Is chipset watercooling even nessesary?

[ZeroAce]

Just as expensive as CPU or GPU cooling, but I don't even have a fan on my current chipset.

[Chiguy]

The chipset gets hot if you are overclocking since the memory controller is in there. Unless you have an Opteron or Athlon64.

[dlh75]

Alot dont have it just a heatsink. I myself think it's not needed. Buts thats my opinion. Just another way to get you to spend more. I think if it was needed then they at least would come with fans standard. Some do. Not sure why some have and some don't.

[Telexen]

It's actually better to not have a fan and use a large heatsink on a chipset...

but back to the topic...

The only reason for it is to eliminate case fans...thereby reducing noise

[beppodmime]

Depending on how absolutely extreme you are going to overclock, then yes, it may be necessary. On the nForce2 mobo's, for example, the northbridge can get extremely hot depending on the memory clock speed. However, if you were planning on using a water block on the CPU, GPU, and NB, then you'd need a pretty hefty circuit to handle all of the heat dissipated by all those chips. You'd want a good, high volume pump, and a large radiator to dissipate all of that heat quickly. If all you are going to be doing is moderate overclocking, then it's most likely not necessary.

I have an 8RGA+ running at 2.0VDD, running a 200 MHz FSB and all I did was install a fairly inexpensive active cooler on it.

[ZeroAce]

I won't be doing extreme overclocking with my current setup.

The plan is to reuse these components on my next upgrade, which will be heavily overlocked.

Also, I want to extend the life and reliability of all my important components, not just the CPU.