Watercooling present and future status...

[RVWinkle]

Originally Posted by JSimmons

In order for watercooling to go mainstream, the package would have to be simple to install, take up very little space, and require *no maintenance on the part of the user*.

That last part is the most important.

If by mainstream you mean gamers and college kids then don't forget all of the smaller OEMs (Alienware, Voodoo, Falcon) have water cooled systems. These companies cover a good portion of the market for people who buy the type of computer that would benefit from $100-250 of cooling (or should I say people who 'think' that the computer would benefit). The company I work for has met all your requirements with 3 designs but performance has suffered greatly.

[Eddy_EK]

I am a student who is making his student money by selling a few waterblocks.

I am working on watercooling watercooling present and future status. So I would need to find some numbers.

OK; if you estimated about 0,1% of PC users have WCing in the USA, and if there is about 232.3 million computers in use so there is about 200.000 watercooled computers. What do you think?

[Eddy_EK]

Cmon guys, I'm running out of time :shrug:

[GlassMan]

I think your #'s are off.
Subtract business computers, then consider that the 0.01% of the remaining MIGHT think about it for 10 minutes, 90% who say no way. I personally know no one that would change out a fan.
The only "hard" data you wil find is publicly held Swiftech, there is a link to those #'s in a thread "Is Swiftech insolvent". Swiftech is one of the largest companies involved in water cooling.

[Eddy_EK]

Originally Posted by GlassMan

I think your #'s are off.
Subtract business computers, then consider that the 0.01% of the remaining MIGHT think about it for 10 minutes, 90% who say no way. I personally know no one that would change out a fan.
The only "hard" data you wil find is publicly held Swiftech, there is a link to those #'s in a thread "Is Swiftech insolvent". Swiftech is one of the largest companies involved in water cooling.

Interesting stuff.
How much % of the market in USA or WORLD do you think swiftech owns?

[HAL-9000]

Originally Posted by Eddy_EK

Interesting stuff.
How much % of the market in USA or WORLD do you think swiftech owns?

If I were going to take a blind stab at it, probably fifteen percent or so I would guess is Swiftech stuff out there. I think just about everyone on this forum has a Swiftech widget of some kind. Me personally, I have an old MCW5002, several of their big air cooler 'sinks (in my buddie's server), a pump, a radiator, and the fill kit, though I don't currently use any of it right now! I would imagine the "biggest" company in watercooling right now is probably Koolance. They are the only ones I know of with an actual, existing OEM customer, Alienware.

The market for watercooling is changing fast though as it gets very mainstream at all. There are big players in East Asia with lots of manufacturing capacity that are now starting to roll out WC stuff. Coolermaster is one, and the ubiquitous rip-off company Thermaltake is hawking their junk. They will get as much of the market as they do with heatsinks. Enthusiast premium stuff will never be "big" in it's respective marketplace. Its like cars or stereos....both are big business obviously, but how many people buy Ferraris and Krells?

One thing any enthusiast startup in WCing is going to need is some differentiation from everyone else if they are going to survive the Asian hordes. All WC'ing companies essentially sell a oil-cooler radiator, fish tank pump, and a chunck of copper cut in a particular way, and call it a water cooling kit. The Taiwanese can do the same thing, much cheaper, with their big Chinese mainland production capacity. Dell will call them before it calls Swiftech, because they essentially sell the same thing. Four degrees of C is not worth ten times the price to Dell, which is why you don't see even nice aircoolers like Thermalright XP's or Swiftys in ANY big box supplier

[Eddy_EK]

I agree with you Hall-9000!

What about other companies...
What is their estimating marker share?
Lets say: Asetek, Koolance, Thermaltake, perhaps Alphacool... :shrug:

[Marci]

Swiftech rules stateside... but in Europe, not the case... over here you're looking at 3-4% Swiftech, but the number is ever increasing... estimate by end of year that'll be 8%.

At the moment, Asetek probably holds the majority market share... Around 20%. Koolance about 15%. Thermaltake 15%, with the remaining having the rest split between them. All estimated...

[TerraMex]

keep seeing alot more innovatek, alphacool, 1A-Cooling and such,
way more than Asetek, or Koolance (which seems to be very rare).
Same with BlackIce, Thermochill, Nexxxos (much cheaper).
swiftech is gaining, storm seems to be selling well too.

[Eddy_EK]

Yes, that kind of commentars I would like to see more.

So you think swifteck shares about 8% of world market or just state market?

[Marci]

I'd guess 8% of world market...

[9mmCensor]

I tried it before. Will do so again, someday.

[Eddy_EK]

Originally Posted by 9mmCensor

I tried it before. Will do so again, someday.

What? :shrug:

[Etacovda]

" No, but will have soon, some day!"

Ill take a stab in the dark, and say watercooling.

[stev]

Originally Posted by bobo5195

Apple's G5 was a hot beast that had to be wedged into a case. Watercooling is not ever going to move into the main stream.

Strictly speaking heatpipes are liquid cooling. There should not be much reason why a heatpipe based system cannot achieve WC results levels. Watercooling hs a number fo things up its sleave (jet impingment cooling, mounting the rad outside the case) but there is not reason why a bigger heatsink cannot overcome that. Especially if the higher BTX HS weight limit comes in.

I agree that heat-pipes are liquid-cooling too! Some even do well against WC'ing setups. However, heat-pipes have a down side, Literally. They do not work well enough to cool upside down, nor very well on their sides.

Heat-pipes can hang outside the computer case like some of the WC'ing setups do. Although the tubing is hard metal line and would require a coil winding to locate the mounting towards the CPU. Very tricky to do too.

Apple's G5 2.0Ghz uses a very LARGE heat-pipe that weights over 2.2lbs per CPU. With two CPU's, 4.4lbs are hanging from the main MOBO.

The Apple G5 2.5+Ghz units with liquid-cooling weighs about 2.42lbs for two CPU's.

Originally Posted by Etacovda

well, apple have managed. It honestly cant be that difficult - it only becomes hard when bling is applied to the situation. Use hard lined tubing which doesnt allow (much if any) water evap through the tubing. Use a soldered copper block, and a decent pump + radiator. Have the connections pre-done in the case with everything in there waiting for an install.

Some of it was easy for us, other parts were a great challenge. The G5 is not a HydroCool at all, although we did learn some valuable things with the HydroCool.

Liquid cooling isn't just for gamers, overclockers nor college youth, other industries use WC'ing as well. The largest being the Telecommunications and Data Acquisition industries. There are data computer terminals with Intel and AMD64 units out there in really harsh environments. These units are not the high ended Ghz CPU's, but still need WC'ing due to the ambient temps outdoors. One example is an automated toll booth collection system on a highway.

Computers are really everywhere. Even in places that the typical person isn't aware of.

[stev]

Originally Posted by HAL-9000

They are the only ones I know of with an actual, existing OEM customer, Alienware.

And don't forget the Corsair COOL supplied kits by Swiftech too.

[gmat]

Most computer geeks i know around have a custom watercooled PC at home. 100% of them went to watercooling for noise reduction. Recently only one dropped because he found out that aircooling an AMD64 could be done quietly enough for him. All the others still are upgrading their hardware (new pump here, new block there..). That's about 10 people in my region.
Now what percentage do we represent... less than 0.5% ?