Air Cooling -- Myths and setup tips for the novice performance / gaming builder

[An0maly_76]

I've noticed there seem to be some rather ridiculous and utter myths and misinformation regarding cooling, particularly air cooling. First and foremost, a popular tech YouTuber did a comparison video testing various air and liquid cooler performance, concluding that while liquid cooling did deliver more consistent temperatures, they were only SLIGHTLY lower – 5C or less, and that air coolers performed quite comparably when properly sized and set up. They made a statement in that video – that liquid cooling was cool if you like to spend more time tinkering with your PC as opposed to using it. To me, that pretty much says it all, as a difference of less than 5 degrees in temp is more or less identical.

NOTE: If you’re planning a simple budget build with less than eight cores and entry-level graphics and other hardware, you won’t need a ton of cooling – in fact, stock air coolers should be just fine in most cases. However, if your build is a stepping stone to bigger and better later on, it makes sense to pave the way for this in choosing components with better cooling in mind for any future upgrade. Otherwise, you’re spending more money in the long run.

My 5900X build's cooling system uses an iCUE Commander with six 120mm fans, and the Scythe Mugen 5 which uses a 120mm fan, seven in total, but they don’t even run that hard below 70C. As illustrated in the screenshots below, CPU Package temperature idles in the 38C-42C range. Under light to moderate use, it hovers around 48-58C, sometimes as high as 63C. Cinebench R23 is the stress test to end all stress tests as far as I’m concerned. And even with a 30-minute CB R23 loop, temp peaks at 75-76C. Post-test recovery to idle temp range takes around 45-90 seconds. So it cools quite well, and at just 34 square inches of intake area for cooling, my Corsair 4000X case is hardly the best-ventilated case on the market -- the 4000D Airflow would do even better, although the 4000X has air filters where the D does not.

My build was hardly a typical process or timeline, but I admit that in the planning stage for my build, I was skeptical of air-cooling and thought the 5900X needed liquid cooling, but others convinced me that a properly set up air cooler is plenty for even the most robust builds, and more reliable than liquid cooling. However, component selection and initial set-up are a bit more critical. As no one else seems to have done so, I thought I'd explain a few myths and misconceptions, as well as share some insight on component selection and tips for proper setup of an air-cooling system.

MYTH #1 – “My processor requires liquid cooling”

This simply is not true in 99.99% of cases. While it is true that more cores and more threads = more heat, my recent R9-5900X build is proof that air-cooling is more than sufficient for consumer market applications. This is not meant to bash those who like liquid cooling, but VERY little, if anything, on the consumer market actually requires liquid cooling. Also, I feel it often is a band-aid for poor component selection and / or an off-the-shelf answer for those who don’t understand how to properly set up air cooling, or the dynamics of cooling.

MYTH #2 – “Air coolers are junk. They don’t work”

This is not true, either. Air coolers do take a bit more care in component selection and time in initial setup. But properly set up, they are actually more reliable than liquid cooling in most, if not all cases. However, certain factors determine whether a particular cooler is suited to your needs. A poorly-ventilated case can actually insulate the components, making your system a furnace even the best cooling system can’t tame. Conservatively speaking, poorly-ventilated cases hamper cooling by as much as 30-50%, and that’s not the cooler’s fault. For example, you simply cannot stuff a 360mm AIO into an NZXT H510 and expect it to cool. It simply will not be able to get air to do so, because the front is solid steel and your radiator is blocking your airflow. Common sense.

Cooling requires three things – heat transfer, ventilation, and airflow. Hotter processors need bigger coolers, because a cooler’s surface area determines heat transfer ability. Too little surface area substantially hinders cooling. Think of it this way – if you were to cut a Mugen 5’s heat sink into three equally sized sections top to bottom and lay them end-to-end, its surface area is quite comparable to a liquid-cooled radiator. Air coolers simply stack their surface area, where liquid radiators spread it out. Some also use two fans, as opposed to one, which can make a difference.

