AIO vs AIR

[Sport Driver]

 

What would be better idea to go for, Be Quiet Dark Rock 4 on the side of air coolers or Cooler Master ML240R RGB on AIO side? It will be cooling 5800X. From Tier list ML240 is better but is it really? Also how is reliability of this CM stuff? Pride delta is 10€. Case will be NZXT H510 if that makes any difference. 

 

[jaslion]

The dark rock is better than the ml240r.

 

Don't get that case either way it has terrible airflow get something with a mesh front that will matter a lot more than the cooler as then your hardware can actually get some fresh air instead of being chocked and running toasty (and thus louder). Putting a aio in the h510 only makes it far worse for the gpu.

[Sport Driver]

6 minutes ago, jaslion said:

The dark rock is better than the ml240r.

 

Don't get that case either way it has terrible airflow get something with a mesh front that will matter a lot more than the cooler as then your hardware can actually get some fresh air instead of being chocked and running toasty (and thus louder). Putting a aio in the h510 only makes it far worse for the gpu.

I'm getting that case, not much else I like is available. Was thinking about Meshify S2 but it is double the price. It will have to do. 

4 minutes ago, DriftMan said:

They are in the same Tier (3), the Dark Pro 4 will require less maintenance (if any other than thermal paste which an AIO also requires, and check the fans), will last you longer and is more reliable

It is normal Dark Rock not Pro so Tier 5 I think. But I get where you are coming from. So generally AIR is better than budget AIO? I do like the look of AIO but really don't want to deal with loads of problems. 

[jaslion]

1 minute ago, Sport Driver said:

I'm getting that case, not much else I like is available. Was thinking about Meshify S2 but it is double the price. It will have to do. 

It is normal Dark Rock not Pro so Tier 5 I think. But I get where you are coming from. So generally AIR is better than budget AIO? I do like the look of AIO but really don't want to deal with loads of problems. 

The meshify c should be the price of a h510 and is basically identical to the meshify 2. In the h510 basically every cooler kinda sucks and watercooling makes it terrible for the gpu as the only place for a 240 is in the front aka the only fresh air intake and then you get the hot air from the cpu all over the inside of everything thus heating the remainder of the components even more.

[Sport Driver]

Wanted type-C. Meshify C also out of stock or more expensive. Case is coming tomorrow so can't do much about that. I'm  sticking with it, if it ends up being too bad I will change it later. 

[Chrismike]

i'm not sure with 5800x, but i'm assuming it'd be a bit warmer. i have a 5600x on a DRP4 my idle's at 37c gaming mid 50s stress test at 60-70c. i'm using an nzxt h510 as well. tried to OC it to 4.7 all cores 1.3v temp just peaks at 75c(i didn't stress test, just did a coouple of benchmarks. i have a front fan intake....drp4...and a stock rear and upper exhaust. i'm guessing it's pretty good. Can't say the same with the GPU temp though. i liked the nzxt h510 because of its simplicity. but it's airflow though.... basically having a negative pressure design, add in my dark rock pro 4 and 2 front fans into the mix: it's causing airflow to stall and just hovers the warm air just above the gpu.

 

Without the front fans, my cpu temp gets a bit warmer. Better gpu temp.

 

With front fans, better cpu warmer gpu.

 

after a bit of work, adding even more fans, and a lot of drilling.... my h510 now looks like a fractal wannabe.

 

To address your concern, H510, Dark rock pro 4 on a ryzen is great.

 

if you're going to go for an AIO i'd recommend to wait and just get another case.

[Chrismike]

On 1/27/2021 at 5:47 AM, Sport Driver said:

Wanted type-C. Meshify C also out of stock or more expensive. Case is coming tomorrow so can't do much about that. I'm  sticking with it, if it ends up being too bad I will change it later. 

oh you bought the case all ready. well... it's available for a reason  anyway, these worked for me:

1. no additional fans cpu gets 5-10c warmer but better gpu.

or

2. just install 1 front fan (the upper one only). if you install a fan at the lower part, it messes with the airflow for the GPU. because the air coming in from the pci slots are interfering and disrupts the airflow altogether.

[AngryBeaver]

On 1/26/2021 at 3:33 PM, jaslion said:

The meshify c should be the price of a h510 and is basically identical to the meshify 2. In the h510 basically every cooler kinda sucks and watercooling makes it terrible for the gpu as the only place for a 240 is in the front aka the only fresh air intake and then you get the hot air from the cpu all over the inside of everything thus heating the remainder of the components even more.

I feel like you drastically over estimate the temp of air after the rad... which is generally only 1-2c warmer (not much) so as long as you have adequate exhaust your gpu temps will remain largely the same. 

