DinoBull

1 hour ago, J7SC_Orion said:

 

That's a nice-looking build. 

 

My go-to rads are either triple-core 480s or triple / dual-core 360s copper/brass rads....generally, the thicker and more cores, the better - especially with the latest-gen CPUs and GPUs which have boost algorithms which use temps as a major input. Since you want to / need to stick to 360s re. available space, I highly recommend the > XSPC RX 360  - I have six of those in use (some continuously from as far back as 2013) in several builds with zero problems. Great performance and quality.

 

FYI, 2nd slide below is an old pic looking at a 360 single-core from a Corsair H150i Pro AIO and a TT CL 360 triple core (64 mm thick) - obviously, much better cooling than a single-core 360 but that might not fit your build, not least as with those, you probably should use push-pull fans...can't really go wrong with the XSPX 360 V3 though, subject to making sure it fits.

 

RX 360s in the back row

  

 

 

 

 

Wow, you are truly a water cooling veteran. Thanks for the suggestions.

My CPU AIO cooler uses a 360 rad that is side vertically mounted in the case. I customized it a little with a push/pull configuration with the fans on that since there was enough space. However, for the space the GPU Rad will sit in (top), not enough space for a rad + the push fans + the pull fans. When added up, the height encroaches into the motherboard and AIO tubes for the CPU.

I may opt for just upgrading the GPU anyhow. It seems to be more cost effective performance-wise over the small performance improvements water cooling yields in this case.

2 hours ago, pioneerisloud said:

Isn't the 3090 faster than the 4070Ti?  I'd almost rather grab a used 3090 personally for that kinda scratch.  More VRAM available to it too, for the higher resolutions.

On paper, the 3090 looks like an absolute beast of a card. And it is:

HOWEVER: Lovelace architecture is way more efficient with 3rd generation ray tracing cores and 4th generation Tensor cores. As a result, the 4070 ti is able to compute ray tracing and make use of use of its neural graphics more efficiently, giving you more computing power for less electricity. 

The upshot of this is that the 4070 ti is the more powerful card despite its smaller bus width and memory size. In fact, the 4070 ti is more powerful than the 3090 ti, an incredible statistic that is a testament to the breakthroughs the Lovelace architecture made.

Also, it uses far less power than the 3090, on average around 41% less.

This thread has taken a turn from:

I'm going to water cool my GPU and I need radiator suggestions

TO

I might scrap that idea and upgrade the GPU instead for about the same cost

Now considering the purchase of an RTX 4070 ti since that is what I was going to spend water cooling my RTX 2080 ti. Better still i'd sell the old GPU for a couple hundred and actually spend less than water cooling the GPU... Thoughts?

14 minutes ago, UltraMega said:

OP what do you do with your old parts? Do you sell them? FYI I think a lot of us here sell our old parts so we usually consider the resale value as part of our upgrade costs. 

I'd likely sell them. The RTX 2080 ti is still fetching $300 - $400 USD on ebay. New they are still crazy expensive! Ive seen them at $1200! Silly when you can now get more powerful cards at $800.

17 minutes ago, Avacado said:

Sounds like you are getting some solid advice. As far as the water cooling components, please don't pull the trigger without confirming your list here first.

 

Need to discuss fittings and that Corsair D5/res is not your best option. Aqua computer and Bitspower beat it hands down, the D5 is also gimped on power as well. Also, those Corsair radiators are just rebranded Hardware Labs rads with a marked up price tag. 

I'm glad I consulted this forum. Last night I was almost ready (aside from the radiator) to pull that trigger. If I do end up water cooling, i'll consider the other pump/res combos.

20 minutes ago, pioneerisloud said:

Well, I'll just put it this way.  My 6900XT is a PCIe 4.0 card.  My Ryzen 3600 / B450 build only allows PCIe 3.0.  Card worked fine, and I saw a massive improvement over my 5700XT that was in the build previously.  HOWEVER, minimum framerates hadn't changed at all, and that was the biggest reason for my own personal upgrade.  So yeah, I was CPU limited, in the sense that my minimum framerates (the stutter) hadn't changed.

 

Yes, PCIe 4.0 matters on PCIe 4.0 cards, of course it does.  That doesn't mean that you won't see an improvement on a PCIe 3.0 system as well though.  This has been argued about since PCIe 2.0 came out to be honest.  It really all depends on your needs and wants out of the system.  If you're happy with your current 2080Ti with + 1-2% more, then yeah watercooling that sounds like the right choice.  If you're happy with it, and just want it to be cooler running, more silent, or perhaps just to do something different, yeah watercooling it sounds right.  If you're after a higher percentage difference than overclocking can give you, get a better GPU for it.

I do want to experiment with water cooling, but now considering if that money is better spent on a GPU:

• Satisfaction knowing I squeezed a few more percents of performance out of that GPU with something I built VS
• Satisfaction that comes with a higher frame rate

Hmmm.

18 minutes ago, UltraMega said:

Is your CPU overclocked? 

