High-budget: Water or air?

[parablooper]

I've been agonizing over which CPU cooler would be appropriate for my friend's FX-8350. We don't want to kill the processor, but we'll probably just run it through AMD OverDrive auto on a voltage boost and see what frequency pops out. Point is, we need a cooler.

By purchasing his computer parts for over $500 he received a $50 newegg gift card, which puts our total budget for this CPU cooler at a decent $100.

First, let me lay down the facts.

1. Right now he is on stock heatsink. It turns into a jet engine when under stress.
2. While our budget is $100, something cheaper would be preferable.
3. We want something that will be both quiet, and keep the CPU under 70C while overclocked.
4. The maximum possible heatsink height on his case is 160mm.
5. A 120mm/140mm radiator is preferable for CLC (as opposed to 240mm/280mm), since we don't want to deal with compatibility issues.

Now my two questions are:
1. What liquid/air cooling solution do you recommend?
2. Is it safe to mount a single-fan-width radiator (120mm/140mm) to exhaust at the top of the case? Or does that cause problems with the fan bearings?

 

[dma0991]

1. If its AIO, my suggestion would be for a 240mm radiator unit, provided that you have a case that fits. Anything less and it would be less likely to cool an overclocked FX8350 below 70C, which is already a difficult task for a 240mm radiator and possibly unachievable with a single thick 120mm radiator.

Since its for a friend, I'm assuming that you would not be involved with maintaining it a few years from now which makes air cooling a better choice as its nearly fool proof. If you're certain that the maximum height is 160mm, go for a Noctua NH-D14.

2. Only if you're using cheap sleeve bearing fans. Good quality sleeved bearing fans tend to fare a lot better. Still better to mount it at the back.

 

[parablooper]

Don't wanna threadspam, so I'll put my new question here.

I had a new idea for liquid cooling while keeping quiet. I'm planning on buying a half-decent 120mm radiator, tossing the pre-installed fan(s), and attaching this high-performance fan: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835242033

It's 140mm and mounts onto 120mm slots. The slot at the back of my friend's case is 120mm maximum (there's a pre-installed fan there, which we will take out).

So we mount the radiator on the back coupled with a high-quality fan. My only concern is power connectors. What kind of connectors do CLCs require? I've heard the pump uses a 3-pin for power and the PWM fan uses 4-pin. The motherboard has one 4-pin CPU slot free (once we take off stock heatsink) and one 3-pin free (once we take off the pre-installed 120mm fan). Will this be enough to power a CLC and aftermarket fan?

Also, what is the best 120mm CLC for radiator alone? Fan does not matter in this case.