Another pair of factors apply to the larger, higher-performance air coolers as well. The impact of heat sink size has already been explained. However, what’s underneath impacts cooling capacity as well, and I don’t mean the processor. First, some have more heat transfer tubes than others. For example, the Scythe Mugen 5 has six heat tubes transferring CPU plate heat to the heat sink. Most, if not all Noctua offerings, such as the NH-U12A, have seven, others can have as few as three or four. And this directly impacts cooling capacity, as to a point, more tubes = better cooling.

That being said, it MUST be made for your processor and suited to your setup. My 12-core 5900X cools quite well with the six-tube Mugen 5, so while it may not be an official formula or manufacturer’s recommendation, it makes sense to theorize that air coolers need one tube for each pair of processor cores. And I think this is the biggest factor in misconceptions about air-cooling, that those having issues with air-cooling are simply not selecting the right cooler for their needs.

But there’s another factor to look at here, as shown below. This is one area where airflow comes into play. The right-side cooler has six heat transfer tubes, compared to the left-side cooler’s four. In addition, the right-side cooler’s tubes are also perfectly round throughout the cooling circuit. The left-side cooler’s tubes flatten / taper sharply at the CPU plate, reducing their diameter. This is a bottleneck and also impacts cooling capacity. No pipe (or tube in this case) can flow more than its smallest diameter.

So, as you can see, a PC system’s cooling and performance both come down to component selection. Case selection has a bigger impact on this than you might think. There’s nothing wrong with a case that uses tempered glass / acrylic panels, but be sure it either provides some sort of air gap around the nose or side for air intake, as well as ventilation to the top.

System board choice can impact cooling as well. Many don’t know that boards have a voltage regulator module (VRM) that controls voltage to the processor. This effectively controls clock speed, but also has an impact on temperature as well. And cooling the VRM is critical with processors with higher clock speeds and core/thread counts. This is easy to determine. Some boards have no heat sink near the processor socket. Others may have one or two, some have larger ones than others. Bigger is better in this situation, especially with processors known for running hotter.

Something to note about fan choice. Quieter fans may not perform as well as others, but you’re not stuck with airplane noise, if you’re willing to put a little work into a custom fan control profile, which I’ll get to shortly. And with a well-designed and well-ventilated case (open grill front such as the Corsair 4000D Airflow), three 120s can flow more than two 140s. My setup has three 120s pulling in at the nose, two exhausting topside, one exhausting to the rear, and one blowing across the cooler heat sink.

MYTH #3 – “Air coolers aren’t cost effective”

MAJORLY not true. Most budget / entry-level builders can find air-coolers to serve their initial needs for under $30-$50, depending on their CPU choice. Even the best ones are cheaper than a liquid cooling setup. Noctua’s NH-D15 averages $100-$110 USD. The Scythe Mugen 5 cools quite well and at an average of $50-$60 USD, I think it is hands-down the best bang for the buck for CPUs over eight-cores.

EASY SETUP OF AN AIR COOLING SYSTEM

First, use the proper thermal paste, and properly apply it. Too little won’t cool well and too much will spill onto the board and other components, potentially damaging them. You don’t need a lot, just a thin coating on the processor lid (two or three dots on the lid center are usually sufficient), and take care to wipe any excess squeezing out over the lid edges as the cooler is tightened down.

Tuning your case fan control curve is key. Most don’t like the airplane noise of constantly wide-open fans. Good news – it’s not necessary anyway. In a well configured cooling system, the fans generally need not exceed 70-85% capacity, as the upcoming screenshot of my fan curve shows. Also, the more options your fan controller software has, the better this will work. I use iCUE, which has adjustable settings to lock the fans at fixed percentages and RPM, as well as a custom fan curve, such as the one I use, shown below. Note that one size does not necessarily fit all when it comes to fan control curves.