 

I think at that resolution you would get a lot more of a performance boost putting the same amount of money all into a GPU vs spreading it out across multiple parts. You should be much more GPU bottlenecked than CPU bottlenecked with the games you listed at the resolution you're targeting. The PCIe3 bandwidth factor in not important, it won't bottleneck the GPU at all. 

 

4K is a bit higher res than you're targeting, but you're not far off. You can see here the real difference for gaming are basically nothing at high res, even for a 4090, aside from a few odd titles but anything short of a 4090 would see much smaller differences still. 

 

 

Wow, interesting! I mean I knew back when I built this PC that the 9900k was the cpu to go for future proofing at least for 3 to 5 years. That 16 threads really does make a difference.

17 minutes ago, UltraMega said:

Yea, as pio said (and it pains me to agree with him ) that calculator is worthless in the context of stuff like this. A mild overclock on the 9900k would go a long way for one, and two, you have to be looking for cpu bottlenecks to find them with games on a cpu like yours vs something new. You can benchmark CSGO at 1080p and find differences, sure, but for all practical purposes the differences in modern games at resolutions above 1080p is completely neglidgable. If it were me I'd hold onto the CPU and put the money towards something else if this is for gaming. 

 

What kind of games do you play and what resolution/hz are you targeting? 

Currently, I am playing Forza 5 Horizon, No Man's Sky, Defense Grid 2 (I know, it's an oldie, but a goodie), Final Fantasy XIV, Elder Scrolls Online and some VR titles with a Valve Index. My monitor is that lovely Alienware AW3423DW (3440x 1440 @ 120 to 175hz depending on the game).

Your advice, though good is now challenging me to think if a GPU upgrade would be more beneficial than simply water cooling and overclocking. It's your fault!!! 

17 minutes ago, pioneerisloud said:

Not trying to convince you one way or the other, but those bottleneck calculators are usually so off its hilarious.  Your 9900k easily, EASILY beats my Ryzen 3600.  But yet I've ran my 6900XT on my Ryzen 3600 and it worked fine.  Yes, I saw a minimum framerate increase when jumping to my 5800x.  Averages were about the same.

 

I'm confident you'd see a significant increase going to a 3080 / 3080Ti over your current 2080Ti in the system, enough to the point it'd be worth the "upgrade".  HOWEVER, given this isn't your only system, that upgrade path is up to you.  Nothing wrong with the pairing you already have either.

 

-------------

About water cooling......

 

Have you thought about ditching the AIO and doing a full CPU / GPU loop on that build?  It'd save a little room in the case, and might make it easier to control where the heat is coming from in that case since Avacado pointed out the case can be a hot box.  Besides, most of the time when somebody builds a loop for their GPU, they USUALLY toss the CPU in the loop too eventually, whether it was in their original plans or not.   

RE: Calculators - Agreed. After my response to @UltraMega, I did more of a deep dive as his words did resonate. I compared performance on 3 GPUs with my CPU and yes, there is a large gain in fps for the resolution and settings I typically use. However, this calculation does not take into account the PCIe version. The motherboard in that build is PCIe 3. All the GPUs that would outperform the 2080 ti are PCIe 4. Dropping any of those newer GPUs into that motherboard would definitely experience a bottleneck in bus bandwidth. It really is challenging trying to figure this out 

RE: Water cooling - My first idea was a full cpu/gpu water cooling loop, but the parts list amounted to over $1200. TBH I hesitate spending that much on a 3 year old PC that would only experience slight performance improvements. So I paired it back to just water cooling the GPU.

51 minutes ago, UltraMega said:

9900k is not going to bottleneck a newer gpu unless you're playing at 1080p. 

According to my research and 2 online bottleneck calculators (cpuagent.com & pc-builds.com), If I dropped a RTX 3080 ti card into that build (wouldn't that be nice), the bottleneck for my system would be anywhere from 5.7 to 21.8% for the 9900k. I realize this is a pretty wide margin. I don't know which calculator is more accurate or even if either is accurate at all. If the bottleneck was closer to 5%, that might not be so bad. The thing is, we don't know for sure if it would be that low. These calculators also don't take into account the  refresh rate.

22 minutes ago, Fluxmaven said:

Nice thing about upgrading older platforms is finding deals on stuff. Funny enough Titanrig is the seller via the Amazon link you posted, but buying the same block from them directly from their site it's on sale for $42.50 

Watercool HEATKILLER IV GPU Water Block for RTX 2080 Ti, RGB, Acryl Ni (4251312603663)

WWW.TITANRIG.COM

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The HEATKILLER? IV VGA series is manufactured for high-performance water cooling for grapgics cardsCompatible with NVIDIA Geforce RTX...

 

Nice find and good point!

37 minutes ago, Avacado said:

Ok, that is a sizable budget. Most water cooling parts will continue in service long after the first generation you buy them for, so the 2080Ti block will go, the rad, pump, res, and fittings will transplant to your next build. 

