Radiator Size

[Ninjutsu PiloT]

I've been reading various guides and posts about water cooling which I will be employing in my next mod for the first time. http://www.thebestcasescenario.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10056 was extremely informative but one question i can't seem to find the answer to (and I could of just missed it) is how radiator size effects cooling.

Obviously the bigger the radiator the more cooling it can provide but 80mm vs. 500mm is a huge difference. I run a moderate gaming system, 8800 gts, AMD 64X2 5400 and want to be able to expand, but not have to buy too much in excess.

Any references or help would be greatly appreciated.

[The boy 4rm oz]

By radiator size do you mean the overall thickness of the radiator, the amount of fans it can support or the size of the supported fans?

[Ninjutsu PiloT]

Overall thickness of the radiator itself

[The boy 4rm oz]

It just improves the surface area of the radiator. Also allows you to mount a radiator in a confined space. Generally I think the thicker radiators cool better. Also the thicker radiators require fans with a lower cfm rating to perform at their peak. This is generally good because the lower the cfm of the fan generally means lower noise rating.

[DonT-FeaR]

im sure that helped me...