Need your advice - 280 AIO in the top or 360 in the front?

[WebMaximus]

Hey guys, need your input and advice.

I have a Corsair Obsidian 500D SE case where I'm currently using a Corsair H115i RGB Platinum AIO mounted in the top of the case as an exhaust. In the front, I have 3x120 fans as intake and in the back of the case, I have another 120mm fan as exhaust.

My CPU is an 8086K and my GPU is the MSI GeForce RTX 3090 SUPRIM X.

Now I'm thinking of replacing my 8086K with the 12900KS. I spend most of my time in MSFS in VR and have found my CPU to be limiting me. I understand the 12900K series of CPU:s and the KS model in particular I guess will get very hot. Why it's important to have good cooling in place.

Since I won't be able to use my current AIO with the new socket and CPU, I bought these two and now I'm trying to figure out which one to use and which one to return.

https://www.webhallen.com/se/product/341676-Corsair-iCUE-H150i-Elite-LCD

https://www.webhallen.com/se/product/348815-Corsair-iCUE-H115i-RGB-Elite-280mm

If you compare the 280 vs the 360 side by side, I assume the 360 will provide better cooling performance. Simply due to it's larger size and for moving more air. However, since I already have a 280 mounted in my case, it would be easier to switch to a new 280 rather than a 360.

Also, since I guess I would need to mount the 360 in the front rather than in the top of the case and with hot air moving upwards, maybe the advantage a 360 has over a 280 wouldn't be that huge based on the different location in the case. Maybe it would even perform worse...

I've tried to find out if it's possible to mount the 360 in the top but most people seem to say 'Not possible'. While a few claimed they managed to do this. So I'm not really sure.

Obviously, the best thing is to give it a try but before I start unboxing stuff over here, I figured I would ask in here.

Many thanks in advance for your help input guys!

 

[AlienALX]

If you are gaming don't buy the 12900k. Whilst it is slightly faster than the 12700k it runs a lot hotter. To the point where no cooler can tame it. As such if you are after pure gaming performance you are better off with a 12700k or kf, and overclocking it slightly. At which point the cooler will be able to handle it better and thus you will get longer sustained boost clocks which will make gaming better.

From what I have noticed 280s perform as well as the 360s. Though a 360 looks a lot bigger it really isn't, as it is all about surface area and thus the extra width and length of a 140 fan makes it every bit as good.

With your GPU I would not put an AIO in the front. I would keep it in the roof. Thus I would go for a 12700 and a roof 280 AIO.

Another reason I am saying go 12700 is that the next gen are coming quite soon, and you may end up regretting jumping now.

Personally I would wait for at least that, and see what happens. Because the rumours are that RL will have much higher boost speeds than AL, which is what matters in gaming.

 

[WYP]

With Raptor Lake being released within the next month or so, it may be best to wait for Raptor Lake to launch. an i9-13900K will certainly beat an i9-12900KS.

With regards to your radiator question, I would top mount a radiator. Having your rad at the front will push hot air towards your GPU, which is not ideal for a hot GPU like the RTX 3090.

Yes, a bigger rad is typically better, but getting your hot CPU air out of your case is better than pumping hot air into your case and towards your GPU.

That's my two cents.

 

[WebMaximus]

Many thanks for your advice both!

Looking at the CPU, reason I went with that one (but can still return it since I haven't unboxed it yet) is how someone else with a very similar system to mine and also spending most of his time in MSFS told me he replaced his 8086K with this CPU and saw a major improvement. As for the temps, he told me he's running it at stock speeds. Where the only things he manually changed was to lower the voltage slightly. Doing so, his CPU is running at around 75 C using a top-mounted 280 AIO.

Great to see how you both say having a top-mounted 280 will be the better option. As for the 360, I was thinking maybe 2 alternatives could have been:

1. Try to make room for it in the top of the case
2. Mount it in the front but make sure the fans will exhaust the hot air rather than blow it inside the case

Not sure how easy or even possible either of these options would be though.

 

[WebMaximus]

Forgot to comment on Raptor Lake. That of course would be interesting to see what it will be like and what real numbers will be in titles such as MSFS vs the existing 12th gen.

