Why aren't AIO gpu coolers more common?

[light-v]

I know historically aftermarket GPU cooling never was that big. I think this is mostly due air cooling being pretty good already and the added complexity wasn't worth it. If you wanted to upgrade from air you'd go custom loop but that's much more expensive and hard to do. 

 

With AIOs, the waterblock is small compared to air coolers so mounting shouldn't be as challenging and much cheaper and easier than a custom loop.

 

Mounting brackets like the Kraken G12 are still very niche which is a shame because I think gpus can benefit a lot from AIOs I mean who doesn't want lower fan speeds on the GPU when gaming without spending a fortune? 

 

Is this just lack of awareness or am I missing something? 

[Chris Pratt]

Frankly, I think it's just market driven. The subgroup of people that actually desire to water cool their GPU is an enthusiast group that is also doing custom water cooling.

 

Also, there's the issue of not really being able to have two AIOs, given most case layouts. I mean you could choose to air cool your CPU and water cool your GPU, I guess, though that's just weird. Once, you're water cooling both, though, a custom loop makes the most sense.

[emosun]

3 minutes ago, light-v said:

I think this is mostly due air cooling being pretty good already

answered it pretty good there

[dogwitch]

here in the usa... market really limited due to  Asetek

[light-v]

4 minutes ago, Chris Pratt said:

Also, there's the issue of not really being able to have two AIOs, given most case layouts. I mean you could choose to air cool your CPU and water cool your GPU, I guess, though that's just weird. Once, you're water cooling both, though, a custom loop makes the most sense.

To be fair if I were to choose I'd rather watercool the GPU which is typically noisier and hotter than the CPU when gaming

3 minutes ago, emosun said:

answered it pretty good there

Same applies to CPUs yet AIO liquid cooling is very popular

[SupaKomputa]

Well on CPU the install process is relatively easy.

While in GPU you need to dismantle the cooler which are more intimidating to do.

[Enderman]

GPUs already come with a cooler mounted so its only enthusiasts that are willing to void warranties to modify their card and put a liquid cooler on it.

 

Some GPUs come with an AIO preinstalled but that makes them more expensive, and for most cards an AIO is unnecessary because they don't overheat on air.

[Nayr438]

It's probably more due to the fact that Graphics Cards ship with a pre-attached cooler and CPU's don't.

Add to it the warranty Void stickers, which is debatable depending on location, then the variances in GPU Board and Cooler designs.

The universal GPU mounts for example only usually cover the GPU itself and forgets about the memory modules and vrm, something the customer would be left to deal with because of the varying boards. There is a a lot of room for error on the customers part and cooling manufacturers probably don't want to take any part in the responsibility for it.

 

Even if we custom made AIO's for very specific graphics cards, it would be a small market that would actually buy them. So they would probably be made in small batches increasing there cost. By the time everything was factored in it would probably make more sense to just go for a custom loop.

[MartinKweh]

I own one which was rather cheap but effective(i got an id cooling frost flow vga) but yea. Its rather hard to find. I mean, the closest one to a gpu aio i saw was the thing from nzxt which is an attachment to an existing cpu aio to be able to attach to certain gpu.

[emosun]

10 minutes ago, light-v said:

Same applies to CPUs yet AIO liquid cooling is very popular

A cpu can be installed in any number of configurations be it a full tower , mini itx , 1U server , ect....

Making a weird cooler that fits any AM4 socket while ignoring any mounting logistics is really easy.

Making a gpu that.... not many people need , not many people will buy , and has to work in every possible configuration the gpu might be placed in , not only for compatibility but also for the sake of trying to get more customers to buy it , would be very unprofitable and not useful to most people. That coupled with the fact that an air cooler is plenty enough and doesn't require a big radiator hanging off of it pumping water.

The real question is , why would someone need only a gpu AIO unless they are just mining..... oh..... I think i see why this was posted lol

[light-v]

Seems like this comes down to having to take the card apart and voiding warranties and manufacturers not willing to ship bare graphics cards 

 

@emosunI'm not sure how you jumped straight to mining but sure believe what you want. I asked out of genuine curiosity. I have a 1070 if that matters and have no interest in mining 

[da na]

It's cause they are pretty big as well as expensive, so it's not really practical and just better to have a water block. In an AIO the pump would have to go on the GPU and that would take up at least 3 pcie slots. NZXT does i believe have a kit to use their water cooler AIOs with GPUs?

