Going back to air cooling

lizard

lizard

lizard

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Hi

My system is - "Ultima H²OC Trident" 280 Intel Core 2 Quad Xeon X3350 2.66GHz @ 3.50GHz+ Quad Core WaterCooled DDR2 System

I've had it for a while now, in the winter its fine, but when the weather gets warmer it starts to shutdown when playing games. I think the watercooling just isn't efficient enough, and the radiator fan is blowing in from what is usually the back vent in my cosmos rc1000 case, ruining the airflow.

If I take the side off and blow a big fan into the case, then its ok.
But this is kind of annoying, so my question is this:-

Would I be able to use a big heatsink like a Prolimatech Megahalems with 2 fans to cool the processors and still be able to overclock a Xeon X3350 2.66 to 3.40Ghz
I could buy more powerful case fans.
I would also be freeing up the back vent
 
Get your case fan's working for you, not against you. Make the cables so they are tucked away, as they can trap hot air. You (In most cases) want to have air drawing in from the front of the case, or bottom aswell, and hot air drawing out of the back. If your rad was a pre-made setup then you'd think the fan's were fine for that, but you never know. See if you can have them drawing out of your case, google this?
 
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Yes i agree with SpAceD, also get better fans, if 120mm get Apahe's, it just a case of improving your air flow in your case and if you can better fan on your rad.
 
Lizard, going back to air because your system is unstable seems counter-intuitive. Water-cooling is better than air if done properly and I fail to see how it can make sense to do what you're suggesting. if your temps are too high, have you looked into what might be responsbile?

Dust clogging your radiator (get some compressed air in a can and blow it out)
Radiator too small (how big is it and what brand? radiators aren't expensive compared to going to high-end heatsinks)
Fans too weak (get some 38mm thick Yate Loonds or Panasonics)
Flow-rate too low (check for kinking, get a better pump)
 
agreed withthe guy above! Even the cheaptest watercooler set up is better than the best Air heatsink. Its just a case of finding what ur problem is. :( dont go doing anything drastic
 
adamknox said:
agreed withthe guy above! Even the cheaptest watercooler set up is better than the best Air heatsink. Its just a case of finding what ur problem is. :( dont go doing anything drastic
Click to expand...

Why do so many reviews put the corsair h50 well below similar or even lower priced air coolers ?
 
Thanks for the replies

I think the first thing I'm going to try is replacing the fans in the case.
I've read that the coolermaster cosmos has airflow problems.

Which ones would be the best ?

How about the Scythe Ultra Kaze 2000RPM 120mm Case Fan
 
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paulselhi said:
Why do so many reviews put the corsair h50 well below similar or even lower priced air coolers ?
Click to expand...
Because people who say it's just fine are lying.

They buy it, install it, check the temperatures at idle, load and while gaming then post outrageous lies on forums to spread the rage over its performance.









Alternatively...

...your computer just performs better with a conventional air brick.

The H50 can require unconventional mounting/airflow in the case. Different isn't always better.


In my case different turned out to be very good.
 
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lizard said:
Thanks for the replies

I think the first thing I'm going to try is replacing the fans in the case.
I've read that the coolermaster cosmos has airflow problems.

Which ones would be the best ?

How about the Scythe Ultra Kaze 2000RPM 120mm Case Fan
Click to expand...

I would suggest replacing the rad fans first with something with increased static pressure such as the Akasa Apaches.

I would also look at how your case fans are setup as they could be working against each other rather than with each other
 
Ok its show and tell :)

There's 2 fans in the top taking air out and one at the bottom right bringing air in. I was thinking about putting a powerful fan at the bottom right.

Another thing I was concerned about is the radiator on the left bringing air in where there is normally a vent area

pc.jpg
 
I read the OP this time instead of the replies.
lizard said:
I've had it for a while now, in the winter its fine, but when the weather gets warmer it starts to shutdown when playing games.
Click to expand...
The CPU (or whichever part) would have to get seriously hot to shut down. Have you got any temperature monitoring programs so you can check just how bad this is or if some other part is overheating.

You didn't mention any temps in your OP so I guess you don't but programs such as Real Temp or CoreTemp would be fine.
 
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The obvious flaw with that arrangement is that the 280gtx blows out a lot of hot air, as does the psu, both of which are promptly sucked back into the case through the radiator. That's a fairly silly way to set it up, turn the radiator fan around and use the top fans as intakes and you're done.

If you're not running clear coolant there's a good chance your cpu block is now full of dye and so not working very well. The ek supreme uses 12mm M4 torx bits which will be difficult to remove if you don't have an appropriate torx screwdriver.
 
From looking at that pic I would guess that the radiator would benefit from another fan this side of it for push-pull.

