Air Cooling over AIO - personal preference

Posted by DarthTerpsy@reddit | buildapc | View on Reddit | 28 comments

We have all seen the tests and comparisons. In most cases (not full 100% load constantly), Air Cooling is comparable to AIO's (off the shelf 240mm and some 360mm). I have been building PC's since the mid 90's, and still remember adding the first fan and cooper shim to a CPU. I am very Old school, and believe that sticking with Air Cooling is the best option for 95% of all computer builds. AIO is a niche market when pushing the CPU over long periods and keeping it at Load is required for your workloads. There are a lot of benchmark chasing posts, that do not reflect what their PC is actually being used for. With Air Cooling, the only point of failure is the fan, and when it does fail, simple and easy correction. With an AIO, you add multiple points of failure to the equation, as well as collateral damage possibilities. You have Fan, Pump, Tubing, Radiator points of failure. In worst case scenarios, liquid can leak into your case, and take everything south of the CPU (NVME's, GPU, Add-in Cards (Controllers, Sound Cards, etc..), Motherboard, PSU (normally below the board in most cases). Too much for a small difference in performance outside of benchmark chasing for a large majority of end users. Again, my opinion. Granted, AIO systems look nicer than Air Cooled, cannot dismiss that.

28 Comments

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CrunchyTheSquirrel@reddit

I just got a Thermalright 360mm AIO for 45 EUR, that is even with ARGB on fans and pump. I don't think there is an air cooler with similar performance at that price point. It seems like overkill for my AMD 65W TDP CPU, but unlike air coolers which dump the heat into the enclosure, the radiator can be mounted so that it expels the hot air to outside - which reduces temperature on all components, plus lowers requirements for airflow, even increasing it. Further, I'm planning to do CPU intensive FEM work on it, which puts 100% load on all cores for hours on, and because of this I consider to change the CPU to a 16 core - maybe a 9950X (170W). It's not a server running 24/7, I hope a failure of the AIO is thus unlikely. 🤞

Viking2151@reddit

When you get Thermalright air coolers for as cheap as they are, I don't see a point in AIO's in most standard builds, I got the Phantom Spirt on a 5950x and its been vary good. I had my fair share of AIO's and have been screwed by a few like Enermaxx and their shit TR4 coolers, replaced it 3 times and 2 of them were their "fixed" coolers and I had to take the loss, threw it in the garbage can.

JobHuntingManiac@reddit

Here I am with a custom open loop and 12 years on a single D5 pump running at about 60% without a single leak or failure anywhere.

That's not an aio btw

*Oh gosh, really???? I thought they were the same thing?????* That was kind of the point I was making. AIO's are going to have a rather short life no matter what since they aren't serviceable. With that said, 4 years with an AIO in my kids computer and no issues yet

Point, where, because the way you worded it, you were saying real water cooling was just reliable as an AIO, read it again, I can not read your mind or thoughts nor can anyone else, go somewhere with that shit attituded.

pythonic_dude@reddit

When you get thermalright aios for as cheap as they are, I don't see a point in air coolers above $50 existing.

Reliability, aio's is always going to be a gamble, does it live long, or die hopefully in it's warranty period? Who knows.

SushiBump@reddit

The only time I've found watercooling to be better was when I would do very long (multiday) video encoding sessions. A 360 or bigger kept temps on my 5950x a good 10 degrees cooler, all else being equal, versus my air cooler on the same task. But both were still well in operating temps, so not really a big deal.

Informal-Aerie7654@reddit

I had 2 AIOs fail me in a row over like 2 years. I'm not a novice, but I had somebody else take a look at the 2nd one to make sure I wasn't missing something obvious and he agreed it had just failed. Swapped it for a Peerless Assassin air cooler and it's going like 5 years strong now.

Borigh@reddit

Air cooling is "better" in the sense that you get more performance per dollar and fewer points of failure. But that means AIOs literally are popular because people think they *seem* better. I get it, I bought a more expensive case because it *seemed* to fit the PC I was trying to build, even though I could've purchased something with better performance per dollar. If you want your custom built computer to feel more custom built because it's liquid cooled, more power to you. I get the same thrill out of tweaking curve optimizer

Once noctua's aios will finally hit the market it will definitely be top ten anime betrayals.

Impossible-Switch127@reddit

I bought a Tryx stage on launch purely for aesthetics. AIOs are perfect for when you have little space to work with. Did a build with a 7600x and 4060ti in a silverstone sg13 case. A Be Quiet shadow rock lp wasnt enough. Gaming temps were around 85 with spikes up to 90. Replaced the shadow rock lp with a corsair H60x 120mm aio and under 100% load on the gpu and cpu it barely hit 80.

BigFatCoder@reddit

Well I agreed with you almost everything except the last one. For me dual tower heatsink looks nicer than the pipes in the chassis like fish tank.

