Is watercooling worth it for non OC?

[Hi P]

I've been using a Dark Rock Pro 4 along my old Ryzen 2600 since 2019. But I will upgrade my components for the Ryzen 7000 series.

 

Would my current cooler be enough or should I keep an eye on AIOs? I don't plan to OC.

[Oshino Shinobu]

The DRP4 performs on par or better than most 240mm AIOs. If you're not overclocking and not using a SFF case (obviously not as you've got a DRP4), there's no point in switching to an AIO.

[PDifolco]

Depends on what you'll get, your Dark Rock will do ok for a 7600X, maybe 7700X, but 7900X and above could be too hot for it, anyway that's just guessing, to really say wait for reviews !

[Fasauceome]

The dark rock pro 4 is already really overkill for a Ryzen 5 2600. Is precison boost overdrive enabled in your BIOS? You have a lot of thermal headroom 

[PeachyUwUSenpai]

water cooling is never worth it at least for cooling a nhd15 kicks the socks off of any AIO and doesn't have pump failures that happen silently.
only point of water cooling aio or custom is Aesthetics and the very rare clearance issue if you trying to do SFF and need to move the rad somewhere other then above the cpu.

[Sjaakie]

Should be no problem. DRP4 can manage a 5950x.

[Hi P]

7 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

The dark rock pro 4 is already really overkill for a Ryzen 5 2600. Is precison boost overdrive enabled in your BIOS? You have a lot of thermal headroom 

Haven't ever heard about Precison Boost Overdrive, Is that MOBO dependant? I have a Gigabyte B450 Aorus Pro WiFi

[Fasauceome]

3 minutes ago, Hi P said:

Haven't ever heard about Precison Boost Overdrive, Is that MOBO dependant? I have a Gigabyte B450 Aorus Pro WiFi

Where in the BIOS you can find it will be dependent on the manufacturer but it should be on every B450 and up mobo. I don't remember where to find it on that particular model, and sometimes it goes by a different name

[Vishera]

16 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

Is precison boost overdrive enabled in your BIOS?

The Ryzen 5 2600 doesn't support that:

[Hi P]

2 minutes ago, Vishera said:

The Ryzen 5 2600 doesn't support that:

That's kinda good news, I would've gotten mad for never enabling it hehe

[LIGISTX]

Water cooling is never worth it. My custom loop cost about 700 bucks, I easily have 150-200 just in fittings….

 

But the “reason it’s worth it” is because of noise. If you want low noise, it’s the best option. Is it “worth it”…. No. Is it fun and provide a little more thought and planning and tinkering on top of a standard build… yes. If noice and “tinkering” are what your after, it’s suddenly “worth it”. Plus the rads, pump and res can be carried forward basically forever. 

[Fasauceome]

10 minutes ago, Vishera said:

The Ryzen 5 2600 doesn't support that:

Strange I thought they retro'd that because I could've sworn I got PBO enabled for my roommate's 2600. But perhaps I'm just misremembering.

[PDifolco]

29 minutes ago, LIGISTX said:

Water cooling is never worth it. My custom loop cost about 700 bucks, I easily have 150-200 just in fittings….

 

But the “reason it’s worth it” is because of noise. If you want low noise, it’s the best option. Is it “worth it”…. No. Is it fun and provide a little more thought and planning and tinkering on top of a standard build… yes. If noice and “tinkering” are what your after, it’s suddenly “worth it”. Plus the rads, pump and res can be carried forward basically forever. 

Custom loop isn't "worth" its cost, but an AIO can be, on a super hot chip like a 12900K for example there isn't much choice, and AIOs are in the $80-$200 range (to $10-$130 for aircoolers..), not even half of a custom loop price

Back to OP cooler BQ DarkRock4 it's good, not sure it is enough for a 170W+ 7900/7950, let's see reviews...

[PeachyUwUSenpai]

3 hours ago, PDifolco said:

Custom loop isn't "worth" its cost, but an AIO can be, on a super hot chip like a 12900K for example there isn't much choice, and AIOs are in the $80-$200 range (to $10-$130 for aircoolers..), not even half of a custom loop price

Back to OP cooler BQ DarkRock4 it's good, not sure it is enough for a 170W+ 7900/7950, let's see reviews...

No aios are never worth it cost wise especially on super hot chips air is way better so the chip doesn't randomly cook it self when the pump fails and just generally has better performance they also last 5x the time or longer

[PDifolco]

6 hours ago, Alaradia said:

No aios are never worth it cost wise especially on super hot chips air is way better so the chip doesn't randomly cook it self when the pump fails and just generally has better performance they also last 5x the time or longer

Sure there's more points of failure in an AIO, but physics say water cools better than air.

 

[PeachyUwUSenpai]

On 9/5/2022 at 4:47 AM, PDifolco said:

Sure there's more points of failure in an AIO, but physics say water cools better than air.

 

I think people tend to forget water coolers are still air coolers..... and waters just a medium for transporting the heat to a air cooler. so actually the thing to compare is water vs Heatpipes which beat water. also most aios aren't using pure water they tend to use a mix of fluids for better stability but tend to be worse then water.also in the end this has been tested many times aios are a joke. pretty yet inefficient 

[PDifolco]

43 minutes ago, Alaradia said:

I think people tend to forget water coolers are still air coolers..... and waters just a medium for transporting the heat to a air cooler. so actually the thing to compare is water vs Heatpipes which beat water. also most aios aren't using pure water they tend to use a mix of fluids for better stability but tend to be worse then water.also in the end this has been tested many times aios are a joke. pretty yet inefficient 

Dunno where you imagined all this but irl a good 360mm AIO beats all and any aircooler, not even talking about custom loops with powerful pump and several rads...

[PeachyUwUSenpai]

9 minutes ago, PDifolco said:

Dunno where you imagined all this but irl a good 360mm AIO beats all and any aircooler, not even talking about custom loops with powerful pump and several rads...

custom loops aren't even in this conversation since worth it includes the cost and while Custom loops can beat aircoolers your selling kidney if not a liver(and custom loops aren't really for cooling their for aesthetics since for the same price you could do phase change which beats it). not sure you defention of a good 360mm aio but due to design issues in aios ussualy 360mm ones hardly even beat 240mm rads also your looking at 2x to 3x the cost of a top end aircooling for the same or worse cooling results so again not worth it.
if your actually interested in learning linus did a good video i think hes actually done several though this one is using midrange aircoolers not even the top end aka nhd15 and beat them.