13 Testing and benchmarking

Testing and benchmarking

Now that liquid cooling is installed, juiced up and working as an actual cooling solution, let's run some performance tests.

We set our room temperature towards roughly 21 Degrees C for an objective comparison. As you will see the Ra X10 Liquid is performing fairly well with regards to cooling our PC.

The setup used:

• nForce 790i Ultra SLI
• Core 2 Quad QX9770 (3.2 GHz / 1600 MHz FSB / 1.2 Volts)
• Core 2 Quad QX9770 (3.6 GHz / 1600 MHz FSB / 1.4 Volts)
• Core 2 Quad QX9770 (4.0 GHz / 1600 MHz FSB / 1.6 Volts)
• Crucial DDR3 memory
• 300 GB WD HDD
• GeForce 280 GTX
• Power supply: BFG 800W.

Core 2 Quad QX9770 XE processor SIM at Silent mode

For our first test session we are going to look at the cooling performance with the SIM software set to Silent. Here the FAN RPM rotation will be at acceptable levels. Granted 13 fans will still produce 43 DBa, so silent is a relative thesis here. You obviously can disable some fans as well if you are an audiophile with a lust for silence.

Our processor is a beefy one, as it's the 1600 MHz FSB based quad core QX 9770. By itself the processor runs quite hot due to the high FSB frequency.

We test the processor in combination with the CPU cooling in three different setups:

• Processor clocks at 3200 MHZ / Processor voltage 1.2v (default)
• Processor clocks at 3600 MHZ / Processor voltage 1.4v
• Processor clocks at 4000 MHZ / Processor voltage 1.6v

We have all power saving features in both the BIOS and Windows Vista disabled.

As you can observe, we get very decent temperatures returned. At default when the 4 processor cores are 100% stressed (rare) we max out at 40 Degrees C (104F). Once overclocked to 3600 MHz again fully stressed we still remain under a 50 Degrees C (122F) temperature. Once we jam 1.6 volts into the CPU and clock it towards 4000 MHz the results cave in. We pass a certain threshold of what the cooling can take, and immediately temps rise closer towards 80 Degrees C (176 F). But with the chassis set in silent mode ... that really isn't a surprise.

Core 2 Quad QX9770 XE processor SIM at performance mode

For our second test we are going to look at the cooling performance of the kit with at an overall HIGH RPM on the fans. This mode is sincerely loud, way too loud for my taste .. but granted .. say you want to break a 3Dmark record and need some extra cooling performance for half an hour ... just set the SIM module through software towards performance and get some earplugs ;)

The reults is definitely better compared to SIM silent mode selection. Again we jam 1.6 volts into the CPU and clock it towards 4000 MHz. We now average out at 72 C / 161 F. While that is a lot, it's however a sustainable temperature for a good benchmark session or whatever you want to do.

Bear one thing in mind though, coolant temperature is always relative towards your room temperature. We always test at a 21 C / 70 F degree ambient room temperature, if you live in a warm country, your coolant temperature will be higher .. and thus also the end results. Something to keep in mind, with an Indian summer.

Competitive charts

Once we start comparing then we see why Liquid cooling always rocks. (all cooler set to medium / temperatures shown in Degrees C). The Ra X10 Liquid is set at silent mode by the way.. These results are all taken at a 3600 MHz processor frequency with 1.4 Volts.