OC & Modding Whether I can manage without water/liquid cooling?

A

AMITNOIDA

Disciple
I plan to build my PC with i5 4690 processor with MSI GTX-970 GPU and Gigabyte H97-D3H Mobo. The PC will be mainly for net surfing, MS Office and Computer Games. The games which I like to play are Civilisation V, Age of Empire-III, Crysis-3, FIFA 15 etc.

I am thinking for CM Storm Scout-2 Mid Tower or Corsair Obsidian 750D cabinet.

I have no plan for water/liquid cooling, as I don't get confidence in puting water pipes etc inside the cabinet due to potential leakage, bacteria/fungus and corrosion issue. Also, I don't have a zilch of idea about water cooling.

In absence of water/liquid cooling, whether it would be possible to keep the CPU and GPU temp within control say less than 50-60 deg C. I don't have plan for any overclocking and my gaming hours will be max 2-3 hours at a stretch.

Can you advise whether I will be able to maintain temp within 50-60 deg C without water/liquid cooling? Is there any other way to control the temp of CPU & GPU?
 
Why not invest in cpu coolers such as hyper212, noctua and so on?? and a good thermal paste from arctic etc. ??
Not everybody here uses water coolers and we still manage to keep our temps way below 50c mark even in extreme summers.
 
GPU at 60 degrees load on air will be very difficult unless you get something with a custom cooler.

CPU may be possible even on stock cooling if you run stock clocks.

Why are you worried about temperatures if they are within specification of the part? Intel guarantees their CPU to 90 degrees Tj.

The total amount of heat generated and dissipated remains the same regardless of cooling solution. The heating effect in the room is a little worse with water as a good loop will be removing heat faster, thus pushing more heat into the room whereas air coolers will leave some of it on the part. Still, up to about 70 degrees you shouldn't worry, the spec is still maintained.

Water gives you a way to get very low noise and very little delta between load and ambient. I have been running on water for about two years now, no leak, no fungus, and max temperature of mid-50s for the entire loop (including two 6970 cards in Crossfire).

Air is lower cost, but has a higher noise penalty in loaded conditions as fans spin up to a very high pitch. Also the heat removal is never quite as good as water. However in ideal conditions a good set of coolers can actually be lower noise than water as there is no pump noise.

If you are who I think you are, you're not going to like it. I switched to water for my ears' sake, not the temperatures. I would never go back to air.
 
cranky said:
If you are who I think you are, you're not going to like it. I switched to water for my ears' sake, not the temperatures. I would never go back to air.
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Yes, I am who you think me. After early retirement I am thinking to start playing PC games, as I have time for the same now. The graphics of the modern games are so good, I feel tempted. Currently I am using E-8400 with single R5770 GPU with only front and rear fan in the case w/o any custom cooler. During games, I don't find much of heat in the room and fan noise is also ok. I don't have idea what will be the case with i5 4*** with single GTX 970 GPU.

Will it throw much higher heat and noise in the room? I am thus looking for quieter case with low fan noise. Currently reading lot of reviews on PC Case. I am not going to play games for super long hours. It may be max 2 hours at a stretch.

Any suggestion on GPU Custom cooler? I am not going for water cooling, for sure.

Also, the PC assemblers here at NCR, whom I know does not have much experience of properly fitting the custom cooler. They generally assemble the budget home PC with low end graphics card.
If any forum member happens to know any competent technician in NCR who can properly fit the custom cooler etc., may share the same.
 
Good to hear from you again :)

You should look at a card with a custom cooler, Asus and Zotac have a few models that are quieter than the reference cooler (I think Asus models are called Direct CU). That said, nV reference coolers are not like AMD's, which tend to wail like banshees.

Room heating is normally a very minor effect, but where you live it can be a pronounced one all the same. I couldn't play games in that gaming room (the small one you may remember from your visit) during summers.

All in all you should be fine if you get a decent set of air coolers. And if anyone can hook up a hifi system like you can, putting together a simple gaming system will not be a problem if you go slow and follow instructions. You would probably get better results than any 'technicians'. Installing Windows, that requires a rocket scientist, but the hardware install is quite easy.

Good Luck!
 
cranky said:
Good to hear from you again :)

You should look at a card with a custom cooler, Asus and Zotac have a few models that are quieter than the reference cooler (I think Asus models are called Direct CU). That said, nV reference coolers are not like AMD's, which tend to wail like banshees.

Room heating is normally a very minor effect, but where you live it can be a pronounced one all the same. I couldn't play games in that gaming room (the small one you may remember from your visit) during summers.

