PC Watercooling Questions

[doowoppdoowah]

first question......wut is the ideal temperature for cooling/watercooling? ive read ppl cooling their devices to average 53 degress celsius or something like that, but i dunno anything about wut temp its supposed to be. wuts the ideal temp (in celsius and fahrenheit) and which temp is "too high"?

do all devices share the same "safe" temp? for instance, lets say a cooled harddrive is at 53 celsius. is the cpu or graphics card at 53 celsius considered cooled or is it something else?

im planning to buy and internal sata harddrive and an enclosure with esata. the question is...is it possible to watercool the harddrive as an external drive? if not, is there a way to cool it?

one more question regarding enclosures....which material is "good" for keeping the drive from getting too hot? is it aluminum or plastic, or other?

[admin]

Hey doowoppdoowah, and welcome to the forums :). I will try answer your questions with some of the knowledge I have on computers. There is no "ideal" temperature for air/water cooling, and everything is relative. It also depends on the CPU and motherboard you are using, as some are known to run hot, such as the P4 Prescott processors. Usually, you should be able to monitor the processor temperature, as well as case temperature; hard drives and graphics should have similar temperatures, and processor temp. should vary, but again this all depends on your hardware specs. The only way I can think of to cool your external hard drive is to place a fan beside it :). As for enclosure material, steel is usually a good way to keep cool.

[DarthBrady]

Hey doowoppdoowah, and welcome to the forums :). I will try answer your questions with some of the knowledge I have on computers. There is no "ideal" temperature for air/water cooling, and everything is relative. It also depends on the CPU and motherboard you are using, as some are known to run hot, such as the P4 Prescott processors. Usually, you should be able to monitor the processor temperature, as well as case temperature; hard drives and graphics should have similar temperatures, and processor temp. should vary, but again this all depends on your hardware specs. The only way I can think of to cool your external hard drive is to place a fan beside it :). As for enclosure material, steel is usually a good way to keep cool.


This is very good advice, I agree.

But I think it may also be important to add this:

***If you are not a Professional, or have no experience with Liquid Cooling your PC, Then DO NOT ATTEMPT TO TRY IT.!!!*****

-The slightest mistake, will cause un-reversable damage and can leave you without a PC, whether its the first day you had the liquid cooled system running, or 3 years down the road, if you dont know what you are doing and how to maintain it, you are better off not using it.

-the common mistake people make with this, is thinking they need it, or it is going to help, and it does/will not. Most Computers dont need liquid cooling, you really need to be running a PC hard to the point where its heat is dangerous to the system, and in most cases this is not a problem.

There are many other ways to keep your PC running cool, like case mods and fans, and even heat-radiating dry pastes. If you just own a home PC, and you live in an climate controlled (air conditioned) home, these mothods alon should be enough, and a water system is not neccesary.