As I feared, summer heat

[Gothch1ck]

Summer heat has taken its toll on my PC, my GPU is running 67C while 0% activity.

I have to blast the fan at 100% to keep it cooler (upper 40s) and it sounds like a bloody turbine engine.


Suggestions for keepin it cooled? Fans don't appear to be doing the trick, and I know little to anything about liquid cooling systems.

The room temp is about 26C just to give an indication on the ambiant temps. The A/C is on full blast and it's 1:40 AM for me

I need to get cooled fast before it degrades performance, I have notice games stuttering and having a hard time keeping up with textures and such, signs that the heat IS effecting the unit.

I am still stock cooling on the CPU as well - which worries me since i7's run hot in the first place.

Kinda need a budget Liquid-or-other-silent-cooling system (or at least more silent than this turbine) at least until it cools off here - like around winter. I have no problems "fitting my PC for the seasons" either, putting liquid cool on during summer, and taking off during winter.

*Edit*
I am also not against totally icing this thing with crazy options like Liquid Nitrogen, but that I will have to save up for. I heard there was never a low enough temp for PC's - to an extent I agree.

 

[CalcProgrammer1]

For the CPU I would recommend a Corsair H50 if you want a simple liquid cooling system without any major hassle, I got one for my i7 930 and it works great, runs at 4.1GHz overclocked and the CPU never seems to exceed 75C core temps, hovers around 70C core temps during load, the motherboard's CPU temperature indicator reads around 65 during load. I have 2 Rosewill fans attached to it in a push-pull setup. For your GPU make sure the heatsink is clean, get any dust out of it (may have to take the plastic cover off) and clean out the fan. My 5870 runs at 60-65C full load with the fan at 50%, I know the 4xxx series did run hotter but 67C idle is way too hot for anything.

If you want to do liquid cooling on the GPU you'd probably have to go with a full water cooling loop and you'd have to connect it all up yourself. You could also look into aftermarket coolers for the 4890 if they are available. Depending on your price range it might be a better idea to upgrade to a 5xxx series card and take advantage of the lower power consumption. The fan on mine is sorta loud at 50% but I overclocked it to 900/1300 and have it running Folding@Home 24/7, at idle it uses very significantly less power (I think around 30W compared to 175W full power).

 

[Abstract Hero]

Newegg.com - Noctua NH-D14 120mm & 140mm SSO CPU Cooler

It's pricey but silent and one of the best air coolers you can get.

 

[Gothch1ck]

Well I figure just jump into it, liquid cool the CPU, GPU (+parts for a second GPU) and what the heck, let's make sure the RAM is cooled too however that would work out to parts. + I plan to crank out 6 more GB RAM ( I do a lot of memory intensive computing where I do make use of it, like digital art) I plan to get a tablet to do my art on - then do the finishing compression and such on my PC here, saving time and energy.

I wanna get my temps down without killing too much power, I could underclock the whole rig pretty far, but then games wouldn't be pretty or anything.

finished plan would be 12GB Ram, 2x4890 GPU (since they are so outdated now though, I might have to go 5xxx series and just make this 4890 find another home, I can't even find a 4890 around here for sale) and I'd love to get a PCI card for usb 3.0 Support (I have many, many plans for the new USBs)

I also want to get a SSD HDD for my OS and a faster set of drives in RAID for my games/info. (the whole original plan)

Of course come to think of it, it doesn't really matter Fan or Liquid... liquids still require fans on the rad. to cool off... and sometimes those aren't so silent.

Main thing is getting the GPU cooler though, might just look into the 5xxx series, but even then I might want to push cooler/more silent on those, what do you guys think? Just Liquid cool the GPU(s) to keep them from turning into turbines? or a aftermarket GPU Fan?

 

[aspire]

If you have aim or facebook feel free to hit me up and I'll give you all the advice you could ever want about liquid cooling. I just don't enjoy the slow back and forth chat you get with the forum.

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aim is: thephilosofizer

For the cpu, and 2 gpu's you're looking at a $350-500 loop if you want to do it right. Taking that into consideration, would high end air cooling be a better way for you to go?

For the CPU I would recommend a Corsair H50 if you want a simple liquid cooling system without any major hassle, I got one for my i7 930 and it works great, runs at 4.1GHz overclocked and the CPU never seems to exceed 75C core temps, hovers around 70C core temps during load, the motherboard's CPU temperature indicator reads around 65 during load. I have 2 Rosewill fans attached to it in a push-pull setup. For your GPU make sure the heatsink is clean, get any dust out of it (may have to take the plastic cover off) and clean out the fan. My 5870 runs at 60-65C full load with the fan at 50%, I know the 4xxx series did run hotter but 67C idle is way too hot for anything.

If my processor ever hit 75C with water cooling I would be pretty terrified, I get angry at anything above 45-50...

 

[Abstract Hero]

The H50 isn't worth it you can get equally good colling out of a high end air cooler so either go big with water cooling or high end air.

 

[CalcProgrammer1]

The H50 is comparable to most high-end air coolers but it is around the same price point and has the advantage of being small and lightweight. If you move your PC a lot, a large air cooler might not be the best idea because they mount directly to the motherboard and do not have any other support from the case. Some of the large air coolers weigh enough to worry about stress on the motherboard when in transportation. I take my PC between home and college a lot and didn't want this to be a problem so the H50 seemed like a good option. Full water cooling can often require extensive case modding to fit the radiator, and sometimes an external radiator connected by hoses is necessary. For a large full tower case, a full water cooling setup should work great but for smaller mid tower cases (like my Antec Nine Hundred) a smaller unit saves space and fits without modification.

As for hitting 75C, it is a bit high but the i7's run hot. 45-50C is the i7's idle range on the stock heatsink or overclocked idle range on a good heatsink, the days of CPU's under load pushing 50C are gone, at least for Intel.

 

[S0ULphIRE]

How easy is maintenance on the H50? Air coolers have the advantage of no maintenance worries, apart from the occasional wipe-down of the fan blades (if you live in a dusty kinda room like me )

Also, for transportation I always lay my pc on its side, so all the stress is taken off the mobo.

 

[CalcProgrammer1]

The H50 is little to no maintenance required. It is a closed, sealed loop water cooler so you never have to add water or worry about leakage/evaporation. The main maintenance is the same as air coolers, you have to keep the blades on the fans clean and blow dust out of the radiator. It's also a good idea to monitor pump RPM (it uses a fan header plug so you can read the pump RPM) and make sure it's in range. I would lay my PC on its side but there isn't much room in my car for it sideways, I usually have stuff in the trunk already so it gets the back seat and it's easier to just strap it in with a seat belt.

 

[mattk1045]

O/P how is summer heat affecting your comp when ambient temp is 26c? That is not hot

My case temp is 25c and my GPU is 32c. Your GPU is a beast I guess lol. I would suggest cleaning the dust out first off before spending money.

Plus if that case is the one with like 4 fans on all different sides, front, side, top, rear plus CPU heatsink, PSU fan, and GPU fan your airflow could be all jacked up.