WC Beginner Considering Corsair's H100i Kit

I'm not one for the whole overclocking thing, but I do like keeping my components nice and cool so they last as long as possible. That said, I've usually stuck with massive Zalman coolers, but a bad experience with the 9900MAX has led me to look at other options.

I've done some of the required reading on the basics of water cooling, as it pertains to the H100i, and it seems like it will be a good fit for me and a good first step into water cooling. Now, I'm fairly certain I have the room for the minimal setup, but I wanted to get input from those of you who are far more familiar with this than I.

My setup will consist of the following:
- Lian-Li PC-V2120 (http://www.lian-li.com/en/dt_portfolio/pc-v2120/)
- MSI 990FXA-GD80
- AMD FX-8350 Vishera 4.0GHz

Now, I've done some preliminary measuring of the space I'll need, and it seems the only place that the radiator will fit is along the top of the case, if I remove one of the fans. I don't believe there will be enough room for a push-pull setup, but I might be able to work one with some low profile fans.

My only concern with such a setup is that it seems that putting the radiator on the top will be forcing nothing but hot exhaust air through it -- which seems like a bad idea. Also, I'd be going from four fans to two, though the bump to liquid may be enough to offset any related losses.

Alternatively, I've considered the H80i and using the rear exhaust fan location, which seems to have enough room for a push-pull, but has a much smaller radiator. Though, I'm not certain which would be better: The H80i side-mounted with two fans in push-pull, or the H100i on the top with the two fans.

So, I look to the experts. What recommendations do you guys have?

-C

If you want cool and quiet the easiest, go for an NH-D14 or PH-TC14PE.

You're not pushing for max clocks, either of those will do you just fine and will be quieter than the H100i.

Yes, the H110i is just a bit better than the Coolers ATM mentions. If you have been running Zalman coolers I can kinda see why your not happy. H100i coolers don't have a very good track record. The Corsair Link software is junk most say, and we have seen a pretty high failure rate here. It's cheaply made....

Secondly, what are the temps on your CPU? If they are within decent levels the CPU will last 10+ years. It'll be in the garbage before it goes bad. In 5 years it will be outdated anyway.

Wow, thanks for the quick reply.

I'm not opposed to using air cooling, but any cooler that relies on any kind of adhesive tape as part of the installation is automatically vetoed. Additionally, according to the dimensions on newegg, I'm not sure if either of the coolers you recommended would fit in the case. I can double check the actual dimensions on the 9900MAX, but even with that in the case, I had to move the support bar off its base by one screw hole.

Also, I guess one thing to consider if air cooling is suggested, I'm using Corsair memory with that gray bar over the memory -- not exactly low profile. I'm fairly certain the mainboard I'm using has enough space between the memory and the CPU that even large coolers shouldn't interfere, but it's still something to keep in mind.

Conumdrum said:

Yes, the H110i is just a bit better than the Coolers ATM mentions. If you have been running Zalman coolers I can kinda see why your not happy. H100i coolers don't have a very good track record. The Corsair Link software is junk most say, and we have seen a pretty high failure rate here. It's cheaply made....

Secondly, what are the temps on your CPU? If they are within decent levels the CPU will last 10+ years. It'll be in the garbage before it goes bad. In 5 years it will be outdated anyway.

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I'm not sure what the temps are. I just got the new mainboard and CPU as part of an unscheduled refresh yesterday (the wife wanted/needed a desktop, so she got my 1-year-old components and I simply upgraded). Due to a BIOS update mishap, I'm having to RMA the board so I haven't had a chance, and am currently unable, to benchmark anything. Generally speaking, however, I usually run very large cases with proper cable management and decent airflow. I've never had a setup last less than five years, and those that are still in service haven't given me any trouble. I'm not one to overclock as I spend most of my time writing software -- my CPU/GPU spend more time idling than anything else. Not sure what that tells you, but it's all I have at the moment.

Anyway, Re: Corsair coolers:
Can they be run without the software? I'd rather just let my mobo handle all that junk as MSI's on-board control has done a fairly good job up to this point with air cooling. Also, I have seen some forum posts complaining about the performance about the H100i. Considering where we're discussing this, I didn't give them as much credit as they may deserve, as it may be coming from people who have used or researched full/custom liquid cooling, and I can easily see a newbie kit underperforming by comparison. That's why I figured I'd ask for opinions within the context of my situation. Though, they have moved me away from a "will buy once refunded" to "will research more."

What adhesive tape? Is that worse than a pump failing like they do all the time. Tape don't break.

