The term "water cooling" is increasingly being used in DIY hardware. From the advent of water-cooled processors, water-cooled cases, and even water-cooled graphics cards, more and more hardware products like to include the "water-cooled" label. So what does water cooling mean? How much difference is there between water cooled radiator and air cooled radiator? Which one is better?

What does water-cooling mean?

At present, when we talk about water cooling, most of them mean that the core of water cooling is actually heat dissipation. They refer to the cooling system using flowing liquid as heat dissipation, which belongs to a more high-end radiator than the common air cooling.

Past and present life of "water-cooled radiator"

In fact, the word "water cooling" has a long history. As early as the last century, foreign DIY enthusiasts used flowing liquid pipes or oil pipes to heat CPUs. Compared with ordinary radiators, they have achieved good heat dissipation performance. That is why the word "water cooling" was born, which symbolizes the generation of high-end technology.

At present, "water-cooling" has been applied to various fields of DIY hardware, and has gradually shifted from an immature stage to the use of water-cooling technology in DIY high-end accessories, and even some smart phones have begun to use water-cooling cooling design.

At present, the most widely used is in the heat dissipation of desktop computers, including the case, CPU, and graphics card. It can be said that the cooling technology is being combined with high-end DIY hardware.

Advantages of water cooling:

The core of "water cooling" is heat dissipation, so the biggest advantage of water cooling is efficient heat dissipation, which is suitable for more demanding high-end accessories with high performance. No matter what we say about water-cooled chassis, water-cooled radiator or water-cooled graphics card, its core is all around high heat dissipation. As a high-performance cooling system, water-cooling is becoming more and more popular, which often symbolizes that water-cooled products are generally high-end hardware.

Water cooling is an ideal cooling solution for high power chips for overclocking players. When used for the needs of the CPU of the feverish players, water cooling will not greatly improve the performance of high-end air cooling, but it can generate much less noise than any air cooling scheme while obtaining low temperature. At present, water cooling technology is getting more and more attention from users. No matter the media or businesses, there are water cooling related news every day. Water cooling is becoming a representative of highly equipped players.

Which is better, water-cooled radiator or air-cooled radiator?

The cooling effect of the water-cooled radiator is better when the CPU is under high load, because it will not be affected by the environmental factors inside the chassis when it works. However, the effect of the water-cooled radiator is not better than that of the air-cooled radiator when the CPU is under low power or low performance.

Water cooled radiator

Air-cooled radiator

In general, water-cooled heat dissipation is mainly used in some high-end hardware with large heat output. Its advantages are good heat dissipation, low noise, beautiful appearance, etc., while its disadvantages are expensive and troublesome installation and maintenance. The traditional air-cooled radiator is relatively cheap and easy to install and maintain, but its heat dissipation performance is relatively inferior to water cooling, which is suitable for most scenarios where the heat dissipation requirements are not particularly high.