Upgrade me - Air vs Water

RyanF

RyanF

RyanF

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Joined
22 Dec 2013
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Hello all, got some money to burn and currently suffering the beginnings of the upgrade itch. However, I'm not having any issues with the performance of my hardware and as such not in a rush to upgrade them. Instead, I'm having issues with the case starting to look a bit worse for wear and a vibration noise from the Rad/Fan CPU combo.

Testing has identified the vibration noise to be coming from the rad/fan combo for the CPU cooler as when pressures applied the noise stops. My current thinking is that some sort of rubber mounting would help dampen the vibration that's being passed on to the case.

My current rig is as follows, sitting in a Corsair Air 540 case:
  • Intel i7 4790K
  • Corsair Hydro H115i
  • Gigabyte GTX 1080Ti "Xtreme Edition"
After help deciding between going for a simple case and "fan upgrade" or burning some cash and delving back into the custom loop market.

If I were to stay on air cooling, which case would you recommend and do you know of any kits that can be used to rubber mount my cooler?

If going for a custom loop, with a budget of ~£1,250 to get a new case and accompanying watercooling kit, what would you get?
 
Good fans don't vibrate much, so if there's lots of vibration that sounds like case of bad fans.
(overhyped Noctua NF-F12 and NF-P12 vibrate horribly)
Mass damping panels of the case with bitumen mat etc can help to prevent/lower amount of vibration and noise from it.
But that shouldn't be used as excuse for tolerating vibrating rollers sold as fans.
(like those two Noctuas)


As for cooling choises regardless of marketing BS, waterpipes in place of heatpipes doesn't make heat disappear anywhere magically.
That water is only temporary heat transfer medium and heat energy needs dissipating into air.

And good high end heatpipe coolers simply have lots of surface area, which isn't matched by average radiators, while higher number of fans and pump means extra noise sources.
Here RGB bling bling "Platinum" version of H115i loses to Scythe Mugen 5 in cooling power per noise:
https://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/8...platinum-liquid-cpu-cooler-review/index6.html
Which costs "overly expensive" £43...
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/scythe-scmg-5100-mugen-5-rev.b-cpu-cooler-hs-046-sy.html
 
RyanF said:
Testing has identified the vibration noise to be coming from the rad/fan combo for the CPU cooler as when pressures applied the noise stops. My current thinking is that some sort of rubber mounting would help dampen the vibration that's being passed on to the case.
Click to expand...


Someone I did a build for with a 540 Air complained of annoying vibration noise after a few months. Checked it out and the offender was one of the five plastic bars on the top, vibrating against the mesh it sits on.

D5fPpev.png


Image not posting for some reason so link: https://imgur.com/a/yliwLm1

The fix was simple as you suspected, in this case I slipped a small piece of velcro between a bar and the mesh, where the offending spot was. The bars aren't welded to the mesh so can be lifted up a bit. That's also why they vibrate against it. Later I found out this was a common flaw in 540 Airs.

Letting you know so you can test that, and stick the rubber/whatever mounting in the place that actually needs it.
 
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I'll check that out, thanks, if the fix is that simple and I haven't got to buy anything I might hold off for a few months and go for an entirely new rig when it's worth the upgrade.
 
FWIW that seemed to fix the issue, so thanks very much for the heads up! Have been gaming all evening with the top off and no annoying noises to report.
However, I decided to sink some money into the O11 Dynamic. Going to swap into that and eventually custom loop and upgrade my rig when it starts struggling.
 
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