 

As far as rads go, I mostly run Alpha cool rads, which are dirty, but effective. Hardware labs would be my second choice. The copper fins you are worried about oxidizing would not be an issue unless they were constantly wet which would not be a result of loop temperature because it can't go below ambient (Dew Point) and create condensation. In order for that to happen you would need a chiller or more exotic cooling solutions. It's possible in an humid environment, but unlikely as the fans blowing air through the rad "should" evaporate some/most left on the surface. I really don't know if it would oxidize over a few years naturally though

Good point RE: cooling parts life span.

All good suggestions on the radiators. Hardware labs also make the Corsair XR5 & XR7 Rads AFAIK. That's why I have the XR5 as a potential on the list.

Thanks for the reassurance on the aquacomputer rad. I live in California, which is normally very dry with low humidity anyways. So if I do choose that radiator, It'll likely be fine.

9 minutes ago, Avacado said:

The Aqua Computer rads are top quality and that HK block for the 2080Ti is great. Before I make any suggestions here, is there a budget?

The budget is around $800. That is a soft target as i'm trying to get the highest performance cooling possible. Of course I don't want to go too crazy as this is a 3 year old PC. So it probably wouldn't make much, if any sense to spend $1k cooling a GPU that has been superseded by a couple of generations already.

I like the look of the aquacomputer rad. A little concerned that the copper fins are not coated. I know the cooling performance is likely better, but concerned that oxidation will occur and those fins would turn green after awhile.

As far as the EK block, upon close inspection the block and the backplate does not have many screws. I have heard a report or two that people have had trouble properly seating this block and experiencing poor performance unless it is seated absolutely perfectly. This is one reason why I chose the Heatkiller block: more screws, larger area of coverage for gpu, memory and vrms.

One of my old builds (The White Kraken (2019) by chrisjmartini - Intel Core i9-9900K, GeForce RTX 2080 Ti, Lian Li PC-O11 Dynamic ATX Full Tower - PCPartPicker) is in need of an upgrade to stretch it's life expectancy 2 or 3 more years. I have already decided that upgrading the gpu or cpu doesn't make sense as the board is a z390 and the gpu and cpu are already maxxed out (i9 9900k) for this configuration. Any newer GPU would suffer a bottleneck due to the PCIe version and other limitations. I have been building PCs for over 25 years but have never tried liquid cooling. My intent is to dip my toe into liquid cooling that GPU (EVGA RTX 2080 ti XC Ultra Gaming). The CPU already has an AIO liquid cooler installed that is good enough and should last a few more years. So i'm only considering the GPU cooling loop for now. I want the cooling to be optimized to push the boost clock and memory of the GPU as high as possible. The stock dual fan/heatsink on this card is already excellent, but likely no match for a higher end liquid cooling solution. Also of note: This PC has 12 fans! So I was looking to simply repurpose and not add any additional fans. Until someone commented that my fans have a static pressure value that is too low (1.4mm) for push pull on a decent radiator.
I have done a ton of research preparing for this but I am still a little unsure as to which radiator to use. I need some thoughtful suggestions from experienced liquid cooling gurus. The basic parts list so far (not counting the fittings & bending kit):

• Corsair Hydro X Series XD5 RGB Pump/Reservoir Combo
• Watercool Heatkiller IV for RTX 2080 Ti - Acrylic + Nickel, RGB (also with a passive backplate)
• Hydro X Series XT Hardline 14mm tubing
• Radiator - 360mm, likely a push or pull configuration and top mounted. The best performing rads seem to be:
  • Aquacomputer airplex radical 2/360, copper fins (the fin density on this rad is low, so a push or pull config should work)
  • Corsair Hydro X Series XR5 360mm Water Cooling Radiator
  • EK Quantum Surface P360M (Love the look of this rad, but that thickness and fin density seems to indicate I would need a push/pull config. That would not fit the top clearance in my case)

Suggestions on what 360mm radiator to use?

It's been about 25 years and perhaps 15 - 20 PC builds, 60% were my own. The rest built for friends & family. I'd say about half of those builds were overclocked in some way. This year I finally decided at long last I would dip my toe into the world of custom water cooling. I mean sure, I've had a couple of builds with AIO coolers, but never have I felt the need to do a completely custom job. I guess I always felt the returns were of little value compared to cost. I'm now in a position where I can afford the time and money o do it. If nothing else, for the satisfaction. And I now have the tools for the most part.

A few of my most recent builds:
2015: Mini-ITX Build (2015) by chrisjmartini - Intel Core i7-4790K, GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER, Thermaltake Core V1 Mini ITX Desktop - PCPartPicker
2019: The White Kraken (2019) by chrisjmartini - Intel Core i9-9900K, GeForce RTX 2080 Ti, Lian Li PC-O11 Dynamic ATX Full Tower - PCPartPicker (This one will get a water cooled GPU this month!)
2023: Death Note (2023) by chrisjmartini - Intel Core i9-13900K, GeForce RTX 4090, Corsair iCUE 7000X RGB ATX Full Tower - PCPartPicker (This one will also need it's RTX 4090 liquid cooled. That GPU runs hot!)

Happy to meet like minded fellow builders!