Do motherboards draw different amounts of power?

Aside from size, when you removed that much material, that pretty much removed a rather large area of the heatsink, shrinking it's cooling capacity considerably. May not seem like a lot was removed, but I can bet that 4-6 square inches of cooling surface was lost, which means the heat has less surface area to dissipate from.

Your going to need a copper heatpipe style heatsink, and one of decent size, or a good watercooling loop. But that heatsink style alone is a very poor one for an i7 even if you didn't shave it. Not enough cooling surface, it honestly reminds me of Pentium 3 heatsinks where it had several large thick aluminum fins, which was sufficient at the time, but newer processors need far more cooling capacity, which means far more cooling surface is needed, which means a far higher cooling fin density is required.
 
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Yea, that's way too small of a heatsink for a high ambient environment.
Ok, well, I suppose now I am one step closer to finding a working solution...

Which of the following CPU coolers do you guys recommend:

Zalman CNPS 9500 AT
Zalman LQ 315
Corsair H60
Cooler Master 212+
COOLER MASTER V8
Any others?

Thanks,

Soar
 
With winter coming and you saying you're moving to the HAF the H60 should do well, the Zalman LQ being a better choice (with H80i after that being the same price). Can do push pull in the summer if needed.
 
I personally have the Cooler Master Hyper 212 and it works nicely, not great, but nicely with a Phenom2 X4 965BE, temps never get above 40C at full load, but I replaced the fan with a pair of 120mm 130CFM fans I bought several years ago, far higher rated air-flow than the single stock fan...

Honestly, I think you should stay away from prebuilt water cooling loops, I see and hear too many negative reviews in regards to the pump failing prematurely, while in other cases the reviews are good, if you go that route, make sure that the motherboard will kill power to the processor if it starts to overheat...

I think this cooler Noctua NH-U12S 120x120x25 ( NF-F12 PWM) SSO2-Bearing ( Self-stabilising oil-presure bearing ) CPU Cooler - Newegg.com should more than meet the requirements of keeping the CPU cool, but you need to keep in mind of several key measurements. One, will it sit inside the case with it's measure height? Will the RAM slots with your current RAM configuration work with the cooler? Or will you have to go with low-profile RAM?
 
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The positive far outweigh the negative. I've flung probably close to 50 or 60 AIO from Corsair alone and the only dead one I've had in my hands happened to be the refurb I bought which Corsair replaced with an H100i.
Actually the only thing I could see being a problem is heat soak with the water but then again in such high ambient temps he'll have the same problem with the tower. I just feel the H80i would transfer far more heat than any of the solutions he listed off. It would definitely beat the rest during the winter for sure.

OP already has GTs, no point in Noctua.
 
The issue is, that pump fails, the coolant will heatsoak very fast considering it's not moving at a fast enough pace what so ever once the pump fails. Least with an air-cool system if the fan fails it will take a few minutes for a properly ventilated system using an old-fashioned heatsink to experience heat saturation.

But you are right, the water cooling systems would transfer heat better, I was looking at the H80i, till I started to read complaints about premature pump failure on several retailer sites, and in a few random forums. Pump failure has always been one of the biggest concerns in watercooling, kind of miss the days of DIY water cooling, so much better, and safer IMO.
 
Think about it this way, people will only say stuff about a failure rather than posting simply to say it works perfect. The perfect to fail ratio is MUCH higher than you might think. Before Corsair started making a killing in the consumer market CoolIT and Asetek were selling these units to large server/database environments. The QA on these has to be incredible. With his high ambient temp if anything fails his PC will shut down immediately.

If it means anything to you, I've had 2 custom loop pumps fail on me during service. On the other hand, I've never had a Corsair AIO fail on me that wasn't DOA. My H50 is still running since 2009 and AFAIK the H60 I sold also is still running 24/7.
 
Well, liquid is the best option at those temps... I am still worried about pump failure, but you are right about people who have issues reporting, while people that dont have issues, just go on with life.
 
Thanks guys for your excellent advice, suggestions, and counsel.

Well, I will give is a little more thought before making a final decision on which CPU cooler to use...

FYI, I have had wonderful success with the Zalman LQ 315 and the Thermaltake WATER2.0 Performer.

I had an absolutely horriffic experience with Corsair's first gen liquid cpu coolers. Massive leak, massive damage, and initally a complete total denial by Corsair that anything was wrong with their H70 POS.

