Can Radiator be Cooler With Snow?

1) It is death to the mobo/cpu/ram/gpu/psu/yourface.
2) Condensation forms on the outside of the tubes if they're cold enough, and then drips.
3) If something is enough below the ambient temp, it draws water out of the air. Think cold beer can you just took out of the fridge.
4) You'd still get cold temps and might get condensation. If you're getting things cold enough to be worthwhile condensation is an issue.
5) Yes. Water chillers and rad-in-a-bucket-of-ice-water-setups work quite well.

BigTerminator said:

What does condensation do to the CPU, Motherboard and the Loop?

Click to expand...

Condensation is water forming on cold objects (think a can of cold pop that you pulled out of the fridge). Water on electronics is very bad.

How does stuff leak if all the water is contained in the tubes, reservoir, cpu block etc.?

Click to expand...

If there is no leak, then there is no issues. You would want to make sure your loop is sealed tight.

How does the condensation occur in PC cooling?

Click to expand...

See the first answer.

If you had a normal water cooling setup but took the fans away and put the radiator in a bucket of snow which would be around 0 Celsius add the CPU's 200+watts of heat, temps would never go below sub zero so would any problems occur like condensation?

Click to expand...

As long as your temperature of anything in the loop is above the dew point, there shouldn't be any condensation.

You are only cooling the radiator, not putting snow on directly to the CPU like LN2 so could it be successful?

Click to expand...

Correct, but in cooling the radiator, you are cooling the water in the loop, which comes in contact with the processor.

So if room temp is 70 degrees Fahrenheit but the CPU temps is below that or the water in the loop is then condensation will build up?
Even if water would condense, wouldn't it fall on the CPU water block, not the actual CPU itself?
How would the water get on the Motherboard or CPU?

As I said, it depends on the dew point. Basically, if it is really dry, then you can go pretty cold without issue. If it is really humid, you won't be able to go much below ambient.

BigTerminator said:

So if room temp is 70 degrees Fahrenheit but the CPU temps is below that or the water in the loop is then condensation will build up?
Even if water would condense, wouldn't it fall on the CPU water block, not the actual CPU itself?
How would the water get on the Motherboard or CPU?

Click to expand...

consider this: condensation CAN (which is to say usually doesn't, but it's a possiblity) occur in the cpu socket. There's no area that's immune from condensation and exposed metal likes to form it more than anything, so the sides of your block might, at which point it would be very easy to kill a phase on your power or to bridge a cap on your board or to drip into the cpu socket. Just as easy as it would be for water to fall off a tube and into a pci slot...there's lotsa things that can happen that insulation prevents.

BigTerminator said:

So if room temp is 70 degrees Fahrenheit but the CPU temps is below that or the water in the loop is then condensation will build up?
Even if water would condense, wouldn't it fall on the CPU water block, not the actual CPU itself?
How would the water get on the Motherboard or CPU?

Click to expand...

If your running your system for hours a day it will create more than just a drop or two of condensation. These drops can add up on the cpu block and run off onto the board. Also the block is cooling the cpu, anything that is colder than ambient can get condensation on it, including the cpu, if its cold enough.

To be more exact, condensation actually depends on how far below ambient the temperature is, what the barometric pressure is, and what the humidity is.

So if your water is below the ambient temp, condensation will form depending on how far below ambient, how humid the air is, and what the barometric pressure is. If its very humid, condensation will form at temperatures closer to the ambient air temperature. If its very dry, condensation will not form until you reach temperatures further below the ambient air temperature.

It's not exact science without working with actual numbers and readings. The moral of the story is that if you have cold water running through your loop, there is a possibility for condensation. Rather than risk it if it could get pretty cold, most people would recommend some basic insulation to prevent the possibility of drops forming somewhere you don't want them (on the motherboard, on the VGA, etc).

Other people have dropped their rads in ice water and stuck them out the window - there are threads that can be searched and referenced to get an idea of how things go from other people who have actually done it.

EDIT: Didn't want to lie to you, here's one that did it and doesn't mention condensation problems. Of course, YMMV depends on variables mentioned above:
http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showpost.php?p=6584264&postcount=17

The other (short-term) option is to take the whole rig out into the cold weather and let it acclimate. Once it's down to outside ambient you can fire it up and you shouldn't have any problems. Of course, if there's snow on the ground you might want to cut out the fingertips on an old pair of gloves.

Something else that's also been done is to set the rig near an open window and have all the intake air come from outside. I've seen pics of cardboard enclosures taped together around a case to isolate it from the house air ...