[Boyohan]

I recently switched to a new case and cooling

Old case: Lian Li O11 Dyn with 360 AIO

New case: BQ 500DX with Noctua NH-D15S

 

I dropped both temps and noise with air-cooling. 

 

The standard H510 has terrible airflow because of the closed front panel. 

Because of the limited airflow in the case I believe the AIO could be slightly better than air-cooling.

 

I would suggest air-cooling with BQ Dark Rock 4 but with a different case (with mesh front). 

BQ 500DX

Corsair 4000D Airflow

Lian Li LANCOOL II Mesh

Phanteks P400A

Fractal Meshify 

Cooler Master TD500 Mesh

[jaslion]

20 minutes ago, AngryBeaver said:

I feel like you drastically over estimate the temp of air after the rad... which is generally only 1-2c warmer (not much) so as long as you have adequate exhaust your gpu temps will remain largely the same. 

The air is a fair bit warmer when the cpu is loaded. If it would only be a couple degrees those rads would suck :P. You can look it up more than enough tests done. Either way even 2c in the h510 coupled with even less airflow due to a front rad really hurts the gpu for temps.

[freeagent]

Crazy. I was running High TDP and high voltage in my CLC days. I cant say I ever felt warm air coming off the rad. I wasn't using stock fans, but still. I always had my rad drawing from outside and exhausting into my case. Sounds like you need to forget about silence and turn up the fans over 500rpm for awhile

[jaslion]

16 minutes ago, freeagent said:

Crazy. I was running High TDP and high voltage in my CLC days. I cant say I ever felt warm air coming off the rad. I wasn't using stock fans, but still. I always had my rad drawing from outside and exhausting into my case. Sounds like you need to forget about silence and turn up the fans over 500rpm for awhile

I have the exact opposite. When my vega 56 is going the air from the rads is proper hot. The fans are only at most at 700rpm (arctic p12's) but the air is clearly hotter. Is fresh from the outside air and in a mesh case so that ain't the issue.

[Sport Driver]

So basically the only thing all of you guys agree on in the fact I f.ed up buying that case  

I was reading/watching more videos those 2 days about how cooling in this case works since it really is "interesting". 

So to sum up: 

AIR cooler:

+ reliability

+ cooler GPU

- worse CPU cooling performance (Can't fit Dark Rock Pro 4 with Vengance RGB in that case)

- worse looks (subjective) 

AIO:

+ Better CPU temps

+ Looks better

- Hotter GPU temps

- potential reliability problems

 

So I basically have to check now how hot do RTX 3070s get 
 

[Chrismike]

well, i really like how the dark rock looks. we have the same gpu. i have the aorus master one. can you post an update what your gpu temp will be? mine plays around 72-73 after 2-4 hours of gaming/stress test.

 

some offsets their front fans to compensate for the rams. then again, i don't know how tall your rams are.

[AngryBeaver]

1 hour ago, jaslion said:

The air is a fair bit warmer when the cpu is loaded. If it would only be a couple degrees those rads would suck :P. You can look it up more than enough tests done. Either way even 2c in the h510 coupled with even less airflow due to a front rad really hurts the gpu for temps.

I have seen it tested. Lol at a water loop for example there is a high delta difference between say the cpu temp and water temp and thr water is in a closed loop. Now when you look at air, with the volume that is flowing through the rad and the speed at which it moves a 2c in vs out difference is still a lot of thermal mass. The difference is you have an almost endless supply of fresh intake air (unless you are heating your room up from a massive amount of heat).

 

It has been proven time and time again that the difference between intake and exhaust air is minimal if you have proper flow. One of the biggest positives to water cooling is the control you have over the air. You can choose to get fresh air or to exhaust the hot. Air coolers can actually cause turbulence issues that hurt the wind tunnel effect.

 

 

[Chrismike]

1 hour ago, AngryBeaver said:

I have seen it tested. Lol at a water loop for example there is a high delta difference between say the cpu temp and water temp and thr water is in a closed loop. Now when you look at air, with the volume that is flowing through the rad and the speed at which it moves a 2c in vs out difference is still a lot of thermal mass. The difference is you have an almost endless supply of fresh intake air (unless you are heating your room up from a massive amount of heat).

 

It has been proven time and time again that the difference between intake and exhaust air is minimal if you have proper flow. One of the biggest positives to water cooling is the control you have over the air. You can choose to get fresh air or to exhaust the hot. Air coolers can actually cause turbulence issues that hurt the wind tunnel effect.