All in all you should be fine if you get a decent set of air coolers. And if anyone can hook up a hifi system like you can, putting together a simple gaming system will not be a problem if you go slow and follow instructions. You would probably get better results than any 'technicians'. Installing Windows, that requires a rocket scientist, but the hardware install is quite easy.

Good Luck!
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Thank you. I feel very good after a long time to get your advise again. You are active in this forum and members are definitely enriched from your knowledge.

The graphics card Asus Geforce GTX970 Strix has custom Direct CU -II passive cooler. That means when the card is not on sufficient load, it saves power and mostly noise. The card is quite thick due to back plate, card, heat sink and dual fan. It has only three heat pipes. Can the no of heat pipes be not increased to around 5 for better cooling? But my requirement is not high (as I may not overclock) and three heat pipe design may be adequate for me. The temp in Crysis-3 hits 68 deg C and Unigine at 72 deg C as per one customer review in Amazon. The case and fan placement also have impact on GPU temp. Regarding case I am coming later. Although the card has good review and 3 yrs warranty but does Asus service is good in NCR?
Or, card from MSI or Zotac will be better from built and service point of view?

Can the ATX Gigabyte H97 D3H mother board will accommodate this thick GPU card along with the CPU with Noctua NH-U12P SE2 120 mm SSU CPU Cooler and my sound card Asus Xonar essence ST, two Corsair venegeance RAM ?
The Asus card requires a single 8-pin connector other than PCI-E lane means max of 225 W of TDP. However, it runs only 145 W under load and extra W is kept in reserve for overclock. Now does all the Full ATX/ Mid Tower cases have provision for 8 pin connector? or I have to purchase Molex to 8 pin connector separately? MSI and Zotac has 2 nos of 8- pin connector requirement. Does this mean they are better in overclocking compared to Asus?

Now let me come to the most important aspect - PSU. I have Corsair HX-620 in my present PC and this is an overkill for my existing PC with a paltry MSI-R5770 1 GB GPU. And I am extemely happy about my PSU's performance.
But my new PC is going to be a different animal. The casing will have atleast three 200 mm/140mm fans. The load for i5 4690 with Noctua CPU cooler and this GTX-970 GPU with Direct CU - will my PSU be adequate? My calculation says that I should go for atleast 750 W. What do you say?

Now, I am selecting the components very liberally without keeping my budget in view. I have plan to build my PC in Dec end (Christmass time), when my younger son will come home in vacation and I intend to inaugurate the PC by him. He will stay here for a week and I think he will enjoy.

Now let me share my selection of PC case. As I am going for Full ATX motherboard, CPU cooler and thick GPU, I think my PC cabinet should be adequate. Among the brands, I am using Cooler Master Centurion 190 since last 6-7 years and the case is good built. But it is a mid tower with only 20 inch depth and 17.75 inch height. I don't think my present components can be accommodated in that case. I have selected few cases:
- Cooler Master HAF XM (20.9 x 9.9 x 22.5 - HxWxD) - Max Graphic card Length 13.9" and max height of CPU cooler - 7.7"
- Corsair Graphite 760T (22.2 x 9.7 x 22.4 - HxWxD) - Max Graphic card Length 17.7" and max height of CPU cooler - 6.7"
(Noctua CPU cooler height - approx. 6.2")
What is your advise ?

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IMHO Corsairs are better built than Cooler Masters. Also they are nicer looking. Why don't you get the 750D which is nicer than the 760T you are considering.

Your existing PSU should be fine for the new system. Should not be a problem. As for GPUs, get whatever is better bang for the buck.

Clearance for tall coolers should not be an issue with modern boards. However I should warn you regarding gigabytes. I have a Z77 UD5H and I occassionally suffer from boot loop issues where I have to reset the bios and then the machine starts fine. Not a big deal but an irritant for sure. I'm not sure if the haswell versions have the same issue - maybe, maybe not. It might be a wise idea to google and check if this particular board has issues.
 
Chaos said:
IMHO Corsairs are better built than Cooler Masters. Also they are nicer looking. Why don't you get the 750D which is nicer than the 760T you are considering.
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Corsair 750D is not very silent (noise level 38 dB at 4 ft) as compared to 760T (noise level 29 dB at 4 ft) as per one review. Noise level is a very important factor for my selection of case, as my PC will be in my bedroom and it will be used during night hours when ambient noise level comes down significantly and fan humming noise matters a lot.

Only bad thing of 760T is not so structually built side tinted panel and its high price.

Also, I could not get any comment about bios problem of Gigabyte H97 D3H mother board in reviews. Any experience on this by other members?
 
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