Water Cooling vs Low Profile CPU Coolers

When it comes to the best CPU cooler for ITX systems, there's a lot of debate. Some people prefer water cooling with an AIO while others prefer air coolers for their simplicity. But when you compare some of the best small form factor heatsinks to an entry level liquid cooler for price, CPU cooling temperatures and more, which one comes out on top?

Buy items in this video from Amazon at the links below:

0:00 - AIO vs Low Profile Air Coolers
0:56 - Corsair H60 for ITX Cooling
1:21 - Low Profile Cooler Prices can be NUTS
2:01 - The Benefits of Air Cooling
2:30 - Sponsor Spot
3:01 - The Best Low Profile Coolers
5:31 - Methodology & What to Look For
6:00 - 65W Temperature Testing
6:51 - 95W Temperature Testing
8:02 - GAMING Temperature Testing
8:54 - To Water Cool or NOT for ITX

Review unit provided free of charge or purchased by Hardware Canucks. This video is sponsored by Phanteks. As per Hardware Canucks guidelines, no review direction was received from manufacturer. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.

Gear list (Available on Amazon):
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[CyFr]

Talks about addressing the elephant in the room, completely ignores the elephant on his shirt.

[mongoosemcmongoose]

I love how a lot of other channels just say 120 AIO's are garbage and to throw them out
but they are comparing them to full tower coolers in big cases
in an ITX environment, this is actually super useful and interesting
thank you !

[Deviantsoundz]

Congrats on the new addition 👏

Maybe a 120mm aio comparison? Cosidering how the h60 did against those popular options and not been that good amongst other 120mm aio it would be interesting to see.

[thestrykernet]

Congrats on the new addition and thanks for another interesting and informative video. I've really enjoyed all of your cooling stuff, because while I'm not in the target audience to use it there always seems to be something useful to take away.

Personally I use water cooling in my primary gaming machine, but nothing else. I really like having no obstructions around the GPU and being able to keep the CPU heat away from it as well. When I did my first AIO build it was using the same GPU as my prior build, but the temps on it were significantly better despite the case having worse airflow and I haven't looked back.

[JeckNoTree]

I'm on "Team Air cooling on desktops", since water cooling is most of the time a hassle, and in my opinion if it fails catastrophically than other components are also ruined, as well as that air coolers have a better resell value (high end ones than high end water coolers), so yea, water cooling is for me similar to people who like liquid metal, the gains are there (sometimes just minimal) but the risk of damaging and maintaining stuff is just too much.

[gedeuchnixan]

I will always stick with air cooling because of reliablílity, also I kinda like the looks of huge heatsinks on a CPU.

[DanceBruce]

CONGRATS ON YOUR NEW BABY!!!! Idk if its your first kid or not but man what a life changer. My kid is 1.5 years old and life got infinitely better.

[JWNGeorge]

I've had an H60 for 3 years. Totally fine AIO. I delidded my 7700k which gives the H60 a bit of a break and allows decent overclocking.

[Mrio]

When you started presenting I was like 'whos Mike?" Now I'm like, "where's Mike?". Welcome back and congratulations! I would take the air over the water any day. There's just a peace of mind in the simplicity of an air cooler.

[IngNomo]

Damn! What a timing, I was looking for a comparison between Low profile Air Cooling an AIO.
Great video I'm going to AIO because I live in a Warm County.

[willlopez]

Would've loved to see a 120 mm fan on the Noctua. Noctua L12g has more thermal mass then black ridge. Also would've liked to see a 140mm AIO. Great video tho!

[michaelthompson]

I’ve personally been building ITX builds in cases such as N-Case M1, Skyreach mini S4, Cooler Master NR200 (original version) and recently the Phanteks Evolv Shift XT …. I use a Cooling Loop or AIO all most setups except the Skyreach Mini S4 which I use an Alpenpfon Black Ridge which with stock fan (not 140mm due to ram clearance issues) with a Ryzen 5800X3D and temps are perfectly fine, even under full loads and long 1080P gaming sessions 🥰😇👍. I’ve been building ITX builds now since 4th Gen Intel CPUs and never looked back to air cooling unless I’m case restricted 😉. Great video Mike. Glad to see you back 🥰👍

[batu]

Thermalright AXP120-67 please!! Also with a 25mm Noctua A12 fan too lol. Also want to add that case space/motherboard compatibility factors into these ITX builds too.

[luckyowl]

I would never get an AIO over an air cooler. I like that air coolers have fewer points of failure and have a lot more longevity, as long as you have mounts for the new CPU sockets.

[odinsplaygrounds]

I use a Black Ridge with a 120mm fan UNDER it, using VLP RAM to make it fit. This way you get L12S equivalent performance at just 47mm height. This works out perfectly with the FormD T1 case which has 50mm CPU cooler height restriction in 3 Slot GPU config. One thing to note on watercooling vs air cooling, is that you will in most cases get better GPU temps since you can populate the same radiator area with fans, that don't have to push/full air through a dense radiator.

[AtomLabX]

I like air cooling, just because it is easier to install, and less headache to deal with.
And also, congrats!

[inshallah]

I’ve always been an air cool person. It has always been fun to create good airflow in a case and growing up with an og Xbox 360 has trained me well. You can’t beat the simplicity of fans.

[igavinwood]

I was always in the air cooling camp, but as cpu and gpu generations pump more heat, due to the ever increasing power draw, I'm starting to shift towards AIO to keep up with a quiet SFF build. The tech has matured and a lot of the earlier faults have been fixed. ITX cases are better designed now, so it's not unusual to see 240mm AIOs fit with a 300mm gpu (or longer). Thanks for the comparison tests. It's so useful.

[garlanramadhan]

the advantage of AiO watercooling is clear. However, since I had my AiO's pump dying for only less than 5 years, I used air cooling till now. The convenience and reliability of air cooling is just better for me in the long run.

[pesco]

i was just looking for a video like this, perfect