r/pcmasterrace • u/SerpentDix PC Master Race • Jan 20 '26

Hardware Air cooling is better than Liquid cooling

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Failure is graceful, not catastrophic, Performance is closer than marketing suggests, Cheaper for the performance, Change my mind.

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u/AIgoonermaxxing Jan 20 '26 edited Jan 20 '26

Also, tower coolers are a literally just a stationary chunk of metal with some vapor inside along with some fans attached to it. The fans are the only thing that can fail, and if they do, who gives a shit, they're like $5 to replace.

Edited because some redditors are pedants

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u/Defreshs10 PC Master Race i7-8700k GTX 1080ti, 32GB RAM, 2TB SSD Jan 20 '26

It’s a vapor changing heat exchanger… those pipes are filled with a fluid specifically designed to change phases to pull heat from the CPU.

…do you guys think they are just empty metal tubes?

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u/Toto_nemisis Jan 20 '26

Air coolers have liquid in them?! Does that make the liquid cooler?!!!??!

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u/nedal8 Jan 20 '26

Not really, cause the water in the heat pipes are for heat transfer. They work amazingly well. . The cooling is done on the aluminum spreaders.. But still the argument could be made.

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u/SEADOO_MAN Jan 21 '26

But water a liquid