[OCNewbee]

On 3/31/2021 at 4:24 AM, light-v said:

I know historically aftermarket GPU cooling never was that big. I think this is mostly due air cooling being pretty good already and the added complexity wasn't worth it. If you wanted to upgrade from air you'd go custom loop but that's much more expensive and hard to do. 

 

With AIOs, the waterblock is small compared to air coolers so mounting shouldn't be as challenging and much cheaper and easier than a custom loop.

 

Mounting brackets like the Kraken G12 are still very niche which is a shame because I think gpus can benefit a lot from AIOs I mean who doesn't want lower fan speeds on the GPU when gaming without spending a fortune? 

 

Is this just lack of awareness or am I missing something? 

*Fact

1) air cooling already does the job well (look at the 3 slot GPUs, they already do the job very well)

2) AIOs sometimes leak and its a headache for manufacturers

3) AIOs have many points of failures

4) AIOs take up too much space and requires additional power

     a. some cases do not have enough room

In general, the extra price does not justify the marginal performance gain.

 

*My general opinion on the lack of GPU cooling aftermarket parts

GPU overclocking is much more finicky than CPU overclocking. It requires software like MSI afterburner or if you flash the bios wrong, you have a dead card.

Overclocked GPUs cause some random issues that are not easily detected by stability programs. For CPUs, we have prime95, OCCT and Linx. These are pretty good programs that catch instabilities well. There are many GPU stability programs but they are not as reliable as CPU stability programs. But most importantly, many people are not interested in overclocking GPUs due to lack of aftermarket parts which stem from 3rd party manufacturers using different PCB layouts and designs. For instance, a cooler that is compatible with Asus Strix 3080 will not necessarily be compatible with AORUS master 3080. There are simply far too many layouts.

 

*solution

If manufacturers standardized their GPU pcb layout, this would give incentive for manufactures to make more aftermarket coolers. I for one, would love to have a thick GPU heatsink and mount some 140mm noctua fans on there.

 

*reason why standardized PCBs will never happen

But 3rd party manufacturers would not do this because they are all competing with each other. Having a standardized layout would mean similar parts and similar performances. Big guys like Asus, gigabyte and MSI would never do this while small guys like gainward and zotac would be thrilled! I think smaller guys should get together and standardized their pcbs. This is the only way to beat giants like Asus, Gigabyte and MSI.   

 

 

[freeagent]

Guys with full loops top up every 6 months or so. How do you top up an AIO? Permeation is real, and I think people would have problems after a couple of years, especially if they are avid gamers.

[Mark Kaine]

2 hours ago, freeagent said:

Guys with full loops top up every 6 months or so. How do you top up an AIO? Permeation is real, and I think people would have problems after a couple of years, especially if they are avid gamers.

But AIOs are super popular for CPU cooling,  people don't even need them,  they mostly buy them for the RGB bling!

 

That's not to say they will be as good anymore after a few years,  doesn't affect their popularity however. 

 

I think for GPUs it's just too difficult,  removing the fans...backplates... vrm/vram cooling, etc.

 

Even Jayztwocents couldn't make it work without dremeling parts of his GPU off! Lol. . Not for the faint hearted for sure. `~°

[mikehoopes]

On 3/30/2021 at 12:24 PM, light-v said:

I know historically aftermarket GPU cooling never was that big. I think this is mostly due air cooling being pretty good already and the added complexity wasn't worth it. If you wanted to upgrade from air you'd go custom loop but that's much more expensive and hard to do. 

 

With AIOs, the waterblock is small compared to air coolers so mounting shouldn't be as challenging and much cheaper and easier than a custom loop.

 

Mounting brackets like the Kraken G12 are still very niche which is a shame because I think gpus can benefit a lot from AIOs I mean who doesn't want lower fan speeds on the GPU when gaming without spending a fortune? 

 

Is this just lack of awareness or am I missing something? 

It appears all of the replies ignored the OP's stated use case...lower fan speeds on the GPU. That means the OP wants a quieter configuration. There's this apparent market for quiet PCs that seems to be avoiding AIOs, even though fan speed is the major driver of PC noise.

 

I get that there's a warranty issue with the add-on thermal solutions, along with the perception of AIO reliability/maintenance overhead, card-mounting variations...the more I think about it, the more fringe it sounds. But it makes the most sense to me in terms of price/performance/low noise.

