Well, I'm in the process of buidling a new comp...god my board and CPU but still getting other parts and what not. I was wondering weather to go with water cooling or air cooling.

My last PC only had 5 case fans but sounded like a vacume! It was annoying bacuse I kept having to turn up my game volume to hear it. I was using 4x80mm Blue LED fans and 1x120mm brushless sleve bering. And with my new stuff I'd like to go with water cooling but I'm still shunning from the whole water near my PC.

I've heard water cooling is awesome for cooling and cuts down a lot on the noise only thing is I don't want it to spring a leak while I'm playing a game and I suddenly loose everything I've invested so much time and money into. But I want preformance without the noise!

The real question I'm asking is should I go with water cooling? And how reliable is it? Along with some advantages and disadvanteges? Also what's a good water cooling sys to go for?

Anyway, thanks for the input.

Case: SuperMicro SC-750 Server Tower(Full)
High Temp engine paint is what I used to paint my case. =)
Interior Color: Ford Engine Red
Exterior Color: Low gloss Black

Water all the way! Its quiet and runs cooler than air, and when put together corectly it wont leak.

I would check out dangerden, or d-tek.

Water cooling: high performance, very quiet but... you have to take care of it... Its good for overclocking but if your not gonna overclock and your using this for more of a lan rig then i would go with a good air cooling setup, lotsa low rmp fans for low noise Little better for shipping around to your friends house. Thats my 1.5 cents after the exchange rate.

Cheap watercooling kits are far more expensive and less powerful then top of the line, or even middle of the line heatsinks.

You can get silent HSF's that perform like none other at next to no noise. Also, the risk of leaks and what not and the other maintenance isn't worth the hassle of just getting a rheobus or what not.

Check out BA's review of the Zalman something or another cooler. It's a beast, performs great, silent, and only like 35 bucks.

WORD that zalman is the SHIZZO. And it's pretty sweet looking. i agree with jcarkeys. you don't want to waste the money on a poopey water system. Something like an acquarius or something BLOWS. That zalman would cool circles around it. When your ready to do some OC then move over to liquid.

-decog

Well, I do pan on overclocking...eventually. And my last CPU cooler was a Zalman...It was good and reliable that little 62mm fan ran at 5000+ RPMs...It was nice but my CPU was still running at 110+ degrees F. My new sys runs at 100 or lower and I'm using the stock cooler and my case currently has almost no fans (P4 1.6GHz was on with Zalman my AMD XP 2800+ is still using stock cooling).

It's really kind of sad to see a 10 degree difference between the two. Though don't get me wrong I love Zalman, they are reliable and good quality.

I'm just looking for something that's quiet and will keep my CPU at 85 degrees F or even lower if possible. I was thinking about getting the Asetek WatefChill Rev2, it's got the looks and according to the PR review it's a good sys for the price.

The Zalman 7000 will not fit on his Abit NF7-S board.

Dreadnaught, Welcome to Pimprig...
With todays CPU's and the top end Air coolers I.E. Zallman, Thermalright, Swiftech, O/C's can be obtained within 100mhz. of the best watercoolers.
We see it all the time.
Granted the Temps are a bit higher, but well within the operating range established by the manufacturer.
You can get creative with the adaptors and ducts and use 120mm fanz on lower speeds to be relatively quiet. As well as having a reserve of cooling power when needed.

Water cooling in my opinion, Is best kept at a desktop, where you don't move around much and can effectivly monitor and maintain the system.
I belive by moving it around, as in a LAN rig, you probably increase the possibility of failure by at least double.

$50.00 plus a fan and rheobus of some kind, or $200+ for about 100mhz more and 10x the maintenance...your call..

If it were my LAN rig...I'd prolly go air, so I could concentrate on the gamming and not the coolant in my system

Hope that helps ya out...

Ahh, BA, I didn't notice he had an NF7-S. I'd reccommend the Vantec Aeroflow, it's another one BA did a review on. I have it as well, and like it alot.

Yeah, I really like that HS also. Matter of fact it's the one I'm using on my testbench right now.

Why not a SKL-900 with either a Zalman 92mm (38cfm @ 20 dbA) or with an Enermax 120mm modded to fit over with a funnel to increase the air? they run at 65cfm @ 24 dbA....

Ooo, I like that 38cfm and 20dbA...Might even go with that 120mm fan on there. I'll probably try both.

Only question is how good is it for overclocking? I plan on doing that later on. Also what kind temps can I expect from something like that?

There are guys who have 2100's clocked to 2.4ghz and with a thermalright 900 series HSF and a 120mm fan, are getting 30C CPU temp with a 21C ambient while F@H...Air ain't so bad 'eh?

Well, cool stuff then. I've been reading around on the SLK-900 and it's good little piece of hardware. I'm going to go with that merely becuse it'll be a heck of a lot cheaper than water cooling and will give me the desired temps with very little noise.

Thanks for all the help!

Don't forget, there are many things you can do to quiet air cooled rigs, sound absorption material, PanFlo fans (Low Noise) Check out the Zalmann Homepage, good ideas there.
A set of rubber feet on the bottom, or a isolation stand helps too.

NP dood..
I see you're from Lompoc... cool
We used to hit Hwy 1 to san Luis obispo,Down from Monterey/Carmel area... got some Bros that played football for Cal Poly...We'd hit Pismo Beach with the sand rails, do a little Clammin'
Lompoc...right past Santa Maria right?
Glad to help ya, good luck with those temps....Make sure ya got good flow through the case..it all helps.
If ya need a hook-up for a 120mm x 38mm Delta 130cfm fan PM me I got a guy who has them for only 4.50 ea. I've bought 6 of them so far..great deal

Ya Lompoc is really close to SM. I may head there to grab a custom plexiglass window for my huge case.

Well, I've acctually had a spit of time to look into silencing stuff and I was looking at those rubber fan silencers...They don't look like they'd do to much.

Also Zennzzo be expecting a PM from me soon...I'll definately want to nab one of those fans.