Step 1: Most fan controllers can be set to a certain RPM and / or percentage of total output. Most fans max out around 900-1400 rpm, some at 1600. With the system idling (only your fan control software running), set all fans wide open for five minutes to get your lowest temperature. I know this will be annoying to listen to initially, but it is necessary to find the coolest temp your system can run. If you’re not seeing low 40s Celsius or better here, something is hindering cooling performance – my 5900X idles at 38C-42C.

Step 2: Every 1-2 minutes, dial your fans down 5%, or 100-250 RPM. Keep doing this until the temp starts rising, then dial the fans back up another 5% or 100-250 rpm to regain your lowest temperature. At this point, note your lowest temperature and fan RPM or percentage setting necessary to maintain it.

Step 3: If you don’t have it, download and install Cinebench R23.

Step 4: Set your fan control to wide open again.

Step 5: Set Cinebench R23 options for a 30-minute multi-core test, then start, minimizing the Cinebench window and switching to your fan control.

Step 6: Watch your CPU Package temp until it stops rising. If all is well, it should top out around 85% of max safe temp. NOTE: If it rises beyond 90-95% of max safe temperature for longer than 30 seconds, abort Cinebench and check to see that all fans are running and blowing the correct direction. Fans can create a deadlock of airflow when positioned and running against each other.

Step 7: Noting your highest stable temperature reading, repeat Step 2, noting the percentage / RPM setting necessary to maintain your recorded stable peak temp. When this has been determined, you can terminate the test.

Step 8: Open your fan controller software’s custom fan curve settings. Most will show dots on a graph, marked as fan percentage / RPM vertically, temperature setpoints horizontally. Each dot represents a setpoint.

Step 9: If silence is preferred, set your first setpoint at zero percentage or RPM just below or at your lowest temperature. Set your second setpoint by your lowest temperature and corresponding fan percentage / RPM setting. (Example: 0% below 30C, 20% at 30C)

Step 10: Find your fourth, fifth or sixth setpoint. Set it to your highest temp and fan percentage / RPM setting.

Step 11: The hard part is now over. The other setpoints between your high and low can now be tweaked to find a balance between stable temperatures and noise level.

 

[dirtyferret]

I don't think any of our regular contributors have ever stated or believe those "myths" but thanks for the info

 

[dgianstefani]

Air cooling has a hard limit on how much heat it can dissipate. Liquid cooling does not (within reason).

 

[An0maly_76]

I don't think any of our regular contributors have ever stated or believe those "myths" but thanks for the info

Keep in mind, I'm a migrant of sorts in from LTT forums. Just transferring a few of my useful threads before deleting my account there. I've seen a fair amount of misconceptions / myths in my time, as well as been flat-out-told my findings from real-world experience cannot be true (by people who have never used the specific components in question together, of course). The final straw came when it became clear that not only were certain members were going out of their way to bird-dog my posts, certain moderators were content to pick and choose who the rules applied to and when. Hence, this thread may contain some rhetoric that spawned it initially.

Air cooling has a hard limit on how much heat it can dissipate. Liquid cooling does not (within reason).

Be that as it may, I'm air-cooling a 5900X using PBO and RTX3060ti OC without issue. Peaks around 70-72C in my use. Haven't seen any numbers from AM5 or 13th-gen Intel just yet, but I'd say my setup is pretty hard proof that liquid cooling isn't required and is overkill in a lot of cases. And that statement is backed up by the findings of a YouTube who tested multiple air and liquid cooling setups, finding less than 5C difference in the peak temps seen among them.

 

[dirtyferret]

Keep in mind, I'm a migrant of sorts in from LTT forums. Just transferring a few of my useful threads before deleting my account there. I've seen a fair amount of misconceptions / myths in my time time, as well as been flat-out-told my findings from real-world experience cannot be true (by people who have never used the specific components in question together, of course). The final straw came when it became clear that not only were certain members were going out of their way to bird-dog my posts, certain moderators were content to pick and choose who the rules applied to and when. Hence, this thread may contain some rhetoric that spawned it initially.

welcome to TPU, the forums here have knowledgeable posters (for the most part ) and the mods are really good.