 

 

Completely agree... but do remember he has an h510(will have). My dark rock performs fairly well even with only the stock fans. Problem with front aio there may not be sufficient air intake. Which in turn may heat up the rad making high cpu temp after some time. I doubt it will affect the gpu. Warm air from the rad will rise before it reaches your 3070. Thanks to the cases’s negative pressure design....Air for the gpu will generally come from the vacant pcie slots and some from the bottom part of the case as well.

 

cleaning the computer is quite a chore with the dark rock. And dust really builds up after about 2 months with the h510s.

 

anyway.... if you decide to choose aio over air, please post your temps here plus side for aio, it’s easier to clean. The panel can be removed easily so you can air clean your board, card and radiator faster.

[Sport Driver]

14 hours ago, Chrismike said:

Completely agree... but do remember he has an h510(will have). My dark rock performs fairly well even with only the stock fans. Problem with front aio there may not be sufficient air intake. Which in turn may heat up the rad making high cpu temp after some time. I doubt it will affect the gpu. Warm air from the rad will rise before it reaches your 3070. Thanks to the cases’s negative pressure design....Air for the gpu will generally come from the vacant pcie slots and some from the bottom part of the case as well.

 

cleaning the computer is quite a chore with the dark rock. And dust really builds up after about 2 months with the h510s.

 

anyway.... if you decide to choose aio over air, please post your temps here plus side for aio, it’s easier to clean. The panel can be removed easily so you can air clean your board, card and radiator faster.

Well final decision was met. I went for EK AIO Basic 240. 

https://www.ekwb.com/shop/ek-aio-basic-240

 

Got a bit of discount on it, seems to be largely on par with Arctic Liquid Freezer II (Only available Arctic is 240) and this was cheaper for me( shipping and all the stuff). Plus warranty is longer on this one and I can go and throw it at EK if it brakes down since they are local to me (probably also the reason why shipping was so much cheaper ).

I also like the look and let's say I feel good for buying something local.

 

So at @Chrismike, I will report back to how thermals look. If you have any benchmarks feel free to recommend them here. It will take a bit of time though, waiting for CPU and RAM and this is also saying it is coming only at 15th February. Seems like they don't have much stock, 40 km shouldn't take too long to travel 

 

[Chrismike]

Nice! i'm really considering an AIO as well... seems easier to clean. so far with extreme time spy, gpu maintains a 72c temp. did my stress test after 2 hours of gaming. stress test made 3 times with 20 loops each. it really maintains 72c. makes a quick 73c but maintains 72c.

 

as for the cpu, i have a 5600x.... so i won't bother.

[1982 Original]

On 1/26/2021 at 4:16 PM, jaslion said:

The dark rock is better than the ml240r.

 

Don't get that case either way it has terrible airflow get something with a mesh front that will matter a lot more than the cooler as then your hardware can actually get some fresh air instead of being chocked and running toasty (and thus louder). Putting a aio in the h510 only makes it far worse for the gpu.

 

21 hours ago, Sport Driver said:

So basically the only thing all of you guys agree on in the fact I f.ed up buying that case  

I was reading/watching more videos those 2 days about how cooling in this case works since it really is "interesting". 

So to sum up: 

AIR cooler:

+ reliability

+ cooler GPU

- worse CPU cooling performance (Can't fit Dark Rock Pro 4 with Vengance RGB in that case)

- worse looks (subjective) 

AIO:

+ Better CPU temps

+ Looks better

- Hotter GPU temps

- potential reliability problems

 

So I basically have to check now how hot do RTX 3070s get 
 

I own the H510 with a Ryzen 3700x, rtx3080, and have no cooling issues at all. 
 

Warzone, Cyberpunk 2077, gpu hovers around 65C and the CPU around 55C. Loop Cinebench for 30 minutes, maybe 62C on the CPU. Very quiet too. 
 

 

 

Edited January 29, 2021 by 1982 Original

[Chrismike]

19 hours ago, 1982 Original said:

 

I own the H510 with a Ryzen 3700x, rtx3080, and have no cooling issues at all. 
 

Warzone, Cyberpunk 2077, gpu hovers around 65C and the CPU around 55C. Loop Cinebench for 30 minutes, maybe 62C on the CPU. Very quiet too. 
 

 

 

Nice!

[AngryBeaver]

On 1/26/2021 at 3:10 PM, Sport Driver said:

 

What would be better idea to go for, Be Quiet Dark Rock 4 on the side of air coolers or Cooler Master ML240R RGB on AIO side? It will be cooling 5800X. From Tier list ML240 is better but is it really? Also how is reliability of this CM stuff? Pride delta is 10€. Case will be NZXT H510 if that makes any difference. 

