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Considering Watercooling Your PC?

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the don't-spring-a-leak dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Thinking of taking the plunge into water cooling your PC? These guys have rounded up three systems ranging from cheap and cheerful, to stylish and pricey."

3 of 306 comments (clear)

  1. I'm past thinking about water-cooling by stecoop · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I once thought peltiers would be great with water cooling but we read on /. the other day that these devices are 5% efficient so that's a no.

    Water-cooling has a few kinks like electricity near water and corrosion - at least a few years ago that may be solved no days with Antifreeze but you still are at the mercy of the ambient room temperature. It's finicky enough that you couldn't build a machine with water cooling and leave it in a room for 3 years so that leaves a hole in reliability as I couldn't leave my machines on while going away for two weeks on vacation unless I didn't mind rolling the dice to seeing fire trucks at my home.

    Considering Water-cooling Your PC? This was the leader I was until I saw a home made active cooling system. I first saw active cooling systems from http://www.vapochill.com/ (website down?) and have been waiting for someone to take an AC compressor and attach it to a computer case. It seems that were just on the verge of DIYers of achieving satisfactory results in active cooling systems; therefore, I will hang on to old reliable (the passive radiators) until I can muscle up the nerve to go the active cooling route.

  2. watercooling by Large+Bogon+Collider · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The major hangup I have about watercooling systems is fault tolerance. How the the whole system handle 1) pump failure, 2) water leak, 3) coolant loss, etc without destroying the PC, or worse, starting a fire.

    1. Re:watercooling by Large+Bogon+Collider · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Semi-true. In many newer processors, if the fan gives out, the CPU on-die heat sensor throttles back power consumption to prevent overheating. However, with a HS+fan, there is only one point of failure, the fan. With watercooling (which I have thought long and hard about), the fan can fail, the tubes can crack/leak/break, the connectors and fail, the pump can fail, corrosion can block the waterblock, etc. These are not just hypothetical situation - they have happened. The scariest part is if the water leaks and shorts out something expensive - esp. the CPU and graphics card (which is usually sitting directly below the CPU). I would be upset if the cooling system caused a fire, but would be even more so if insurance decided not to cover it because of my modifications.