointed out, unless you've a huge external passive radiator then watercooling setups rely on a fan pushing air through an (internal) radiator - net result is fan noise + pump noise.
With either a positive pressure case (more intake chassis fans than exhaust) + fan filters, or, with semi regular cleaning (being lazy, I favour the former) internal dust build up is not an issue.
Assuming no overclocking, sensible TDP processor choice, and regular gaming rather than specialist super CPU intensive apps like batch rendering jobs etc my first recommendation would be to stick with the stock cooler. That may seem heretical to many but the cooling provided will be fine in such a scenario, the only thing which may intrude would be noise - and that's subjective and dependent upon the rest of your setup. If it's fine then spend the £30 saved on beer and pizza. Or sex & drugs, your call.
If you do end up requiring aftermarket cooler then tower coolers tend to be more more efficient at removing CPU heat than top down blowers. More efficient means lower speed, means quieter. Tower coolers don't put as much air about the motherboard components but if the airflow in your case provided by chassis fans is adequate then you'll be fine. Larger, slower running fans better than smaller whizzing fans for efficiency and noise, so aim for 120mm CPU fan if possible. Space may be a constraint dependent on your case so check clearances - some of the larger tower coolers are 165mm+ tall. And personally I worry a little about the weight of some of the huge coolers - near a kilo of metal levering down on the motherboard (assuming a tower case) is quite a lot. Some cases (eg Silverstone TJ08-E) make provision for this by including heatsink supports.
All that said, for actual recommendations, Scythe, Noctua, and Thermalright all have a good recommendation for producing efficient and quiet coolers in both tower and top down format. They tend to stretch your stated budget however.
If your first priority (after "sufficient" cooling) is noise, then SilentPCReview.com have good reviews on a lot of these and their forums are worth a punt too, as the main site is a bit US-centric.
Last edited by MiniMatt; 02-10-2012 at 03:06 PM. Reason: typo
A radiator can be positioned anywhere, and it obviously doesn't need to go where the case fan is mounted. A radiator can be positioned to blow over the MOSFETs and ram pretty easily, so any argument here is pure laziness. Here's a pic from my WIP a year ago (tie strings for testing purposes only of course!):
Overclocking above 4Ghz easily exceeds the 200w range. I have my core i7 3930k overclocked to 4.5Ghz and my CPU draws 90w on idle.
Last edited by mashakos; 02-10-2012 at 04:05 PM.
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So that's where the bloody polar ice caps went :)
I fear we've gone past offering solutions based on the OP's question and are entering the realm of PC porn :)
1. Oh yes, because that fits real well in most normal cases. Not to mention the way it covers the top PCIe slot...A radiator can be positioned anywhere, and it obviously doesn't need to go where the case fan is mounted. A radiator can be positioned to blow over the MOSFETs and ram pretty easily, so any argument here is pure laziness. Here's a pic from my WIP a year ago (tie strings for testing purposes only of course!):
Overclocking above 4Ghz easily exceeds the 200w range. I have my core i7 3930k overclocked to 4.5Ghz and my CPU draws 90w on idle.
2. Overclocking? That's not the TDP for chrissakes. Thermal Design Power.
Last edited by Sakkura; 02-10-2012 at 05:07 PM.
It's pretty clear that Mashakos never did give a damn about the OP's question. "Something in the £25-£35 range" and he suggests watercooling starting at ~£75.
To be honest, all of his posts seem to be "Here's my stuff/opinion/anecdote, and I know more than you! It's vaguely related to what you said, so I can post it here."
"Swans are so big, they're like the Ostriches of the bird world"
Also, mashakos clearly has a very different value:cost ratio to (at least my) expectations of normal. Yeah... I don't often frown on RPS, but mash, you have the knack >:/
I'm failing to writing a blog, specifically about playing games the wrong way
http://playingitwrong.wordpress.com/
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