 

So let me finally respond to this. The case you picked isn't know for having great air flow. So do you have any fans in the front of the case? If so hopefully they are optimized for static pressure.

When it comes to coolers the ML240r isn't the worst AIO, but it isn't a great one either. It will be about on par with the dark rock. Now if you do not currently have good static pressure fans in the front then you should get some. The fans on the ML240r are probably decent and if you were to get another 2 fans and run a push/pull setup you could potentially get better case temps all around (No enough space in your case nvm). Also since it is push pull you can run lower rpms making the setup a little more quiet.

The most important thing no matter which cooler you choose is going to be getting enough air moving through the case.

[freeagent]

Don't forget, not all air coolers are good. Just like not all CLC are good. Air cooling done right can be quite potent, but moving air is louder than moving water. CLC done right can be pretty good too, but there are concessions to be made when running either choice. Either way, you still need to move air, and you still have to pump water, so there is going to be noise.. Someone might say this budget cooler X is awesome because it was 10c better than their stock cooler and they don't really know any better, same goes for CLC. Reviews should always be takin with a grain of salt because your results might be better then the reviewers, or it might not be. 

[Chrismike]

On 1/29/2021 at 5:37 PM, Sport Driver said:

Well final decision was met. I went for EK AIO Basic 240. 

https://www.ekwb.com/shop/ek-aio-basic-240

 

Got a bit of discount on it, seems to be largely on par with Arctic Liquid Freezer II (Only available Arctic is 240) and this was cheaper for me( shipping and all the stuff). Plus warranty is longer on this one and I can go and throw it at EK if it brakes down since they are local to me (probably also the reason why shipping was so much cheaper ).

I also like the look and let's say I feel good for buying something local.

 

So at @Chrismike, I will report back to how thermals look. If you have any benchmarks feel free to recommend them here. It will take a bit of time though, waiting for CPU and RAM and this is also saying it is coming only at 15th February. Seems like they don't have much stock, 40 km shouldn't take too long to travel 

 

Any update with the ek?

[Sport Driver]

13 hours ago, Chrismike said:

Any update with the ek?

You are bang on the money writing that yesterday. I was busy with exams and stuff up to this weekend so it was on hold but yesterday my friend helped me get it together. After some voes, like PC not shutting down, were sorted by latest BIOS I have those CB R23 scores to provide.

First one was after 2 single core runs, second one was after 10 minutes(11 runs) of Multi core test. Nothing is changed from stock appart from XMP enabled in BIOS. 

 

[Chrismike]

:)) nice nice! you forgot to put in some info about the gpu though. maybe you could try time spy extreme strress test if you have it?

 

ANYWAY good that you went for the liquid cooling. UPDATE on my end.

 

As it turns out.... the dark rock pro is causing the my gpu to heat up. it's the one that's blocking the airflow if you have front in take fans. funny thing is... i bought a meshify c the other day, only to find out that i'm getting the same temp as my h510 (do note that i jerry rigged my h510 to have an intake fan beside the PSU, and have another fan below the gpu). so Same temp. i finally removed my dark rock pro and installed the stock wraith cooler. using my meshify c case now, with front intakes, bottom intakes, top exhaust and rear exhaust, and my gpu went down to 72-73c. all fans installed are below par though, the nzxt stock fans. i only have one good fan installed, and it's at the bottom... an arctic(though i doubt it helps even a bit.  but this was my fan setup at the h510 and i wanted to replicate it(minus the fan below the gpu). so...to be clear... 

 

h510 fans all over the place including a fan below the gpu....i forgot to take a picture of it. but anyway the fan below the gpu was slanted as to force airflow over the gpu and over the aircooler towards the exhaust. anyway it looked ridiculous (total of 6 fans) = 74c

 

meshify c - same config as h510 + additional intake top fan = 74c

 

meshify c - top 2 120mm exhaust, rear 120 exhaust. front 2 140mm intake. bottom beside the psu 120mm intake....minus the fan below the gpu and minus the dark rock = 72c with the 1 arctic installed in the lower front part, temp's at 70c.

 

this was done earlier today. so....i bought an aio myself. a 240 aorus liquid cooler.

 

point of my long post is.... h510's airflow isn't that bad after all... as long as you're able to understand what disrupt its airflow. i think the h510 has the kraken in mind when they went ahead with its design. as per my experience, a tall air cooler provides very good thermals for the cpu, but compromises airflow for the GPU.

 

i really think a 120mm aio installed at the rear or at the top would even give the GPU in an h510 even better temps. --- i mean if you're not overclocking or a cpu with low TDP, obviously not for a 5800x

Edited February 14, 2021 by Chrismike
just had to change my closing remark :P