MindTheBees@reddit

I have custom water-cooling for my desktop and air cooling for my two servers. I don't think I can go back to air cooling for my desktop, mainly due to the noise. At full load while gaming, I barely hear anything and can actually play games without a headset on. However I also don't think (CPU) AIOs alone are generally worth it since they aren't dealing with the GPU. It's not adding a huge amount to the average person who isn't over clocking. There are also now air coolers with LCD screens if that's the criteria.

Accomplished_Emu_658@reddit

My preference is aio. I run pc’s constantly for some projects and love the peace of mind it won’t heat soak and get too hot. I had run one running 3 years in “the worst” install setup in a poor airflow room and no issue. I have never had a leak or failure. Have i replaced bad pumps for customers? Yeah it does happen.

sob727@reddit

AM5: air cooling sTR5: AIO Main reason being the Wattage is reasonable enough, and the IHS is too small on consumer CPUs for AIOs to make a difference

mshelbz@reddit

I’ve done AIO and custom water cooling. I’m back to air, it just works.

HaroldSax@reddit

I swear if people only came to this sub to read about computers, they'd think AIOs were mass failing at alarming rates with the way y'all talk about them. Use what you like. No one but mental muppets care.

MTMTECHGLOBAL@reddit

I’m with you on this. For most normal builds, a good air cooler just makes more sense. Cheaper, simpler, less to fail, and performance is usually close enough unless you’re running a hot CPU under sustained heavy loads all the time. AIOs definitely have their place, especially for aesthetics, space around the socket, or high-end CPUs that are being pushed hard. But for the average gaming/general use PC, a decent tower cooler is usually the smarter buy. Fan dies? Replace the fan. Pump dies? Whole AIO is basically done. The leak risk is small, but it’s still a risk that doesn’t exist with air cooling. Same with pump noise, evaporation over time, mounting/radiator clearance, etc. mtmtechglobal has said it well before: air cooling is boring in the best way possible. It works, it’s reliable, and for 95% of users that matters more than chasing a few degrees in benchmarks.

Eleventhousand@reddit

Actually, I find air cooling to look better than AIO. I also prefer air cooling, even if I run a couple of degrees warmer. It's just not worth it for me to mess with a broken pump in a few years,

gabacus_39@reddit

I like my AIO because it takes up far less space than one of those dual fan heatpipe deals and I think it looks good.

AisMyName@reddit

I would have preferred to go with a heatsink+fan combo, but this i9-14900k runs so hot, I don't think it would work. My next CPU, which I expect to be an AMD, I want to try to not go AIO to save on money and risk of failure.

Hrmerder@reddit

AIOs can leak (though failure rates seem to be much lower now than the past), but regardless, an AIO is a finite device with liquid that has a finite life and afaik, not a single one on the market has a sensor that will tell you it's getting low or empty. Also back to leaking, if they do, generally the liquid is conductive, which means you are absolutely SOL if it leaks as you probably wouldn't know until your machine shuts off from shorting. Air coolers? Pretty much infinite. If the fan fails chances are more than not, you will know if it is failing (buzzing/scratchy sounds or whining), or if it completely stops as you can set alarms to let you know if this happens, but generally speaking most fans give a LOT of audible alarm itself well before it ever goes kaput. You will never have an air cooler leak on your precious and very expensive components that (at this point) could possibly be irreplaceable.

notadroid@reddit

i agree with the gist of your post (i'm old school and well, been building systems since the 90s). do you have a link though, that shows the air cooling is comparable to AIOs? I agree with your sentiment that for 80-90% of computer users, they don't need an AIO, but I'd still like to see some date behind what you mentioned in your original post. Bust most of the data from trustworthy reviews show that even the best air cooler (while beating sub-par AIOs) falls far behind 360mm AIOs. Your post has caused me to be curious about how different CPU temps are under the majority of users' out there who are moderately gaming, vs review sites running gaming benchmarks for testing.

Toast_Meat@reddit

In the end, it's all personal preference. I think we all know that air cooling is typically the way to go because of the cost, low to non-existent risk of failure and similar performance to AIOs. Over the many years of building PCs, from full sized towers to compact SFF builds, I've always switched between the two cooling solutions mainly for aesthetic reasons. I think both can look amazing, depending on the build. However, in my current system I opted for an AIO because it's an SFF case that allows for 240mm radiators, which I would much rather have than a low-profile air cooler. AIOs are fundamentally better in this exact scenario. On top of that, I chose a budget liquid cooler that costs as little as an air cooler. Kinda sus, but well over half a year later and it's still running.

sHoRtBuSseR@reddit

I prefer air cooling in like 90% of applications. I was forced to go to water because of my 5090+ampinel.

9okm@reddit

I mean, I think AIOs are ugly. Those sloppy tubes flapping about disgust me. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

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