 

[dgianstefani]

Keep in mind, I'm a migrant of sorts in from LTT forums. Just transferring a few of my useful threads before deleting my account there. I've seen a fair amount of misconceptions / myths in my time, as well as been flat-out-told my findings from real-world experience cannot be true (by people who have never used the specific components in question together, of course). The final straw came when it became clear that not only were certain members were going out of their way to bird-dog my posts, certain moderators were content to pick and choose who the rules applied to and when. Hence, this thread may contain some rhetoric that spawned it initially.



Be that as it may, I'm air-cooling a 5900X using PBO and RTX3060ti OC without issue. Peaks around 70-72C in my use. Haven't seen any numbers from AM5 or 13th-gen Intel just yet, but I'd say my setup is pretty hard proof that liquid cooling isn't required and is overkill in a lot of cases. And that statement is backed up by the findings of a YouTube who tested multiple air and liquid cooling setups, finding less than 5C difference in the peak temps seen among them.

No offence, but that isn't a demanding heat load.

Or particularly good temperatures.

Air cooling has it's place, so does liquid cooling. Simply because your use case has acceptable results on air does not prove or disprove anything.

You seem to essentially be setting up an argument noone is making, then refuting it, before coming to conclusions not supported by evidence.

Here's an example of what liquid cooling can do (silently), while running a CPU + GPU under load, pushing locked 1440p 236 FPS, from a single 240 mm radiator in a case the size of a shoebox.

 

[ShiBDiB]

No offence, but that isn't a demanding heat load.

Or particularly good temperatures.

Air cooling has it's place, so does liquid cooling. Simply because your use case has acceptable results on air does not prove or disprove anything.

You seem to essentially be setting up an argument noone is making, then refuting it, before coming to conclusions not supported by evidence.

That's a nice way of saying "why does this thread exist?"

 

[tabascosauz]

Be that as it may, I'm air-cooling a 5900X using PBO and RTX3060ti OC without issue. Peaks around 70-72C in my use. Haven't seen any numbers from AM5 or 13th-gen Intel just yet, but I'd say my setup is pretty hard proof that liquid cooling isn't required and is overkill in a lot of cases. And that statement is backed up by the findings of a YouTube who tested multiple air and liquid cooling setups, finding less than 5C difference in the peak temps seen among them.

5900X being "hard to cool" is a common assumption from people who have never really OC'd one...

You only need something around a NH-U9S to cool a stock 5900X without throttling. With more airflow you cna do it with a NH-L12S. It's not even remotely hard to cool. 3060Ti also is not a high wattage GPU. GPUs (shouldn't) don't affect CPU air cooling temps nearly as much as you think.

If you want a challenging heat load that separates the men from the boys, push for 24k+ R23 score with 200-240W power draw. I could tame it pretty easily on custom loop but I don't have any air coolers that can do it (some of us on TPU do but it can be a challenge @freeagent )

 

[Bill_Bright]

I don't think any of our regular contributors have ever stated or believe those "myths" but thanks for the info

I wish that were true but sadly, there are a few who do believe myth #1, their processor requires liquid cooling and myth #2, air coolers are junk.

I do agree those really are myths - perpetrated, in part, by the marketing weenies of liquid cooling products, and in part by a few people who misunderstand the importance and/or how to properly set up case cooling for sufficient air flow through the case.

That said, most myths have roots in truth. And that is the case here. For example, there are always exceptions, of course. For those who do "extreme" overclocking during stress testing, they may need some form of alternative cooling.

And it is true that early (like 20 years back) "OEM" cooling solutions were barely adequate for the CPUs they came with. This is due to several factors.