Reason I'm not sure I want to wait for it is how I don't think it will be available and a fully stable platform within the next month or two but more realistically maybe Q1 or so 2023.

Since I just got myself a new pair of VR glasses I've been looking forward to enjoy during the fall and winter (escape the darkness although only virtually ), I want a good system now and not in Q1 2023.

Valid input though but the way I see it, there will always be something better around the corner in this business. This has been true for as long as I can recall.

 

[AlienALX]

It's a refresh. The platform is the same as the one you're buying dude.

 

[AlienALX]

Valid input though but the way I see it, there will always be something better around the corner in this business. This has been true for as long as I can recall.

Intel release once a year. It was exactly a year ago, pretty much to the day that I bought my 12700KF just after launch in October/November.

So "just around the corner" in this case literally IS that. Just around the corner - about a month away out of 12.

The biggest leap this time apparently is clock speed. Something they have been stuck on for a long time. Raptor lake being a refresh means that quite literally all they have done in that time is work on clock speed. 5.8ghz apparently. Which in Intel terms means you can usually clock all cores to that speed. Unlike AMD who seem to need selected binned cores.

And that, IMO is well worth waiting 30 days for. Why? you may ask? because I can categorically tell you right now that ESPECIALLY for MSFS it will make a BIG difference. Because that game thrives on raw clock speed, which is why the 12900K is the best CPU for it as I type this.

I mean dude look, I am not a patient person but you would have to be nuts to not wait a month FFS.

Send back the 12900K, and wait for the 13700 chip. It will demolish the 12900K in gaming. Probably run cooler, too.

 

[WebMaximus]

Intel release once a year. It was exactly a year ago, pretty much to the day that I bought my 12700KF just after launch in October/November.

So "just around the corner" in this case literally IS that. Just around the corner - about a month away out of 12.

The biggest leap this time apparently is clock speed. Something they have been stuck on for a long time. Raptor lake being a refresh means that quite literally all they have done in that time is work on clock speed. 5.8ghz apparently. Which in Intel terms means you can usually clock all cores to that speed. Unlike AMD who seem to need selected binned cores.

And that, IMO is well worth waiting 30 days for. Why? you may ask? because I can categorically tell you right now that ESPECIALLY for MSFS it will make a BIG difference. Because that game thrives on raw clock speed, which is why the 12900K is the best CPU for it as I type this.

I mean dude look, I am not a patient person but you would have to be nuts to not wait a month FFS.

Send back the 12900K, and wait for the 13700 chip. It will demolish the 12900K in gaming. Probably run cooler, too.

All very valid points you make and you really got me thinking. Can't promise I'll be able to keep my hands in the pocket but will definitely give it some second thoughts after what you've said here.

I guess one problem that could mean it won't be a month but more likely several is availability. Especially when you're living in Sweden as in my case. I'm sure it will be much easier to lay your hands on one on the bigger markets.

Again, thanks for great input!!

P.S As for the cooling part and where to put the AIO, I actually received the very opposite response over in the Corsair forum and it made a lot of sense to me when I read it. See for yourself ->

https://forum.corsair.com/forums/topic/179998-h115-in-the-top-of-h150-in-the-front/?do=findComment&comment=1028814

 

[AlienALX]

You take the red pill - your CPU runs cooler.

You take the blue pill - your GPU runs cooler.

What he fails to mention there is that GPUs run hotter, use more power and dump far more waste heat than a CPU.

So I'd take the blue pill. Especially when you consider a new GPU costs twice as much as a new CPU

 

[Avet]

Blue pill is the better option.

If your CPU runs hotter it won't drop any performance until it reaches 100+ degrees. Unless you blast it with render (very rare workloads) it will work exactly the same at 60 and at 99 degrees.

On the other hand, GPU scales down speed linearly depending on temperature. GPU running at 60 degrees will boost a bit higher than a GPU running at 85 degrees.

If you can always mount CPU AIO at the top.

 

[Warchild]

Take it from someone who ran a 1000D case with 2x 480 rads.

Previously I had them in the front and 8 fans exhausting air out the top. Even though its overkill, CPU hit 60C max, and 55C on GPU.