Sure you can run the fans off a controller and let the pump run at max RPM. Your choice. The H100i isn't a noobie kit, it's an AIO cooler. A noobie kit is like XSPC etc. You ever hear of them? We have GREAT STICKIES, might want to read while your waiting for parts and do your temp test so we can see if you even need watercooling.

Now we know you bought tall ram, maybe not. Sorry. Your ram.

If you don't know what your temps are you don't know what you need.

So lets.... Slow down and wait till you do proper temps tests. We use some here for across the board comparison. Maybe you can read for a while for what we recommend and how we run temp tests eh? Till you got better answers for us, please, help us help you, we can be 5000 miles away dude. Calm down.......... It's not a job, it's a home PC.

Keep at it, I'm a old dog and a hard *** so forgive my direct style. It gets your attention and I need more info etc. Full detaled info, when you hit 5 posts you can make a sig etc......... Make it good what do you have, overclock etc.

Conumdrum said:

What adhesive tape? Is that worse than a pump failing like they do all the time. Tape don't break.

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That's exactly the problem -- screw up or otherwise need to change things once and then you need to find more tape to make it work. Seems like a lazy solution to engineering problems.

The pump failure issue is something I'm considering and part of why I bothered to get more opinions before buying.

Conumdrum said:

Sure you can run the fans off a controller and let the pump run at max RPM. Your choice. The H100i isn't a noobie kit, it's an AIO cooler. A noobie kit is like XSPC etc. You ever hear of them? We have GREAT STICKIES, might want to read while your waiting for parts and do your temp test so we can see if you even need watercooling.

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I dunno. I looked at the XSPC offerings and they seem to be at least a level or two more advanced than the all-in-one kits.

Conumdrum said:

Now we know you bought tall ram, maybe not. Sorry. Your ram.

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Whoops. I intended to link to the kit I purchased. Forgot, apparently.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820233393

Conumdrum said:

If you don't know what your temps are you don't know what you need.

So lets.... Slow down and wait till you do proper temps tests. We use some here for across the board comparison. Maybe you can read for a while for what we recommend and how we run temp tests eh? Till you got better answers for us, please, help us help you, we can be 5000 miles away dude. Calm down.......... It's not a job, it's a home PC.

Keep at it, I'm a old dog and a hard *** so forgive my direct style. It gets your attention and I need more info etc. Full detaled info, when you hit 5 posts you can make a sig etc......... Make it good what do you have, overclock etc.

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Not sure what happened here -- I'm guessing the scatterbrained nature of my post made it difficult to follow.

The summary:
- Air or water cooling _will_ get the job done, so long as they're not stock or otherwise poor products. The only overclocking I plan to do is through MSI's handy OC-Genie feature.
- The biggest concern is physical space. Even though I have a full tower, I believe I only have around 140-150mm of usable space before I start hitting the support bar.
- Due to the enraging one-time-use nature of the installation components Zalman seems to have moved to for this generation, I thought I'd look into water cooling.
- I'm not able to provide temps before hand as I don't have a CPU cooler to use aside from the stock cooler. I'm not comfortable running the OC functionality with stock, and, as such, I wouldn't be able to provide any accurate temperature information.


I understand where you're coming from and I can understand the frustration associated with trying to help someone that appears to be ignoring you or otherwise not giving you the details you need. Rest assured, I'm not (intentionally) disregarding any opinions/information I receive, but I can only be down for so long -- getting proper cooling and building a PC isn't a job, as you say, but my job does rely on it.

Stock cooler can keep temps perfectly fine. Depends on you needs, your case, and you room temps. If you overclock, yes you should get a better cooler. There are some nice offerings for lower profile coolers and some that offset for tall ram. In fact, upper left, the HOME button we have reviewed some..

Tell you what. Run it stock for a bit, read some stuff we have here and don't forget the HOME page. And Silent PC I think for smaller coolers, ack another great one to look up. One I used was.. ACCK no link. Maybe your case is lacking? Airflow/fans? Dunno yet.

On the case, maybe all you need is a new case fans? New fan layout?

There is just so much info out there and here I just want you to read a bit and see what options there is first. Using just Zalman coolers means you been missing out on a LOT of stuff, more likely due to lack of info.

YUou have any P95 temps runs for temps you want to share? Or other numbers of the problems with your temps?

Your case can fit 180mm tall heatsinks. You're clear for either heatsink I mentioned.

Edit: Conum, one of the best sites for air/aio data is frostytech.com

AHA! Yep that's it, thanks ATM!

Frostytech.com

@ATM:
That measurement is a bit of a lie. There's a bar that spans vertically along the side right off to the right of where the processor would sit. Thinner tower coolers like Cooler Master's 212 EVO have no problems what-so-ever, but for coolers which have a width radius of 65mm or more the start moving under the bar, which limits the height to around 140mm.

