Does anyone else dislike water cooling and overclocking?

[emosun]

I've been consulting/building machines ever since 2005 and I don't think there was ever a time when I thought water cooling or overclocking was a good idea or worth it.

Now if you do overclock and water cool , then good for you more power to ya. But it's not my cup of tea nor do I ever recommend it to others.

Just curious if anyone else is sort of in this same boat.

Extra tldr fluff you can skip :

I usually don't recommend it as the cost doesn't seem quite worth the hassle of dealing with/maintaining a water cooling system. Nor do the gains from overclocking seem worth the small risk that the components may have a shorter lifespan or fail. The time frame of how much computer parts progress seems to outpace the advantages of overclocking to me. The biggest time to see this type of progression was when people ran water blocks on their overclocked pentium 4's and 6800gt's only for a few years later to be 6 times slower than more efficient machines running at stock speeds on air cooling. I only just recently came across an old geforce 7950 which had an old water block on it and it made me laugh to think someone would water cool a card like this. I feel as though rather then spend 100$ on water cooling a slower component , maybe save it and wait till you have 200$ and get a component that already reaches the speed you would have overclocked to but can do it on air.

[LienusLateTips]

AIOs

 

[Max_Settings]

Well old water cooling from 2005 and today are totally different. So if you are basing your opinion off of 10 years ago I don't find that valid.

[vanished]

Full disclosure, I've never used water cooling, but I don't like the idea of it either.  And the idea of getting more performance out of parts is great but (and I know some will definitely disagree) if I could hit a button and get a perfect overclock, I would definitely take that over doing it manually any day.

[Max_Settings]

7 minutes ago, emosun said:

I feel as though rather then spend 100$ on water cooling a slower component , maybe save it and wait till you have 200$ and get a component that already reaches the speed you would have overclocked to but can do it on air.

Or you could get the $200 component you want then water cool it and overclock to above the speeds you want

[emosun]

Just now, Max_Settings said:

So if you are basing your opinion off of 10 years ago I don't find that valid.

It was just an example

I suppose a modern example would be watercooling/overclocking maybe a socket 1366 cpu. While it is doable , there do exist much quicker and less power hungry stock air cooled cpu's. Most wouldn't recommend water cooling a 1366 system today of course.

So as such , I wouldn't recommend it for a new system either. Because sure enough there will be a cpu platform that will exceed it's speed and efficiency with no overclocking on air. So might as well save some money for  better future components than trying to push an older one nearer to the newer component. 

[Max_Settings]

8 hours ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

Full disclosure, I've never used water cooling, but I don't like the idea of it either.  And the idea of getting more performance out of parts is great but (and I know some will definitely disagree) if I could hit a button and get a perfect overclock, I would definitely take that over doing it manually any day.

It's honestly not that hard. For GPUs it takes a while, but CPUs is super easy. If you are running a basic Intel system just set the voltage to 1.3V and crank up the multiplier 100mhz at a time, then run Cinnebench and a few other things till it crashes, then just go back to the last successful speed and you are done. Easy and doesn't take more than an hour unless you want to do extensive stress testing.

 

8 hours ago, emosun said:

It was just an example

I suppose a modern example would be watercooling/overclocking maybe a socket 1366 cpu. While it is doable , there do exist much quicker and less power hungry stock air cooled cpu's. Most wouldn't recommend water cooling a 1366 system today of course.

So as such , I wouldn't recommend it for a new system either. Because sure enough there will be a cpu platform that will exceed it's speed and efficiency with no overclocking on air. So might as well save some money for  better future components than trying to push an older one nearer to the newer component. 

But let's say you had an 8700K, it doesn't get any faster. So why not water cool it and overclock it? And the cooler isn't a waste, when the new one comes out the cooler still works and can be reused.

[PETRGangKing]

It kind of depends on what the use case is, what hardware he is using and how experienced the user is with water loops. Some hardware benefits from overclocking much more than others, and to someone experienced with loops it's not much hassle to assemble or maintain one.

 

An i3-8350k being used solely for gaming is an example of when you see a considerable increase in performance by overclocking. 

 

Whether or not it's worth it on a cost basis is a different story. Unless you're using an AIO , the cost increase of the cooling system usually doesn't require to the same increase in performance. For example, I've got somewhere between $700-$1000 in my water loop, and I get an extra 0.2 GHz of clock speed. Realistically, in this instance, I don't see any considerable performance increase from this clock speed increase. 

 

To the comment about evolving tech outpacing overclocking, this is probably true for most of the last ten years, but the last few years we have seen very little increase in performance from Sandy bridge to kaby lake. I expect things will begin to rapidly improve again now that there is competition between CPU manufacturers again.