1. Computers were designed for simple office tasks, and low demand games like solitaire.​

2. The heatsinks were relatively small.​

3. In many cases, the heatsinks were all or mostly aluminum instead of more efficient copper.​

4. The thermal pads back then were slightly better than basic silicon paste, which was barely better than nothing,​

5. The included fans were small, many 60mm or less, and thin which means they could not move much air.​

6. Demanding games were not very demanding.​

However, it did not take long for 3rd party air cooler makers to start making excellent coolers. But more importantly (when it comes to these myths) both AMD and Intel saw the light, heard the complaints, learned their lessons and started providing much more efficient (and quieter!) OEM coolers with their CPUs.

Sadly, many are still in denial of that fact, however. Yet it is just makes no sense for those people to assume AMD and Intel would include coolers that are incapable of cooling the CPUs they come with. If that were true, those CPUs would always be throttling back and we know that is not the case. So not only are the OEM coolers much superior than those of yesteryear, so are the thermal pads and/or OEM supplied TIM.

And we also know that both AMD and Intel sell CPUs sans coolers - again indicating they learned their lessons.

This is a bottleneck and also impacts cooling capacity. No pipe (or tube in this case) can flow more than its smallest diameter.

Ummm, first that is irrelevant to the point of this thread. Your thread is about air cooling in general vs liquid cooling in general. Tube/pipe design is a totally different discussion.

However, that is a much smaller problem than you make it out to be - if a problem at all. Be careful you are not forming the historic basis for yet another unfortunate myth.

Just because a oval shaped tube may "appear" to be a squished circle, that does NOT mean the volume capacity of the tube is lessoned. Unless the tube is actually smashed to where the inside walls of the tube are touching, a cross-sectional slice of the tube will still have nearly identical area. Thus they will have the same or nearly equal amount of liquid flow capacity. While one dimension will have a smaller diameter, the other dimension will have a significantly larger diameter.

Plus, heat will still radiate from the outer surfaces of the tube and whether circular or oval shaped, that surface area is the same.

My point is, when it comes to those pipes/tubes, one design is not inherently inferior or superior to the other.

Keep in mind, I'm a migrant of sorts in from LTT forums. Just transferring a few of my useful threads before deleting my account there. I've seen a fair amount of misconceptions / myths in my time time, as well as been flat-out-told my findings from real-world experience cannot be true (by people who have never used the specific components in question together, of course). The final straw came when it became clear that not only were certain members were going out of their way to bird-dog my posts

I second dirtyferret's welcome.

But I might suggest before you transfer more of your threads here, you might become familiar with this site first to see just how useful they may be. Otherwise, you risk being seen as just another newbie trying to impress us by making a splash with a bunch of posts consisting of old news.

For example, you put a lot of emphasis on case cooling, saying such things as "Case selection has a bigger impact on this than you might think." If you had done just a little researching here at TPU before jumping in, you would see that most of us know very well, the importance of case selection and proper case cooling for good air flow.

So while I personally believe your intent was good and sincere, not sure the impact you wanted, or impression you were trying to achieve was what you really got.

 

[Count von Schwalbe]

Welcome to TPU!

Don't worry about some of the others - sometimes we forget not everyone is as knowledgeable as the others. I call that a good guide for someone starting out - it would have been nice to have when I first got into PC building and immediately jumped on the liquid bandwagon.

 

[ir_cow]

Let me know when you find a

MYTH #1 – “My processor requires liquid cooling”

This simply is not true in 99.99% of cases. While it is true that more cores and more threads = more heat, my recent R9-5900X build is proof that air-cooling is more than sufficient for consumer market applications. This is not meant to bash those who like liquid cooling, but VERY little, if anything, on the consumer market actually requires liquid cooling. Also, I feel it often is a band-aid for poor component selection and / or an off-the-shelf answer for those who don’t understand how to properly set up air cooling, or the dynamics of cooling.

I'm that .01% because NO air cooler can handle 300+ watts.