The bar itself has a standard four screws for each "corner." With the 9900MAX I just returned, I was able to fit everything in place by simply mounting the bar shifted to the right so the left screws on the bar matched with the right mounting holes. I wasn't exactly pleased doing so, but it worked, was fairly stable and required no modifications.

I've looked into those (and several other coolers, liquid and air), and the biggest thing with some of the air coolers (specifically, the two you linked), is they are _massive_. I can physically fit them in the case, but I'm not sure how comfortable I'd be with that much weight/strain on the mobo. I'd almost have to get some wire and rig up some kind of suspension system for the cooler alone.


Frostytech has been a great resource for comparing some of the cooling options into which I've been looking -- specifically the comparison to the coolers I've used in the past, so I know roughly where I'll be relative to those.

Get rid of the bar. You don't need a PCIe card holder. And it's not a lie. Bad word. There is plenty of room from the mobo to the side of the case. So ATM is correct.

Folks by the 10,000's use these coolers. No problems. You're welcome to do as you wish, but it'll be fine. You need no suspension. You can do the research, I'm telling you it's not an issue.

You ask but discount our advice. You can ask and then ignore us, sooner or later we'll give up. We can't help the umm... never mind.

Cooler weight is a non issue bud...Thermalright Silver Arrow user here. Went through 4 pcs with it. The back plate mechanism holds it in place, you won't strain the motherboard at all.

You shouldn't use oc genie feature, it over volts too much and might raise temps too much...Learn how to do a slight oc by yourself.

Conumdrum said:

Get rid of the bar. You don't need a PCIe card holder. And it's not a lie. Bad word. There is plenty of room from the mobo to the side of the case. So ATM is correct.

Folks by the 10,000's use these coolers. No problems. You're welcome to do as you wish, but it'll be fine. You need no suspension. You can do the research, I'm telling you it's not an issue.

You ask but discount our advice. You can ask and then ignore us, sooner or later we'll give up. We can't help the umm... never mind.

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And with this, I'm out.

Look, I didn't come here for an "us vs new guy" battle, nor was I looking to be talked down at. You appear to be confusing your "directness" for blind arrogance and it's bloody annoying. This whole "our word is the word of God" mentality of yours is completely unreasonable and childish at best.

Yes, according to the manufacturer's specs, I have 180mm of room -- assuming, of course, it doesn't interfere with anything else going on in the case, like the support bar. And yes, if I never moved or bumped my PC or I was comfortable with the sagging of my video cards and other components, I could totally remove it -- but I'm not! That's not discounting your advice -- it's providing you more details with which to make your assessments. How can you expect to have any reasonable exchange of information if you instantly sound off about how wrong I am and how I'm "discounting your advice" without even considering what I'm saying?

So whatever, mate. You can take your elitist, one-sided concept of a "discussion" and **** off. There are plenty of other forums with people far more open to the needs, ideas and opinions of us savages who haven't put the same amount of time into PC cooling as you have.

To everyone else, the advice and information has been much appreciated -- honestly -- but I'm not a fan of drama or passive-aggressive verbal jabs.



@ivan:
Thanks for the heads up about the OC Genie stuff. I assumed it was smart enough to do logical increments, but maybe not. It is convenient that it does it on the fly as needed, but if it turns out it could be doing more harm than good, I should probably just figure out some static values myself.

@ivan, ATM:
In a vacuum or less volatile environment, I'd be right there with you regarding the weight of some of these things. However, my case gets bumped more than I'd like (especially once alcohol gets involved), and with the motherboard being vertically mounted, the extra torque is something that concerns me. The video card (MSI's Radeon7970 Twin Frozr III) already has a noticeable sag, which is why I'm reluctant to omit the support to begin with. However, since the support bar spans the entire height of the case, I could probably just use the supports to hold up the CPU cooler itself without needing to do anything custom.

As a quick FYI my phanteks doesn't use any adhesive tape....

I was in the same boat as you when considering what type of cooling to switch to from my previous Zalman cooler. I was not only concerned about weight, but about RAM clearance. I have 3 dogs over 60 lbs (one is a 100lb great dane puppy) and one really obnoxious cat that run around the house like morons. The case is only 2 feet off the floor and it gets bumped a bit here and there. Not to mention every time I move the case to do work inside of it, it's a lot of jostling sometimes. I can tell you from experience, the Phanteks cooler not only performs VERY well, but mounts VERY solid to the mobo. The thought of warping or damage hasn't crossed my mind since install.

That being said, I feel like your RAM may be an issue on some larger coolers. So long as the heatsink doesnt encroach on the RAM's floorspace, the fans can be moved upward to allow room for tall RAM.

