Can i water cool a haf 912 case

[caknight]

I'm building my new rig and have a i5 6600k with a MSI Pro Solution Intel Z170A mobo. i want to overclock so what would be a good cooler for this case i'm open to air cooling too.

 

[Justiceinacan]

Cryorig H7 is a nice budgety air cooler and short enough to fit.

Anything bigger I think warrants a new case. Last time I checked around 150mm is a bit of a tight squeeze, or something around there.

I'd recommend a good fan over AIO water. Not really worth it for the performance it brings.

 

[caknight]

so an air cooler is going to give me more performance the an AIO water cooler?

 

[ledhead11]

I think what Justiceinacan means is price per performance. If you're gaming at 1080/1440 then a I5/I7 CPU just over 4ghz will almost always do fine. At 4k sometimes there's issues but that's usually just poor coding. There's plenty of affordable, quiet fan solutions that will get you into 4-4.3 range.

If you're trying to get to 5ghz stable it's going to cost you and that case probably won't help. Plus faster memory, etc., etc. You're also going to need to do a bit of research on you're bios settings and I'd recommend a significant amount of research in the many OC forums on the net.

If this is for high FPS, high res gaming then you really need to focus on your GPU/PSU. If you're trying to set a CPU record it will cost you some money.

 

[caknight]

Corsair Vengeance LPX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR4 DRAM 3000MHz is the ram i got. i game at 1080p and have a r9 280x im bringing from the old build i want a good cpu cooler that will work with the case i have and give me some overclocking head room

 

[caknight]

specs of my pc are
case-haf 912
cpu-i5 6600k
mobo-MSI Pro Solution Intel Z170A
ram-Corsair Vengeance 3000mhz 2x4gig
gpu-r9 280x
psu-600gs corsair
hdd-1tb WD black

 

[ledhead11]

"overclocking head room" - Well there are many good air solutions that should get you into the 4+ghz range with comfortable temps. That Cryorig should do it as would a hyper evo. The list is actually quite large with prices going from $20-100. I didn't look at that MSI mobo specs but if it has OC genie it would probably push to around 4.2ghz. If you want higher you're going to have to invest in water and I don't know much about 'em. I personally don't feel they're worth the money yet for the .5 to 1ghz extra they might give over air. If you'redoing this manually you'll need to learn a little about voltages.

Tom's, HardOCP, Guru3d all have many amazing cooler reviews. They're very detailed and I strongly recommend digging through some but honestly going to much over 4-4.4ghz isn't going to get you much other than some bragging rights which probably won't last more than 6 months or so. I'm also pretty sure you'll find some reviews about OC'ing that CPU in there as well.

With any cooler I'd recommend also looking at noise ratio's. I also use HAF cases, HAF X & 932 so I already have some ambient noise but nothing outrageous. I'm using Hyper 212's on both my CPU's(I7 4930k-4.10ghz, I7 2600k-4.2ghz) and I rarely see either go above 65c. The futuremark physics test is about the only thing that does it.

TBH you really need to consider upgrading that GPU. Its still the usual shootout from both sides for the best 1080p cards so I won't really say much except go higher than a 1050 so you can enjoy more for longer. I'm not sure about that PSU(gold?), its probably o.k. PSU's can have a hand in good OC'ing too.

I think that ram should do just fine just make sure the MOBO bios are all set right and you're actually get the correct speeds.

 

[Justiceinacan]

I've read many reports of people getting 4.5 on air alone. On a much hotter and less refined AMD I've been able to do it, even. I think you're underestimating air coolers, ledhead. Geofelt gives a good explanation of them. Simply put ; water cooler exhausts directly out of the case. CPU fan heatsink will blow it away from the CPU, and a good tower style one out the back of the case. They're just different methods of relocating heat. CPU fans don't get particularly loud if they're the good kind, and the only real drawbacks are size.

The corsair GS600 wouldn't be my first pick for a PSU. It's channel well technology 80+ bronze...

Gaming performance is most heavily influenced by GPU, but you will want the i5 for future proofing CPU intensive games and stuff. It's not a bad pick but consider updating the GPU later on.