 

[Tomgang]

Aircooling has all ways been my favoridt cooling type. Cheaper, most reliable and easy to/less maintinense needed compared water cooling. The downside of aircooling is that not every one like a big ass dual tower cooler in there system and aircooling can dissapate less heat than a proper custom water loop, limit overclock in some cases.

With the rate CPU´s goes in form of power consumption. Aircooling and high-end cpu´s like 13900K and 7950X really pushing the limit for what even the best air cooler can handle with stock power consumption of all ready 300 watt and 230 watt respectivly. Even the zen 4 6 core now has a power of 105 watt compared to my 5600X of 65 watt. Zen 3 is easy to aircool while zen 4 is a nightmare. Specially for the 170 watt rated parts. 5950X rated for 105 watt (in realioty it uses stock 141 watt) while 7950X is 170 watt (in reallity it more like 230 watt). The higher clock speed the latest gen of CPU´s are capable of hitting, has a back side to that. More heat and power consumption that needs even better cooling. Intel and AMD pushes there cpu all ready at stock now to the limit of what air cooling can handle.

My 5950X cooled by a Noctua NH-D15 hits stock single core up to 72C while multicore load is 58 C. Witjh PBO single core load is the same while multi core load raises to 76 C (that is at 200 watt my motherboard allows as max). Manuel all core OC to 4.65 GHz at 1.375 volts i hit 86 C and is really the limit for my cooling before throttle temp is reached at 90 C.

What i try to say is that aircooling is apselutely sifficiant for Zen 3 based CPU´s, while Zen 4 and alder lake/meteor lake is really pushing aircooling to the limit because of the increased core clock and power consumption. This unfortunaly can mean this is my last aircooled high-end build do to cpu are pushed so hard all ready at stock. I can off cause limit power, but how fun is it to buy an exspensive cpu to just limit it´s capabillity.

I will say a good big dual tower air cooler is just as good as at least a 240 MM AIO, maybe even 360 MM in some cases.

My system is at least a prove of that a high-end system dosent have to be water cooled to perform it´s best. My system is completely aircooled and i will not call my system low end by any means.

My system (se all spec in my profil):

 

[freeagent]

I'm that .01% because NO air cooler can handle 300+ watts

I have one cooler rated for 320w and another cooler rated for 360w, but that’s for old school 45nm and 32nm chips. At 22nm and under they lose their grip and don’t do so well with the smaller nodes. They could just need a lap though..

 

[Udyr]

Keep in mind, I'm a migrant of sorts in from LTT forums. Just transferring a few of my useful threads before deleting my account there. I've seen a fair amount of misconceptions / myths in my time, as well as been flat-out-told my findings from real-world experience cannot be true (by people who have never used the specific components in question together, of course). The final straw came when it became clear that not only were certain members were going out of their way to bird-dog my posts, certain moderators were content to pick and choose who the rules applied to and when. Hence, this thread may contain some rhetoric that spawned it initially.

Welcome to TPU!

Unfortunately, that happens in other forums as well. They start pretty decent, with useful information provided by knowledgeable people, new information submitted by curious folks and new stories by upcoming enthusiasts. But then it grows too wild with some loud folks providing misinformation and turning everything into a marketplace for some products. Then every question is replied by an attempt of making you buy something you don't actually need or solves the problem.

In here you can find a variety of friendly, grumpy and geeky folks, and even if some might justify their purchases, no one (or far few) will try to entice you to buy X or Y.

 

[Vario]

5900X being "hard to cool" is a common assumption from people who have never really OC'd one...

You only need something around a NH-U9S to cool a stock 5900X without throttling. With more airflow you cna do it with a NH-L12S. It's not even remotely hard to cool. 3060Ti also is not a high wattage GPU. GPUs (shouldn't) don't affect CPU air cooling temps nearly as much as you think.