Learned me lesson since then and ripped out every Corsair Liquid Cooler I ever installed.

I understand others have had good luck with Corsair liquid coolers...on the other hand, I had massive numbers of people respond to my post at Amazon regarding problems with Corsair's liquid coolers. I'll continue to purchase Corsair's awesome PSU's, RAM, cases, etc. but I'll never touch another one of their liquid coolers.

I am posting a pic of my leaking H70 as well as the Amazon review that won me one of their top awards as a reviewer. I am also posting some pics of the modified dead cat cartoons that I posted after researching and discovering the Corsair Gen 1 Liquid Coolers used a cooling solution that was deadly to household pets such as cats and dogs...I kinda had fun with this...

Have a good one and thanks again for excellent info.

Soar

My Review

This review is from: Corsair Hydro Series H70 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (CW-9060002-WW) (Personal Computers)
At first appearance, I was extremely excited about purchasing a Corsair H-70 Liquid CPU cooler. I totally liked the idea of how a massive CPU air cooler would no longer restrict the overall air flow in my new CM HAF 932. Also, just the thought of much less weight on my motherboard was very attractive to me. Finally, when I read the benchmarks on the Corsair H-70, and how it did a fairly good job of cooling, I was sold on it.

After reading many, many glowing reviews and absolutely stellar reports about Corsair's Liquid cooled H-70, I eagerly purchased one and installed it in my computer.

It worked well for about 30 days. Suddenly, one day when I can home I smelled the very strong odor of something similar to anti-freeze. My computer would not boot, and at first, I could not figure out what was wrong. Then I opened my computer case...

What I discovered was shocking. The Corsair H70 had sprung a leak at the point where the hose attaches to the water pump. I still could not figure out how and why I kept smelling a strong automobile anti-freeze like odor...and then I realized the smell was from the liquid the Corsair H-70 was dumping on my motherboard. After doing a little more research, I discovered that Corsair does not use water but Propylene glycol, also called 1,2-propanediol or propane-1,2-diol, is an organic compound (a diol or double alcohol) with formula C3H8O2 or HO-CH2-CHOH-CH3 as the liquid inside their H-70 liquid CPU cooler. I am thankful that the leak only killed my motherboard. Propylene glycol is toxic to small animals. Veterinary data indicate that propylene glycol is toxic to dogs with a 50% chance of being lethal at doses of 9mL/kg, although the figure is higher for most laboratory animals (LD50 at levels of 20mL/kg).

I emailed and called Corsair, explaining the problem and requested a full refund for my purchase of a defective item that killed my very, very expensive motherboard. They outright refused. Instead, they insisted I package up the leaking H-70 and mail it to their factory so they could "confirm" that what I said actually occurred. I spent another $15 to mail the defective H70 to Corsair.

Finally, after 4 weeks, Corsair sent me an email, confirming the H-70 was indeed defective. They insisted on mailing me a replacement...something I did not care for.

After this experience, I ripped out every Corsair Liquid CPU Cooler I have ever installed [over the last 2 years, I've installed other Corsair liquid CPU Coolers in other systems]. I replaced these liquid coolers with simple yet effective CPU air coolers. The stress of wondering if my next system build would develop a leak was just too much. There is enough stress in the world and I did not want to needlessly add to the stress already out there by installing a component that would place the entire system at risk.

I realize many people are happy with Corsair's liquid CPU coolers. I am happy it is working out for them. For me personally, I will never trust a high end system to Corsair for a liquid cooled solution. I will continue to purchase their PSU's and RAM, but I will never touch their liquid CPU coolers ever again. Way too much risk, way too much stress and way too much irreparable damage with an accompanying deep disappointment.
 

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Yea, first genners had terrible linkage and hard tubing. Not something you get with newer setups, although if taken care of properly they can run a long time like my H50. The H70 was also discontinued and quickly replaced by the H80, then the H80i with rubber tubing and better fittings. As to the liquid, actually prop glycol is rather safe and used in foods. It's also in the ecig I'm puffing now. It's not good for cats though.

One thing to remember, is you may nay say Corsair units but ALL AIO coolers are made by two companies besides a select few. Most all companies rebranding these coolers also use a combination of CoolIT and Asetek units and you have to know what to look for to differentiate the two.
 
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