high end water cooling vs. sp-94

[Home-Chicken]

how much better are the temperatures going to be in say in this water cooling setup:

cascade
scoop+xlr120
mag3

compared to a sp-94 with quiet fan running at about 2500 rpms?

The price difference seems huge, about $300 for the water setup, but only about $75 for the sp-94 + fan/controller.

I actually just put in my order for a cascade then thought to myself, is there any alternative to spending this much on cooling? i could get higher end components for the price difference. Can i get similar performance out of the new sp-94 vs. the high end water cooling setup? So far from what i can see, performance numbers for the sp-94 are pretty good...

[humdinger]

I'm going to be a bit controversial and say no, you don't need to spend up to $300+ for effective watercooling. I'ld say for less than $100 even you could get good watercooling which is better than air cooling.

For example, even using old danger den waterblocks (I have an old GF2/GF3 style one on my 9700 Pro, works very well indeed!) For an experiment I tried my old Maze 2 CPU block as well, and used the free Arctic Alumina I had with my new block; with the setup I had I still got great temps compared to air cooling! In fact compared to my current Whitewater setup (which is now inline, with 1" tubing, previous had a big res and 1/2" tubing) the temps were only 4C or so higher at load... now you need to ask if you think 4/5C is worth a few hundred $ ;) (I upgraded after moving over to a P4 from AMD and not having a proper mounting kit at the time)

It depends really what your aims are and what you're cooling, and what kind of temps you're personally happy with but several parts like fan shrouds, radiator/heatercore, tubing etc you can either make or pick up for small amounts (e.g. from scrapyard/old car/ebay)

[deeppow]

Given fixed cpu voltage for air versus water, I saw about a 5C underload decrease in changing from a SLK800 plus Tt Smartfan I to LRWW. Is that worth it? Depends on your value system doesn't it?

Water cooling will let you run a higher cpu voltage for higher overclocks if you wish plus it is quieter. My air cooling would run a XP1700+ at 1.9V underload in the summer at about a max temp of 46-48C. That was pretty decent.

Be :cool:

[Home-Chicken]

I think half the reason i want the cascade setup is just because it seems so cool. What is putting me over the top for the entire setup are all of the new blocks i am purchasing. I want to put a northbridge block and a gpu block into the loop as well. If that occurs, that will most likely require either an additional loop or an additional radiator and powerful pump.
Maybe if i start with just the cascade, heatercore/shroud/fan, and i do an impeller mod on my existing Via 1300, i can keep costs down. Right now the Via is vibrating way too much, which somewhat leads me to believe a air setup would even been quieter.

[deathman20]

Well I went from a water cooling setup to a SP-94 with a Tornado modded to run at 2100 RPM and im only a couple C hotter then I was with my water setup 1-2C in games and rendering, and 4C under prime95 load.

Its much quieter then the water cooling setup that I had installed in my case and I'm very happy with my choice.

[Home-Chicken]

deathman, can you post your original setup?

[deathman20]

Waterblock-------Maze3-1
Radiator----------Black Ice Extream
Pump--------------Maxijet 1200

Radiator was set up in a push-pull config with 2 120mm Vantec Thermal Control Fans. Mind you my setup was in a small case in all but it ran quiet well. I have the setup selling on the cooling clasified forums for $100 plus shipping. Its all the equipment I used to cool my computer when I had it watercooled and then some.

http://forum.oc-forums.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=236934

My temps where at 27C Idle and 38C load with the setup. If I had pictures of it, well it was in a ****ty spot to cool and about 1/4th of the fan was blocked by my res basicly for pushing the air out of the rad. I'm sure I could of made a better setup with that config but to much hassel for me right now since I need my computer up and running.

[Mac]

Originally posted by deathman20
Well I went from a water cooling setup to a SP-94 with a Tornado modded to run at 2100 RPM and im only a couple C hotter then I was with my water setup 1-2C in games and rendering, and 4C under prime95 load.

Its much quieter then the water cooling setup that I had installed in my case and I'm very happy with my choice.

i wonder what the performance is of a 92mm tornado @ 2100 rpm compared to a panaflo H1a @ stock rpm.

[deathman20]

Well at full blow it was at 4500RPM about so thinking that is at 119 CFM. Now with 2100RPM after my calcs and figuring the CFM would be constant all the way down would be around 55.5CFM or about 46% speed of the fan. At 1500RPM's or 33% of fan speed around that area is there the fan stalls.

As I said in one of my earlier threads that the fan is quieter then my 29dB case fans. I bearly notice the computer is running til I crank up my Tornado up to 3500-3600RPM (where it maxes now due to a mod).

[deathman20]

Ooops also forgot sound wise too. Like what I said earlier if it was consistant all the way with dB to when lowering fan speed at 46% it would be around 26dB running if not quieter at 2100 RPM's.

[Mac]

k, then thats pretty close to the panaflo fan im gettin (h1a). it at 55cfm @ 35dba

thanks for the info

[ShaDrag]

It's true you dont need to spend 300+ on watercooling to get good performace, of course we all want cascades, but to me the price isn't worth it. The SP-94 has dense fins which should not perform too well with low pressure (eg quite fans) but sucking air through a radiator is a bit easier.

Watercooling will be more $$$ than air, but there are added benefits, aka generally lower temps and noise leves.

As for getting top of the line watercooling, well thats up to you and your wallet