When I swapped and put the rads in the roof and 8 fans as fresh intake, CPU still hit 60Max but GPU dropped 5C.

This is with everything overclocked. In the end, things will normalise such as water temp but 5C is probably negligible for many. It did show however that a fresher air intake was better than drawing in air that already passed through a hot radiator.

 

[Avet]

Take it from someone who ran a 1000D case with 2x 480 rads.

Previously I had them in the front and 8 fans exhausting air out the top. Even though its overkill, CPU hit 60C max, and 55C on GPU.

When I swapped and put the rads in the roof and 8 fans as fresh intake, CPU still hit 60Max but GPU dropped 5C.

This is with everything overclocked. In the end, things will normalise such as water temp but 5C is probably negligible for many. It did show however that a fresher air intake was better than drawing in air that already passed through a hot radiator.

That is a completely different story. You can't compare full loop with an aircooled GPU and a AIO on CPU.

 

[Warchild]

That is a completely different story. You can't compare full loop with an aircooled GPU and a AIO on CPU.

Why not? end of the day the air flow of the case temp drops when you use fans as fresh air intake through the front, and mount a radiator in the top as exhaust. It was even shown on Martins Lab once upon a time. The water cooling the GPU gets, becomes normalised anyway due to the loop itself. However cool air as intake dropped the max temp of it. Sure it was a small amount, but still dropped.

OP will probably see the same, although maybe a only a 1-2C temp drop. The unfair comparison if anything is the cases themselves. I do have an unfair advantage of more fans as intake.

 

[Avet]

Why not? end of the day the air flow of the case temp drops when you use fans as fresh air intake through the front, and mount a radiator in the top as exhaust. It was even shown on Martins Lab once upon a time. The water cooling the GPU gets, becomes normalised anyway due to the loop itself. However cool air as intake dropped the max temp of it. Sure it was a small amount, but still dropped.

OP will probably see the same, although maybe a only a 1-2C temp drop. The unfair comparison if anything is the cases themselves. I do have an unfair advantage of more fans as intake.

That is the basic physics, and not worth debating, but you can't compare those scenarios because they transfer heat in completely different ways.

You have ONE very efficient heat transfer system whose temperature depends mainly, probably only, on how good can the radiators dissipate the heat. If you put them in front to have fresh air through them ofc it will drop the temps. You don't need to be rocket scientist to know that.

In the above scenario there are TWO heat transfer systems GPU cooler and CPU AIO. As said you can only choose which component gets hotter and which colder. You can't have both cold. In that case it is better for CPU to get hotter because it either throttles or it doesn't care. GPU is scaling performance based on temperature so it is better to be colder.

 

[Warchild]

That is the basic physics, and not worth debating, but you can't compare those scenarios because they transfer heat in completely different ways.

You have ONE very efficient heat transfer system whose temperature depends mainly, probably only, on how good can the radiators dissipate the heat. If you put them in front to have fresh air through them ofc it will drop the temps. You don't need to be rocket scientist to know that.

In the above scenario there are TWO heat transfer systems GPU cooler and CPU AIO. As said you can only choose which component gets hotter and which colder. You can't have both cold. In that case it is better for CPU to get hotter because it either throttles or it doesn't care. GPU is scaling performance based on temperature so it is better to be colder.

We are actually arguing for the same thing. My point is that its better to put rads in the roof and let the CPU get hot because placement matters little. Whereas for closed loop or AIO (it matters not) having fresh air intakes from the front will improve GPU temps as you have cooler air flow in the case.

 

[Avet]

We are actually arguing for the same thing. My point is that its better to put rads in the roof and let the CPU get hot because placement matters little. Whereas for closed loop or AIO (it matters not) having fresh air intakes from the front will improve GPU temps as you have cooler air flow in the case.

Then it is settled.

 

[trawetSluaP]

Or you can be smart like me. Get a 5000D. Side mount the rad (I have a custom loop just for CPU atm), so both rad and GPU get nice clean cool air.

Admittedly the air hitting the GPU will still not be as cool if there wasn't a side mounted rad but it still works well.

 

[Warchild]

Then it is settled.

That is most definitely agreeable