One thing I can confirm is, for the most part, manufacturers can't measure their hardware very well (or websites don't represent them very well). So try to base your decision on people with real experience with certain coolers. I searched until my eyes bled, then searched more. I couldn't be happier with my choice.

IF you really want to go the WC route, keep on the lookout for new products that are coming out. There's some entry level AIO kits out there that offer dense, thick, efficient radiators. But opinions vary a great deal on AIO kits. The general consensus on this forum is a distaste for their pump performance (I never hear about leaky systems, or bad rads). Considering the community you've entered, it shouldn't come as a surprise that people are against the simple AIO solution that appeals to the masses. People here like to do things a bit better, so that should give some insight as to why some here might be so opposed to AIO coolers (and some have had bad experiences themselves). Basically, it's a niche community (to which I've only been a part of a very short time).

I hope you figure something out that works for you. In the meantime, you can boot into the bios with the stock cooler and disable your overclock until you decide on something better.

BTW, might I inquire as to why you chose the RAM kit you did? 32 jigglebits is quite a lot, and that's some fancy shtuff. Just curious

bamato said:

People here like to do things a bit better, so that should give some insight as to why some here might be so opposed to AIO coolers (and some have had bad experiences themselves).

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True but you usually only hear the bad side of things and not the good. I am sure it's good overall otherwise they would've scrapped this product.

bamato said:

BTW, might I inquire as to why you chose the RAM kit you did? 32 jigglebits is quite a lot, and that's some fancy shtuff. Just curious

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Maybe he's ram caching or graphic design or just total overkill.

It seems I'm not the only one Conumdrum has managed to offend or infuriate lately.

As for the H100i. Yes, it can be run without the software. The product is iffy at best though as far as build quality goes. The warranty is good though luckily. Mine leaked and they replaced it with a new one.

There are some good AIO liquid cooling kits out there though, I've been using a Corsair H60 in my main computer for a year or so now with no problems.

To be fair, I'm running a used H60 I got, and selling my Silver Arrow, mainly because I couldn't find the 2011 mounting bracket, and secondly because I ended up with a 60 bucks profit out of the deal.

It's certainly not the greatest but I can see what the appeal of these coolers is, and would favor something like an H320 in the future. I can't see myself going to a lower end cooler than this though.

Here we've been using the Corsair H50 (original cooler, round) for 4 years now going on 5 with no issues.

I just thought I'd stop back and give everyone a final update.

After doing a fair amount of research and comparing reviews of everything, I ended up going with Noctua's NH-U14S cooler as opposed to the H100i. I really wanted to start trying water cooling, but I also prefer low-maintenance setups and, according to what I saw here and from others, the H100i (or, at least, its fans) is loud for what it does.

Anyway, I decided on the NH-U14S primarily due to a few things:
- Pretty solid performance. Only 5-10C "warmer" on average (based on data from reviews)
- Low(ish) physical footprint
- Extremely quiet
- Mounting kit & accessories didn't leave me worried about the state of the motherboard or quality of the cooler itself.


My wife took pictures for me while I was doing the final assembly. It's pretty pedestrian compared to the setups I've seen here, but may give a clearer idea of what I was working with:

I tried to setup a push/pull with the cooler, but that bar is exactly where the other fan needs to go and I'm still not quite comfortable giving it up. Also, the second fan was still a little tight on my board (MSI 990FX-GD80V2). It would fit, but it touched the memory and slightly tilted it -- another thing I wasn't comfortable doing.

I still need to figure out what to do with my extra Noctua fan, but in the meantime, this setup seems to be working fine and it's extremely quiet.

Again, I want to thank everyone here for their input. I would have likely not discovered the parts I did had it not been for the suggestions here.

GTXJackBauer said:

True but you usually only hear the bad side of things and not the good. I am sure it's good overall otherwise they would've scrapped this product.

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That's exactly why I asked here. I can hear all the good from reviews and product placement. I figured people here would have had hands on experience and would be able to tell me everything that sucked about it.

GTXJackBauer said:

Maybe he's ram caching or graphic design or just total overkill.

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Correct on all accounts.

I'm a software developer both in my spare time and for a living. I need a fair amount of ram for virtualizing test environments and for the occasional UI design stuff I throw together in Photoshop. Also, I prefer to run multiple enterprise-grade HDDs in RAID as opposed to using an SSD, so ram caching (as well as some of the readyboost stuff Win7+ does) speeds certain things up considerably.

Admittedly, I doubt I'll need 32GB, so it's also complete overkill. However, the idea is to not need to upgrade until the computer as a whole is in need of replacement.