[SteveGrabowski0]

Overclocking your cpu is pretty important if you use emulators like Cemu or if you're trying to push more than 100 fps in AAA games. And AIO are super easy to install. Additionally gpu overclocking is almost always worth it in AAA gaming. Putting an extra 50 MHz on the core and an extra 200 MHz on the memory on my GTX 970 made a huge difference in the stability of the framerate at a VSync'ed 60 fps in The Witcher 3 with HBAO+ turned on (and HBAO+ looks amazing in that game). If I turn off the OC then the HBAO+ has to go too for me. Furthermore memory OC has made some big differences in games for me when it comes to minimum framerates. Going drom DDR3-1600 to DDR3-2400 upped my minimums in GTA V and Fallout 4 by 10-15%.

[dizmo]

I feel ya. I haven't overclocked any of my PCs manually, but I always buy the K SKU. I also haven't had a water cooling loop much for the reasons you listed. I love the look, but I can't be bothered to maintain it, and as a result I'll stick to AIOs or big old air coolers. I don't mind overclocking though, with a simple software button push. It won't kill the CPU in 3 years, the typical time I'll keep it, so it doesn't affect me at all

 

5 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

Full disclosure, I've never used water cooling, but I don't like the idea of it either.  And the idea of getting more performance out of parts is great but (and I know some will definitely disagree) if I could hit a button and get a perfect overclock, I would definitely take that over doing it manually any day.

Have you ever used the software overclocking? I remember the board I had with my 2700K just had software with three "buttons" that adjusted the OC accordingly. It was so simple, I loved it.

[vanished]

Just now, dizmo said:

Have you ever used the software overclocking? I remember the board I had with my 2700K just had software with three "buttons" that adjusted the OC accordingly. It was so simple, I loved it.

I have played a bit with various auto tools like the ASUS auto overclocking on the motherboard but I've found them to be totally useless

[PETRGangKing]

I think where you see the biggest gains from water cooling is with GPUs, as it eliminates any thermal throttling, allowing for a consistently higher average framerate, even if the max framerate stays the same.

[TheCherryKing]

I don't do any overclocking because I can't.

[PlayStation 2]

Don't care for water cooling, don't really have the patience for overclocking.

[SteveGrabowski0]

10 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

Full disclosure, I've never used water cooling, but I don't like the idea of it either.  And the idea of getting more performance out of parts is great but (and I know some will definitely disagree) if I could hit a button and get a perfect overclock, I would definitely take that over doing it manually any day.

Overclocking is a pain in the ass, but I usually try to be pretty conservative with it. Eg keep bumping clock and voltage up until I need a decent bump in voltage to inch the clock up. Then I back to the highest clock I could get before the big nonlinear jump in voltage.

[emosun]

3 minutes ago, Max_Settings said:

But let's say you had an 8700K, it doesn't get any faster. So why not water cool it and overclock it? And the cooler isn't a waste, when the new one comes out the cooler still works and can be reused.

Air to me is more reliable and cheaper , not to mention the speed gain to me isn't worth it. 

honestly if i could run a vw engine in my car and eliminate the radiator I would do it just to simplify the engine more.

[Max_Settings]

Just now, emosun said:

Air to me is more reliable and cheaper , not to mention the speed gain to me isn't worth it. 

honestly if i could run a vw engine in my car and eliminate the radiator I would do it just to simplify the engine more.

It can be cheaper. Unless you go high end with like a Dark Rock 3, or something high end that can push close to the $100 range, then it costs more or less the same. And people take water because it looks better and it not as massively big and heavy for basically the same performance.

[Cyracus]

4 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

I have played a bit with various auto tools like the ASUS auto overclocking on the motherboard but I've found them to be totally useless

well, not totally, they just throw a crap ton of voltage and meager OC to what you can get by doing it manually

As for water cooling a properly designed loop includes a means to drain and refill it so maintenance isn't a problem unless you don't know how to research the basics... I don't like AIOs though, you can get similar or better performance from cheaper air coolers more often than not

[PETRGangKing]

3 minutes ago, Cyracus said:

 

As for water cooling a properly designed loop includes a means to drain and refill it 

This. Everyone i see some one build their first loop and omit a draining mechanism, all I can think is "you're making this so much harder than it needs to be." Unfortunately none of the beginner water cooling kits ever include the parts to make a drain port.

[Daniel Z.]

24 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

Full disclosure, I've never used water cooling, but I don't like the idea of it either.  And the idea of getting more performance out of parts is great but (and I know some will definitely disagree) if I could hit a button and get a perfect overclock, I would definitely take that over doing it manually any day.

 

32 minutes ago, emosun said:

I've been consulting/building machines ever since 2005 and I don't think there was ever a time when I thought water cooling or overclocking was a good idea or worth it.

Now if you do overclock and water cool , then good for you more power to ya. But it's not my cup of tea nor do I ever recommend it to others.

Just curious if anyone else is sort of in this same boat.

