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Originally Posted by pHaestus
Ben I would counter that flow rates above 1.5-2GPM are sometimes still beneficial but no longer practical. Let's assume that you are willing to increase radiator size and fans to keep water temp constant and remove that from the equation. Even still, the cost/performance benefit for going from 0.5-1GPM is usually large, the benefit for increasing from 1-2 is much smaller (and may be completely offset by pump noise), and the step from 2-3GPM is probably not worth it to water coolers.
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I'm going to go out on a limb here. With certain waterblocks I have seen overclocking stability benefits that outweigh the apparant difference in CPU temperatures at various flow rates.
For example, say I run at 4LPM vs 10LPM, and observe a ~2C CPU temperature difference between those two flow rate points at the same water temperature. I then set my CPU overclock to a near unstable point with 25C water. If I turn off the fan on the radiator and let the water temperature climb for both, the 4LPM flow-rate will become unstable at a lower CPU
and water temperature than the 10LPM experiment. I've observed the 10LPM flow-rate to generate stable overclocks with up to 3C warmer CPU and 5C warmer water temperatures over a 4LPM flow rate.
I do not observe this behavior with thick-based blocks, but with thin-based impingement blocks.
Why?
Now overclock stability is a shaky thing at best to run with as the rate of instability can be statistically mapped out as a Poisson distribution with the chance of a computational error occurring being time-based, but if I can repeat the experiment multiple times (and I have) then this lowers the statistical chance that what I'm oberving is just a co-incidental anomaly.
Indeed, it would seem that I absolutely require 2+GPM flow rates to pull off some of the more extreme overclocks that I am able to eke out of my CPU's, which I admit is part of the reason for my hunt for good strong 12V pumps that I can over-volt. I believe it enough to spend money on it, despite the temperatures not being dramatically better, the overclocks certainly are.