Liquid and air GPU card cooler

Buzz

Master
Lol Tom, I deserved that. :) What ever it comes in I dont care once it works and cools ma gpu. It could come in a stork's beak for all I care
 

blindhamster

Bronze Level Poster
looks like it'll make a card similar in size to Palits Jetstream? wonder how it compares for cooling... very cool either way!
 

Karnor00

Bright Spark
I purchased my new computer a couple of months ago but rapidly got sick of the noise from the stock cooled 7970's and so did some research into how to best cool a GPU.

There are similar multi-GPU type waterblocks around. The main problem with them is that they only cool the main processor on the GPU whereas other parts (e.g. memory) need cooling as well. So you basically need an alternative approach to cooling the memory, typically some mini heat sinks plus a fan to blow air over them. It ends up as a halfway house between a fully watercooled system and the stock air-colled system. That said it should certainly be an improvement over the stock cooler, albeit at a significant cost (about £110 from the price you posted).

An alternative is to get an aftermarket cooler. Basically the same idea as the stock cooler but rather better designed and typically with more (and quieter) fans. You will need to get a specific aftermarket cooler to match your GPU and you need to have a standard design of GPU (which most are). Prices vary but typically somewhere around £50-70.

The final alternative, which is what I went for, is a full watercooled system. Which means some full custom waterblocks, a pump, fans, radiator and reservoir. Definitely the best cooling and quietest option but also the most expensive (looking at £300+). Also it's the most complicated solution to implement.
 

keynes

Multiverse Poster
I purchased my new computer a couple of months ago but rapidly got sick of the noise from the stock cooled 7970's and so did some research into how to best cool a GPU.

There are similar multi-GPU type waterblocks around. The main problem with them is that they only cool the main processor on the GPU whereas other parts (e.g. memory) need cooling as well. So you basically need an alternative approach to cooling the memory, typically some mini heat sinks plus a fan to blow air over them. It ends up as a halfway house between a fully watercooled system and the stock air-colled system. That said it should certainly be an improvement over the stock cooler, albeit at a significant cost (about £110 from the price you posted).

An alternative is to get an aftermarket cooler. Basically the same idea as the stock cooler but rather better designed and typically with more (and quieter) fans. You will need to get a specific aftermarket cooler to match your GPU and you need to have a standard design of GPU (which most are). Prices vary but typically somewhere around £50-70.

The final alternative, which is what I went for, is a full watercooled system. Which means some full custom waterblocks, a pump, fans, radiator and reservoir. Definitely the best cooling and quietest option but also the most expensive (looking at £300+). Also it's the most complicated solution to implement.

Did you buy the watercooled system already fitted in the pc?
 

tom_gr7

Life Serving
On reflection, one problem we may have with this liquid cooler, even though it looks ace, is like any aftermarket cooler, it would invalidate the warranty with Palit. That's not really something I would want, esp if you had a non related problem with you card you have just taken apart.
 

keynes

Multiverse Poster
Envy!!!! looks ace mate. How long did it take you to do all that? What are the temps on your GPUs when gaming and full load?
 

Karnor00

Bright Spark
Envy!!!! looks ace mate. How long did it take you to do all that? What are the temps on your GPUs when gaming and full load?

Didn't really time it but I think it took me about 10 hours to get it all setup. Could have been a lot quicker but I took the time to make sure everything was as perfect as I could get it (including rinsing out all the parts) before switching it on.

When I tested it while gaming (Crysis 2 on max settings) it got up to 34C. With max load stress testing it got up to 38C. That's without any overclocking which I haven't needed for any gaming so far but should have plenty of room in the future if I need to. Those tests were when the weather was a bit cooler (ambient in my house was 22C at the time) so with the hot weather we are having I'm sure the temperatures will have gone up a few degrees.

It's pretty much silent - I have to touch the pump check it's working and pretty much put my ears to the fans to hear them. So quiet that the case fans were the noisiest thing in my system. To the extent that I started getting a bit obsessed with the case fan noise and replaced the stock fans (coolermaster of some kind) with Scythe Gentle Typhoons. What I discovered while doing this was that the NZXT Sentry II fan controller isn't very good (at least my one wasnt). When running fans at less than 100% speed I was getting a sort of electrical buzzing noise which was louder than the fans themselves. So my case fans are now very quiet as well as I just run them at 100% all the time.

If I'd realised about the fan controller I probably wouldn't have bothered replacing the case fans. The Scythe Gentle Typhoons are a little quieter, but the PCS stock case fans were already very good (I can't say the same about the fan controller however).
 

Quidix

New member
Very interesting thread, and I do think more options to get reasonably silent gaming rigs would be awesome.

That liquid-cooled GTX 680 sounds absolutely awesome, did PCS specify anything more precise than soon? (they says <1 month in the video, but might take longer before PCS stocks it)
 
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