I would also agree with above and suggest you reverse the flow of air through the radiator so that it exhausts the heat out of the case, because as has been mentioned above, all it is currently doing is sucking in all of the heat exhausted from the 280GTX.

Having reversed that, keep an eye on temps, and if you feel it could be better, then consider reversing the fans on the roof so they intake rather than exhaust.
 
what i do in the summer is down clock my system if i notice temps are rising too much as well as open the case.

being in the uk this is not such a proble, oc'in in south africa can be troublesome...

are you sure it is not your graphics card that is overheating the pc and shutting down.

I have always thought that due to heat rising any venting out would be at teh top, this is one of the reasons why they moved the psu to the bottom of the cases, i thought.

why they would create water heating with vents blowing inwards seems completely retarded. i have never used water cooling. but i know that you don't actually need fans blowing air in, if you have sufficient air out, and vents with dust filters that is sufficient to generate enough suction. currently i have the noctura 12cm fan as my only outflow fan on teh back of a sonata II and my noctura hsf blowing through the hsf's heat sink and into the outflow fan. nice temps
 
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Its definitely the processors

temps.jpg


They are 52 at idle on a cool day and 58 on a hot day.
Running prime95 temps jump up to 80s and 90s then pc shuts off.

I've already tried reseating the cpu, didn't help much.

I'm going to rearrange the fans a bit like a few of you have suggested and see it it makes a difference.


Thanks
 
I have this system and suffer similar temp issues. I added a push fan to the radiator, not sure why yours is pulling into the case as im pretty sure mine doesnt but i will have to check that to be sure.

One question that always niggles me is the orientation of the radiator itself, with input / output nossles at the bottom of the radiator. Surely it would fill better with fluid sat on its side, with input going in at the bottom and output at the top, as the air that could become trapped when filling should naturally head to the output nossle rather than get trapped. Even input and output at the top seems a better orientation than both at the bottom surely?

The bottom line though is that single unit reservoirs and single radiators dont seem to be a particularly efficient cooling system as the low quantity of fluid soon warms up to a point where it isnt really going to cool the processor very well...
 
I had a big long post with ideas of how to improve airflow but with a single rad setup and that case it makes it really hard. I was going to buy that case at one time but man the airflow in those are just not good by todays standard. They look cool but just are not that functional for overclocked systems because they are so restrictive.

One of the major problems is the hard drive bays and lack of airflow most cases give ya from the front. Even if it did have front vents through the door that wall they call a hard drive bay wouldn't do much trying to get through the few pinholes they put there. With a big vid card that bottom fan just does not look like it has the juice to get enough cool air in.

If it was me I would look into trying to mount the rad on the top if it will fit. Flip the back fan as exhaust and buy a really good replacement bottom fan that will push a lot of air. That case is pretty sealed up so a higher rpm fan shouldn't make it to noisy.

A Megahalems might be to long for that case. You will need to measure from the cpu to the door and google some specs. Honestly I am not sure it is worth the money to buy a ton of new fans for that system unless you wanna revamp and maybe look into a top mounted 240 rad.

If your feeling handy and there is room as I can not tell from the pic a dremel and a added 120 at the bottom might help some or even making the whole bigger and getting a beefy 140mm down there. the vid card will restrict it but it would be more positive airflow.
 
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lizard said:
I've had it for a while now, in the winter its fine, but when the weather gets warmer it starts to shutdown when playing games.
Click to expand...

If you have had this kit for more than a year, you should have at least emptied, flushed and replaced the fluid in that system once in that time. With the black tubing its going to be hard to tell, is there a reservoir in there anywhere so you can check the quality of the fluid and whether you are still getting enough flow?

As was already mentioned, a lot of coloured cooling fluids especially Feser, tend to break down over time especially if the loop is overloaded heat wise. When they break down the different parts tend to separate and clog up things like the fins in the blocks with the additives that were in the mixture.

What you will need to do is empty the fluid and strip the entire loop down and clean and flush it through with deionised water, get 5 litres for a few quid. The blocks may need stripping back and scrubbing with a toothbrush and something mildly acidic like vinegar or tomato sauce.

Moving forward, the strip down and cleaning will take it back to how it performed when new, for what is the equivalent of a Q6600 a single radiator like that should be sufficient, although it probably needs fans in push/pull to keep on top of any overclock you have on there or variables in ambient temps. As suggested a 240 in the roof would be a better bet and works well in the Cosmos.

Good luck :)
 
52 at idle is way too hot. Turn the rear fan to be an exhaust. Check the fluid level. Direct a case fan onto the chipset.

Given the time since the OP, is this still a problem?
 
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