That motherboard is an 8 phase board which is pretty good. I'd expect making 4.4 GHz.

 

[ledhead11]

I've read many reports of people getting 4.5 on air alone. On a much hotter and less refined AMD I've been able to do it, even. I think you're underestimating air coolers, ledhead. Geofelt gives a good explanation of them. Simply put ; water cooler exhausts directly out of the case. CPU fan heatsink will blow it away from the CPU, and a good tower style one out the back of the case. They're just different methods of relocating heat. CPU fans don't get particularly loud if they're the good kind, and the only real drawbacks are size.

The corsair GS600 wouldn't be my first pick for a PSU. It's channel well technology 80+ bronze...

Gaming performance is most heavily influenced by GPU, but you will want the i5 for future proofing CPU intensive games and stuff. It's not a bad pick but consider updating the GPU later on.

That motherboard is an 8 phase board which is pretty good. I'd expect making 4.4 GHz.

Thanks for the info on air cooling. I've yet to have a need not to use it. I honestly think that water cooling CPU's is a bit overrated at the moment for the price and headaches. I think water cooling GPU's is a greater need except the many restrictions NV put into pascal still leave limited returns. It'd be fun to see a 1080 pushing 3ghz stable.

I've only recently(last 1-2 years) been catching up on info about phases for both PSU's and MOBO's. It can get complicated quick. The most I've really ever taken my stuff past is 4.3-4.4 but since it really wasn't adding to anything I've kept them in the 4.1-4.2 area for longevity. Plus my knowledge is minimal for voltages/timings, I just try to keep 'em at or under 1.35v and make sure they don't really go above 65-70c.

I completely agree with you about CPU fans not usually being loud, I only mentioned it because I've read some forums where people really, really, nitpick 'em. I often tell people that my cases are as ugly as anything but they get the job done 24/7/365 and even when I've had one on a desk next to the monitor its about the same volume as a small desk fan on low.

My 2600k would take some effort for me to calculate how many hours it been on for at this point and how many different things its been used with but its easily in the thousands.

The 4930k has mainly been for 1440p/4k and probably only has about 5-900 hours on it now but except for futuremark or video conversions I rarely see its usage above 40%.

The only thing I'll say against air cooling: If you're in a relatively small room say a child's bedroom or dorm it can get pretty warm after a while w/o proper a/c-ventilation or windows. I never notice anything w/ my rig in the living room, but the bedroom definitely warms up after 3-4 hours on.

 

[caknight]

thx for the advice, i think ill go with a Cryorig H7. Gpu is getting an upgrade soon 980ti

 

[Justiceinacan]

Don't get a 980ti unless you're getting a really good deal on it (Sub $350)
The new GTX 1070 has similar performance but more VRAM and will likely have longer support in games.

 

[caknight]

good to know,r9 280x are about $100 on ebay what about crossfire?

 

[ledhead11]

good to know,r9 280x are about $100 on ebay what about crossfire?

As somebody who's been doing SLI for about 10 years now I don't presently recommend crossfire/sli to anyone unless they have the time to tinker to get newer games working. Most game dev's really are not giving mgpu the support it deserves in favor of making single gpu optimizations for consoles. There's a mythical mention of DX12 providing its own mixed mgpu options but I've yet to really see it. For 1080p good single gpu will do just fine. Plus if you add a second card you're all but guaranteed to have to upgrade your PSU.

On that note, I agree with Justiceinacan. If you can afford it go for a 1070, you'll be set for a couple years at least in 1080p/50-80fps-maybe more and also some 1440p/30-40fps options to boot. I almost got a pair of those. There's a lot of good reviews showing the 1070's kicking butt at 1080p. The other advantage is if you decide to upgrade your PSU down the road you'll be able SLI should it look favorable again.

If you're on a budget a 1060 will cut it, but you really need to get one the 6gb models. 1080p may not fully eat 3gb but its really close on quite a few AAA titles and its usually good to think ahead as things rarely use less down the road. You might have to dial back a few settings here and there but they mostly hold 40-60fps in even the more demanding games.

I like the 980ti's, I almost broke down and got a pair while waiting for Pascal, but unless the price is ridiculously low, the newer cards are a better buy.