Need Some Advice on Radiators

[tolagarf]

Hey there!

So in my last thread regarding water cooling I talked about getting a D5 pump combo, however as events turned out I went back to a Swiftech H240-X. For some reason I'm just a sucker for this AIO

Well I've got it up and running with a GTX 980 Ti OC'ed at 1428 MHz (boost) using an EK Titan X water block and it spins like a kitten. However considering I've only got a 280 mm rad in total my temps can reach 65-67 degrees Celsius on both the CPU and GPU. This is only for the most demanding games, some games it only reaches 50 degrees on both.

So I ordered an Alphacool NexXxoS XT45 Full Copper 140mm radiator so I can mount it in the back section of my Define R5 case since I use those moduvents in the top to remove some of the noise the pump can generate (the H240-X is mounted in the front). This means I only have a total of 3 fans in my system (Noctua NF-A14 PWM), and I'm really not certain this will have the best impact I'm looking for. I guess my question is if I should go for the Alphacool NexXxoS ST30 Full Copper 280mm mounted in the top instead? As an example my VCORE can reach 67 degrees Celsius on my ASUS Sabertooth X99 board and I'm not sure if that's healthy in the long term.

TLDR; Sheesh these posts tends to get long and complicated!

 

[Davva2004]

My gut feeling is that single fan radiators don't add an awful lot of cooling to a loop, and there's not much of a cost increase between the 140 and 280 (£14 difference from Scan, plus an extra fan) so going for the extra 280 makes more sense to me. Have the rear 140 fan as an intake, and the top 280 as exhaust.

 

[tolagarf]

I already ordered the 140mm rad directly from Alphacool in Germany. I just checked, it would cost me nearly 65% of the radiator's cost to return it. Yeah think I'll just use it and hope for the best. I did also buy an EK Supremacy MX water block, should help quite a bit with restriction in the loop.