If you want a challenging heat load that separates the men from the boys, push for 24k+ R23 score with 200-240W power draw. I could tame it pretty easily on custom loop but I don't have any air coolers that can do it (some of us on TPU do but it can be a challenge @freeagent )

It can be done quite easily on undervolted 12900KS on air (NHD15S), but don't know about the 5900X.

https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/attachments/5ghz-1-2v-cinebench-r23-multi-png.262851/

 

[Shrek]

Didn't Apple have a liquid cooled power Mac G5 Mac that had a tendency to leak?

 

[Space Lynx]

Air cooling has a hard limit on how much heat it can dissipate. Liquid cooling does not (within reason).

this is why you always set a slightly higher fan curve than what is stock on air coolers. I always do. sucks it right out the exhaust rear, since all 3 fans are lined up perfectly. 2x in push/pull on the heatsink, 1x rear exhaust.

i have no issues with noise, I don't do anything crazy, just a slightly higher fan curve than stock. its always worked wonders for me, and kept temps down to almost liquid cooler levels. Not sure how well my new V5 cooler will do, I got as a budget experiment. I intend to try it soon. I may end up doing something better though like a U12A or a AIO, haven't decided yet. If the V5 does what I need it to do though, and I expect it will, especially with the fan curve I will be using, all will be well.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

That being said, it MUST be made for your processor and suited to your setup.

The only 'must be made' should be referring to mounting. I'd rephrase this to

That being said, it should be RATED for your processor and fit inside your case.

Its rare that I openly agree with Bill, but... most instances of poor cooling is because of poor case design and insufficient airflow thru the case. An air cooler thats slightly underrated can still work with the right case with good airflow, along with some cable management.

 

[dgianstefani]

this is why you always set a slightly higher fan curve than what is stock on air coolers. I always do. sucks it right out the exhaust rear, since all 3 fans are lined up perfectly. 2x in push/pull on the heatsink, 1x rear exhaust.

i have no issues with noise, I don't do anything crazy, just a slightly higher fan curve than stock. its always worked wonders for me, and kept temps down to almost liquid cooler levels. Not sure how well my new V5 cooler will do, I got as a budget experiment. I intend to try it soon. I may end up doing something better though like a U12A or a AIO, haven't decided yet. If the V5 does what I need it to do though, and I expect it will, especially with the fan curve I will be using, all will be well.

Nothing you said in any way refutes the simple fact that air cooling has a hard limit.

 

[Space Lynx]

Nothing you said in any way refutes the simple fact that air cooling has a hard limit.

not for a casual gamer it doesn't. it's all relative

 

[AlwaysHope]

Air cooling has a hard limit on how much heat it can dissipate. Liquid cooling does not (within reason).

Of course this is true, but what is also true is air is pushed through radiators to cool the liquid. No getting away from the fact that air is still vital to cooling the system obviously, then there is the question of ambient temperatures & what each end user is tolerant with however that is another discussion but still relevant to overall efficiency of the cooling solution.

A lot of variables come into this & literally endless discussions on many enthusiasts forums will never satisfy everyone.

Let me know when you find a

I'm that .01% because NO air cooler can handle 300+ watts.

A question of relevance though. One could have 10C ambient or even lower & that high end air cooler will compete with water coolers.
As I said before in the first quote of my post, it all depends on what the end user can put up with & can control.

 

[dgianstefani]

Of course this is true, but what is also true is air is pushed through radiators to cool the liquid. No getting away from the fact that air is still vital to cooling the system obviously, then there is the question of ambient temperatures & what each end user is tolerant with however that is another discussion but still relevant to overall efficiency of the cooling solution.

A lot of variables come into this & literally endless discussions on many enthusiasts forums will never satisfy everyone.


A question of relevance though. One could have 10C ambient or even lower & that high end air cooler will compete with water coolers.
As I said before in the first quote of my post, it all depends on what the end user can put up with & can control.