Extra tldr fluff you can skip :

I usually don't recommend it as the cost doesn't seem quite worth the hassle of dealing with/maintaining a water cooling system. Nor do the gains from overclocking seem worth the small risk that the components may have a shorter lifespan or fail. The time frame of how much computer parts progress seems to outpace the advantages of overclocking to me. The biggest time to see this type of progression was when people ran water blocks on their overclocked pentium 4's and 6800gt's only for a few years later to be 6 times slower than more efficient machines running at stock speeds on air cooling. I only just recently came across an old geforce 7950 which had an old water block on it and it made me laugh to think someone would water cool a card like this. I feel as though rather then spend 100$ on water cooling a slower component , maybe save it and wait till you have 200$ and get a component that already reaches the speed you would have overclocked to but can do it on air.

I want to watercool as a project. My PC isn't even very good. My point is that in practice, AIOs or good air coolers are cheaper for CPUs. Most people that watercool do it for the fun of it. There are many cheaper, slightly worse alternatives to watercooling

[RollTime]

I'd say AIOs have the advantage of being quieter.

There's an LTT vid on this:

 

 

[Cyracus]

6 minutes ago, PETRGangKing said:

This. Everyone i see some one build their first loop and omit a draining mechanism, all I can think is "you're making this so much harder than it needs to be." Unfortunately none of the beginner water cooling kits ever include the parts to make a drain port.

what bothers me is EK's fluid kit has no easy means to make a drain port.... but you could get a pair of quick disconnects to do the job...

Just now, RollTime said:

I'd say AIOs have the advantage of being quieter.

Not always, they can be quieter, especially if you put good fans on them since many AIOs cut costs by neglecting the fans

[sazrocks]

41 minutes ago, emosun said:

I usually don't recommend it as the cost doesn't seem quite worth the hassle of dealing with/maintaining a water cooling system.

Only really applicable to custom water cooling, and even then its users often say is definitely not the best bang for your buck cooling system. AIOs don't really have any maintenance.

41 minutes ago, emosun said:

Nor do the gains from overclocking seem worth the small risk that the components may have a shorter lifespan or fail. 

If I can gain 10+ FPS on a competitive game, then heck yeah I'm going to overclock. 10+FPS can seriously give me a competitive edge and is noticeably smoother. As for risk, it is minimal/almost nonexistent except for absolute trash components, as long as you use common sense.

41 minutes ago, emosun said:

The time frame of how much computer parts progress seems to outpace the advantages of overclocking to me. The biggest time to see this type of progression was when people ran water blocks on their overclocked pentium 4's and 6800gt's only for a few years later to be 6 times slower than more efficient machines running at stock speeds on air cooling. 

I don't really understand this argument. To me it seems to be saying, "Why get a free bump in performance in your current system when you can just pay for an entirely new system?", which makes no sense. Maybe you do, but I sure don't have the money to upgrade every time a new generation of CPUs comes out, so I'll choose free extra performance. Second, this argument was basically irrelevant until a few months as basically every cpu from the 2700k to the 7700k was basically a very small increase in IPC and/or clocks; for example the 7700k is essentially an overclocked 6700k witht the same IPC, and I can easily surpass a stock 7700k with my overclocked 6700k.

 

41 minutes ago, emosun said:

 I only just recently came across an old geforce 7950 which had an old water block on it and it made me laugh to think someone would water cool a card like this.

Argument doesn't make sense. What would you have that person do, jump into the future and grab a 1080ti? They needed extra performance, so they did what they could to get it. 

41 minutes ago, emosun said:

I feel as though rather then spend 100$ on water cooling a slower component , maybe save it and wait till you have 200$ and get a component that already reaches the speed you would have overclocked to but can do it on air.

1. Overclocking certainly doesn't have to cost a $100 water cooler. Heck you can overclock on the stock box coolers that come with Ryzen CPUs. 

2. Or I can buy a cooler now that will support my CPU and probably every CPU within reason for the next 10 years. Noctua is an awesome company that will send you free brackets for new sockets for basically any of their coolers. Other companies also do this, but I can't list them off the top of my head.

 

 

[RollTime]

9 minutes ago, Cyracus said:

what bothers me is EK's fluid kit has no easy means to make a drain port.... but you could get a pair of quick disconnects to do the job...

Not always, they can be quieter, especially if you put good fans on them since many AIOs cut costs by neglecting the fans

So put a good fan in an AIO. 

 

Size advantage is also a factor- AIOs leave a lot more room in your build.

[emosun]

5 minutes ago, sazrocks said:

"Why get a free bump in performance in your current system when you can just pay for an entirely new system?"

so pentium 4 and 6800 gt water blocks were free then?

6 minutes ago, sazrocks said:

What would you have that person do, jump into the future and grab a 1080ti?

Id have them wait a few months an get an 8800. No sense in overclocking a dx9 gpu when dx10 was replacing it. 

9 minutes ago, sazrocks said:

If I can gain 10+ FPS on a competitive game, then heck yeah I'm going to overclock.

or just turn off AA but whatever floats your boat