The takeaway: YouTuber TrashBench recently tackled a topic that many PC hardware enthusiasts and overclockers have likely contemplated at some point – stuffing a system inside a freezer. While most such attempts fail miserably for a variety of reasons, TrashBench showed that with tempered expectations and the right setup, it is possible to achieve a limited degree of success.
The YouTuber started with modest – some would say heavily dated – hardware including an Intel Core i7-9700K CPU and a GTX 1070 GPU. For cooling, he went with a chest-style deep freezer and modified it with extra insulation around the lid to help keep outside air from getting inside.
The hardware was suspended from rubber straps, and copious amounts of silica gel were used to wick moisture from the air. TrashBench gave the setup time to stabilize, essentially creating a cache of cold air inside. Then, it was time to benchmark.
The focus of the experiment was on GPU overclocking, and the results were a bit underwhelming. The super-chilled environment (-26 degrees Celsius) only netted an additional 240 MHz or so of overclocking headroom. In Far Cry 6, this only resulted in three extra frames per second and in Cyberpunk 2077, four additional frames. In Shadow of the Tomb Raider, the OC'ed freezer system gained eight FPS.
Impressively enough, the hardware was bone dry when removed from the freezer. Usually, condensation ends up interfering and either wrecking hardware or halting similar projects prematurely. At least now, we know it is possible to keep moisture at bay if you take the right preventative measures and don't run the system 24/7.
All things considered, the setup does technically work but it is not exactly practical. TrashBench concludes that it might be worth the time and effort for those interested in extreme overclocking but for everyone else running at stock clocks, you are better off not even bothering.
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Enthusiast proves it is possible to operate a PC inside a freezer, but not really worth the hassle
