Personally I have no argument that air is easier to do quieter. I know this because I've got a noisy MCP350 that I just can't shut-up in my watercooling setup, despite suspension mounting (if hanging by the tubes actually counts as a 'mount'). The WD5000KS runs a close second for noise - but that's not irritating like the pump whine.snutten wrote:...and therefore quieter than my air alternative?
That said...
I couldn't O/C on air like I do on water. I know I could do an basically inaudible system with air at stock speeds - but when you're running 3.2-3.6G from an E6600, and 800Mhz+ core from a 9800GTX, it's just NOT POSSIBLE to quietly cool that with air cooling, IMO. If someone has done it, please tell me how.
I still believe WC is the best alternative for overclockers who like (relatively) quiet PCs. Silent is quite hard (simply because pumps are difficult to work with), but is also plausible on a heavily overclocked system. The same cannot be said for air, and in fact the best air rigs still seem to rely on undervolting CPUs.