Instead of being pedantic we could understand that the difference is liquid has the ability, by nature, to quickly and constantly move heat away from the source, whereas air coolers (you know what I'm talking about) have to use heatpipes or vapor chambers to do so (guess what, there's liquid in these). Its getting harder and harder with the increasing transistor density of CPUs especially, to do this.

On a liquid system you can add as much surface area as you want through radiators, there are no limits, assuming you have a pump strong enough, or several in series. On an air system, you are limited by the thermal conductivity of the heatpipes/vapor chambers, which decrease with more distance from the heatsource, fundamentally limiting the effective size of any air cooler heatsink. Liquid also has the ability to have a large thermal reservoir, serving as a buffer for spikes in thermal load. There's also the advantage of liquid cooling systems to directly exhaust the heat outside of the case, instead of blowing it on the other components (like RAM), or GPUs exhausting very hot air directly into the CPU cooler.

Additionally, you can position the various elements of a liquid cooling system anywhere in the case, for aesthetics or space efficiency. Air cooling forces you to have your heatsink directly on top of the heat producing element - leading to absurdities like 4 slot GPUs, or huge tower coolers forcing large case sizes.

There is a good reason almost every serious heat producing element in any part of any industry or product (cars, industrial machinery, nuclear reactors etc.) all use liquid cooling. Air can potentially be lower maintenance, but it depends on the design of the loop, air is fundamentally a lower capacity, worse cooling system. The advantages are simplicity, cost, and to a certain extent, lack of maintenance.

 

[damric]

I have one cooler rated for 320w and another cooler rated for 360w, but that’s for old school 45nm and 32nm chips. At 22nm and under they lose their grip and don’t do so well with the smaller nodes. They could just need a lap though..

This. I've pushed older CPUs over 300w on TPC-812, but I've found 7nm to need water for the awful things I like to do to them. The 14nm 1st gen ryzens could do it, but even the 12nm ones were just too heat dense to push that hard.

That dang FX Bulldozer I was able to cool it at 5300MHz 1.8v on a Hyper 212+ while unloading upside down cans of duster into the fins.

 

[dgianstefani]

That dang FX Bulldozer I was able to cool it at 5300MHz 1.8v on a Hyper 212+ while unloading upside down cans of duster into the fins.

Interesting technique for sub ambient

 

[AnotherReader]

Instead of being pedantic we could understand that the difference is liquid has the ability, by nature, to quickly and constantly move heat away from the source, whereas air coolers (you know what I'm talking about) have to use heatpipes or vapor chambers to do so (guess what, there's liquid in these). Its getting harder and harder with the increasing transistor density of CPUs especially, to do this.

On a liquid system you can add as much surface area as you want through radiators, there are no limits, assuming you have a pump strong enough, or several in series. On an air system, you are limited by the thermal conductivity of the heatpipes/vapor chambers, which decrease with more distance from the heatsource, fundamentally limiting the effective size of any air cooler heatsink. Liquid also has the ability to have a large thermal reservoir, serving as a buffer for spikes in thermal load. There's also the advantage of liquid cooling systems to directly exhaust the heat outside of the case, instead of blowing it on the other components (like RAM), or GPUs exhausting very hot air directly into the CPU cooler.

Additionally, you can position the various elements of a liquid cooling system anywhere in the case, for aesthetics or space efficiency. Air cooling forces you to have your heatsink directly on top of the heat producing element - leading to absurdities like 4 slot GPUs, or huge tower coolers forcing large case sizes.

There is a good reason almost every serious heat producing element in any part of any industry or product (cars, industrial machinery, nuclear reactors etc.) all use liquid cooling. Air can potentially be lower maintenance, but it depends on the design of the loop, air is fundamentally a lower capacity, worse cooling system. The advantages are simplicity, cost, and to a certain extent, lack of maintenance.

This is all true, but the VF curve being nonlinear means that the added capacity of liquid cooling doesn't do much for actual performance as proven by TPU in the 7950X cooling test. The clincher for me though is that air cooling is vastly more reliable than cooling using electrically conductive liquids.