Question How reliable are Silverstone AIO coolers?

[jferments]

I am considering switching from air cooling to liquid cooling for my AMD 7965WX build, and have been trying to find coolers that will fully cover the heat spreader of the TR5/SP6 socket.

One of the few that actually is made for this socket is the Silverstone XE360-4677 AIO cooler, and am wondering if anyone has any experience using this on TR5/SP6 socket? Especially interested if you are using it under high loads in multi-GPU setups where a lot of heat is being generated (my build has two RTX 4090s right below the CPU)

I have seen several recommendations for this cooler in various places, but I don't really know anything about Silverstone or the quality of their products. I have about $10k in hardware that will be sitting underneath this cooler, so if there is any risk of it leaking, I don't want to take it.

What are your thoughts on this cooler, or the quality of Silverstone products in general?

 

[Eximo]

If you want no risk of leaking, don't use a water cooler. Not really anything more to say than that.

Plenty of massive air coolers that can keep the chip under control. I would probably stick with Noctua NH-D15 as a baseline to look at.

Probably better off water cooling the GPUs then the CPU, but if you don't want to risk leaks, not much to say on that. $365 is quite a bit for an AIO. Not to far off from the price of doing a custom water cooling loop, you start adding in the GPUs and the cost of a pump/reservoir gets more spread around.

 

[jferments]

If you want no risk of leaking, don't use a water cooler. Not really anything more to say than that.

Plenty of massive air coolers that can keep the chip under control. I would probably stick with Noctua NH-D15 as a baseline to look at.

Probably better off water cooling the GPUs then the CPU, but if you don't want to risk leaks, not much to say on that. $365 is quite a bit for an AIO. Not to far off from the price of doing a custom water cooling loop, you start adding in the GPUs and the cost of a pump/reservoir gets more spread around.

Yeah, I thought about doing a custom loop but honestly I just feel intimidated by it because I don't have experience with that (I've always used air coolers), and this is also the most expensive PC I've ever built so I'm hesitant to try my hand with my first custom water loop on it.

The Noctua DH-15 doesn't work with TR5/SP6 socket unfortunately. Right now, I've got a Noctua NH-D9, which is completely inadequate (very tiny cooling fin block, and 92mm fans). I had switched from Noctua NH-U14S which had fans in wrong orientation (pulling air from GPUs below and exhausting out the top). The only compatible air cooler that I have left to try is the Arctic Freezer 4U-M, which I had originally returned for the Noctua fans, because the build quality felt so shitty and it doesn't cover the whole CPU heat spreader.

It's really disappointing/frustrating how few decent cooling options there are for this CPU. Hopefully some more will come onto the market over the next year or so.

 

[vMax]

Modern AIO's are very good and I have been using a 360 AIO for many, many years without any issues. Silverstone in general is a good company and I see no reason as to why it would not do a good job for at least 3 to 5 years. Just took a look at the hi res images from the website and it also looks like it has a fill port so it could be refilled extending it's life.

From my perspective having used AIO's, especially closed loop AIO's, they do a good job for higher end CPU's that run hot and with the 360 versions the fan profiles can be controlled to keep everything running cool and quiet.

 

[Eximo]

The intended use case for the form factor is in server racks, which is why most of the coolers are smaller.

 

[Eximo]

Custom loops aren't that complicated if you stick to basic components. No different to an AIO except that it is user serviceable and you get to pick what it looks like.

CPU block/pump (I have looked this up before, it fits the newer threadripper sockets as well)

https://shop.alphacool.com/en/shop/...3094-alphacool-eisbaer-pro-es-solo-full-black

Thick radiator

https://shop.alphacool.com/en/shop/...acool-nexxxos-xt45-full-copper-360mm-radiator

4 of these

https://shop.alphacool.com/en/shop/...-hf-13/10-compression-fitting-g1/4-deep-black

and three fans (You can swap in whatever you want here)

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/9r6NnQ/arctic-p12-max-8104-cfm-120-mm-fan-acfan00280a

That totals 200 Euro, plus some 13/10mm tubing and you would have a functional loop, no true reservoir or drain though.

Adding in the GPUs and another radiator would make it a little more complicated, but not too much. Just add about $200 per GPU, plus another $110 at least for another radiator and fans, and another 6-8 fittings depending on the layout.

Would also really need to double check if that pump can handle that much stuff. There are other CPU blocks out there, that one just happens to be quite inexpensive.