 

I did this with an ID-COOLING FROSTFLOW 120VGA and a used RX 5700 XT ref card in 2020. That was a pretty simple operation, no dremeling required. I haven't had any of the aforementioned issues with my AIOs; no problems or maintenance needed (yet). Now I'd like to upgrade the GPU in my Mini-ITX system, and am not seeing 120 mm solutions out there for newer GPUs. I'd need a different PC case to support anything available today (240 mm AIO or multi-fan air-cooled).

 

 

[freeagent]

14 hours ago, mikehoopes said:

It appears all of the replies ignored the OP's stated use case...lower fan speeds on the GPU. That means the OP wants a quieter configuration. There's this apparent market for quiet PCs that seems to be avoiding AIOs, even though fan speed is the major driver of PC noise.

AIOs have fans too.. and a pump.. how is that quieter?

 

Good job on the Necro, but only 2 years? You can do better.

[RevGAM]

On 2/5/2024 at 6:57 AM, freeagent said:

AIOs have fans too.. and a pump.. how is that quieter?

 

Good job on the Necro, but only 2 years? You can do better.

You beat me to the punch on this necromancer.

 

Wait a minute, I hear something outside the window... ZOMBIE!!!  

[AngryBeaver]

On 3/30/2021 at 2:24 PM, light-v said:

I know historically aftermarket GPU cooling never was that big. I think this is mostly due air cooling being pretty good already and the added complexity wasn't worth it. If you wanted to upgrade from air you'd go custom loop but that's much more expensive and hard to do. 

 

With AIOs, the waterblock is small compared to air coolers so mounting shouldn't be as challenging and much cheaper and easier than a custom loop.

 

Mounting brackets like the Kraken G12 are still very niche which is a shame because I think gpus can benefit a lot from AIOs I mean who doesn't want lower fan speeds on the GPU when gaming without spending a fortune? 

 

Is this just lack of awareness or am I missing something? 

I think they are a variety of reasons why they aren't more popular. 
 

• They require much more disassembly than say just putting it on a cpu
• The brackets out there don't work for all cards and for some cards they don't offer enough cooling for things like memory
• GPUs with AIO preinstalled are disproportionately priced. 
• GPUs have more orientations and positioning options which can complicate routing or placement in general
• Most people looking to put and AIO on a gpu probably is considering it for the CPU. You can build a budget custom loop for slightly more, but with higher gains.

 

It essentially comes down to being a very niche market. I think most people either are satisfied with air cooling and the ones that aren't probably lean towards a custom loop. There are a few reasons I can see someone using an AIO VS the other two options, but they are again niche use cases. I think that is why you just don't see a huge market for it.

Just to touch on one of your points "Custom loops are much more expensive and hard to do."

I would have to disagree. From what I have seen installing a AIO bracker on a GPU for example is more rigged feeling than something like a dedicated water block made for that card. The disassembly of the GPU is the hardest part of the loop.

If you are running dual AIO that is the equivalent of installing 2 radiators. You will need to install a pump which can easily mount to a radiator if needed or you can even buy blocks/radaitors with them build in. 

The biggest difference would be the tubing, but soft tubing is super simple to install and you can find fittings to suite the look or ease of use you are aiming for. Then you just fill it up. Leaks can happen, but are pretty darn rare even for first time loop builders provided they pay attention to what they are doing. Use distilled water and just power up the loop to fill and check for leaks... you aren't going to damage your hardware if a leak happens that way.

In the end you have 2 more things to worry with and they aren't hard by any means or even time consuming. If we look at cost it can go either way... you can go high end or budget just like anything else.

A decent AIO for GPU and CPU would be lets say 150 each. Then another 20-50 for the mount. So lets call it $350. You can buy cheap copper radiators online for 20-30 bucks. You can get the Corsair offerings for 50ish each for a 240 and 360 for 60 ish.  If we budgets for 2 of the 360s you are sitting at 120 for radiators, add some tubing for 25ish for 145 (this will include a coolant mix to use with distilled water) A cheap CPU block for 20-40 and a gpu block for 60-80 so lets call those 120 together. We are sitting at $265. Then toss on a cheap res/pump combo for 40 puts us at 305 which leaves you about 45 for fittings to be within an AIO build. Now if you want to go high end you can easily spend over a thousand on a custom loop and the above assumed you already had case fans to reuse, but you can toss in a couple 4 packs of artic p12s for about 25-30 a box.

Now