at what point of a budget would a custom water loop make sense?

[adarw]

this is a curiosity question, at what point of a budget should you do custom water cooling? 

[Oshino Shinobu]

From a performance standpoint, it never really makes sense. It's only worth it if you're doing it for the enjoyment and the looks, it's not practical when there's cheaper options that offer the same performance without the work involved 

 

If you're happy with the performance of a build and you want to watercool it as you like the process and want to make it look good, then it's really up to you. If we're talking purely for performance, unless you're using the absolute best hardware available, it's always a better option to upgrade components than watercool them to try to overclock. 

[RONOTHAN##]

You should only consider it when getting a higher tier component costs more than the water loop. Basically, that means that 12900k/5900X/5950X/Threadripper for your CPU, and 3080/3080Ti/3090/RX 6800XT/RX 6900XT for GPU. If you have those components, you then need to decide if you are willing to deal with the headaches involved with it, since it can be a headache. That said, if you want the ultimate in silence/aesthetics/cooling outside exotic/bragging rights and you don't mind having to do maintenance on your system every ~6 months, then it's for you. 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

only consider it if you want silence and/or overclocking cause silence alone only needs a beefy aio like a liquid freezer 360 and shove it onto your cpu and prob ziptie to your gpu but deshrouding exists so dont bother unless your gpu cooler is trash, personally ill do custom loop but thats because i like ocing the sht out of my hardware, and also because i can just attatch a bucket of water to it for ultrabudget custom water cooling

 

another reason to do custom loop is sff, tho thats usually for ppl that want silence or god forbid overclocking on an itx system

[thrasher_565]

well most things you do with a build is mostly not needed and is for looks.  so budget wise spending moeny on say a case is not needed. you get free cooling with out a case...so...

 

adding extra cooling the cost will most like be more then just upgrading cpu/gpu. of cores there are cheap mods like the zip tie gpu fan mod.

[fonzz1e]

if you have the extra time & money, go ahead

 

it depends on what case, cpu & gpu yer using, lower budget ones don't generate much heat so air cooled is fine

 

my ambient temp is quite high (31c to 35c) ,my gtx1070 & rtx3070 gets way better temp on watercooling 

[alphatessi]

Most of the time, Watercooling is not logical. Good Aircooling is way cheaper, performs maybe slightly less while not silent.

For me, i see watercooling as a challenge. its like lego: expensive fun to build but not very practical 

[Stahlmann]

Water cooling has no point where it financially makes sense or is really needed. Even the highest end consumer components can easily be cooled with conventional air cooling.

 

I myself did it solely because of noise. I never got my PC as quiet as i wanted it to be, even with the best possible coolers/fans. But now it's inaudible no matter what load or ambient temperature. The only way i know it's on is by looking at the lighting.