cooling my case

[albxor]

Hi, first of all sorry for my bad english.

I want to get some suggestions for cooling my case efficiently. It has a 12cm fan in the front getting air, and a 8cm fan in one lateral side drawing air. I want to put a 12 cm fan in the rear for draw air, but i dont know if i should change the lateral fan in order it gets air.

also i want to know how good are the pci slot fans for cooling the vga.

thanks in advance.

 

[assasin32]

Generally (not always) the front is used as intake, rear as exhaust, and the fans on the side pannel are used as intake as well. Setting up the rear exhaust should help alot by getting rid of alot of hot air in the PC.

If you set up the rear fan as an intake you mess up the air flow direction in the case quite a bit and now have air circuilating around awhile before the fan on the power supply sucks it out.

 

[geofelt]

In general, you want the front fan to take in air, and the back fan to exhaust air, creating a nice flow.
The side fan is usually an intake fan. Some side fans do more harm than good by disrupting the airflow. Try it with and without a side fan to see which works beter.

A slot fan can be very effective for some vga cards. The 8800GTS/GTX stock coolers are good, sending hot air out the back. Those cards have four slits where some hot air can escape into the case. I mounted a slot fan just under the vga card, where the slot-fan intake was right under the slits. It helped both my vga temperatures and cpu temperatures noticeably. In general, if the intake to the slot fan can be placed to capture a source of hot air, then they can be good.

 

[V3NOM]

basically front+side = intake rear+top = exhaust.

Expansion slot coolers can be good or bad... some suck in air and shoot it out the back of the expansion slot, some blow air upwards to the graphics card. this could be beneficial or bad for the cooling f a graphics card depending on the situation.

 

[albxor]

thanks for answer.

I have a zotac 8800 gt, should i use an PCI fan to exhaust air?

 

[Superhal]

it's better if you list your cooling issues, some solutions work better than others.

 

[geofelt]

thanks for answer.

I have a zotac 8800 gt, should i use an PCI fan to exhaust air?

I don't think a slot fan will help. They are cheap, so I suppose you could try it. The reason is that the Zotac and most 8800GT coolers do not use two slots to send the hot air out of the case. The coolers get heat off of the vga card ok, but depend on your case cooling to get the hot air out of the case. Remember that a strong vga card will be the biggest heat producer in your case. Far exceeding the cpu.

For the 8800GT, look at the EVGA Akimbo cooler.
http://www.evga.com/products/moreinfo.asp?pn=202-F2-EV03-A1

 

[V3NOM]

to repeat myself -.- it depends on the slot cooler... if its the type that sucks air in and throws it out the back, then that will increase the temps of your graphics card most likely. if it instead blows it UP into the graphics card then that should DECREASE the temps. it also depends in which slot you place it in realtion to hte graphics card...

 

[geofelt]

to repeat myself -.- it depends on the slot cooler... if its the type that sucks air in and throws it out the back, then that will increase the temps of your graphics card most likely. if it instead blows it UP into the graphics card then that should DECREASE the temps. it also depends in which slot you place it in realtion to hte graphics card...

V3NOM, I would like to disagree with you on this.
It is most important to get heat OUT of the case as directly as possible, instead of recirculating it.
From actual experience, a slot cooler mounted under the 4 exit slits of a 8800GTS-640 reduced both my vga temperatures AND the cpu temperatures.

 

[Superhal]

what he's refering to is that gpu cards' hsf's blow up. if you have an exhaust sucking down, it is bad for the graphics card. also, he says "should." my card, the 8600 GT gains about -2C with the exhaust fan under it, while other cards may not.

 

[V3NOM]

if the slot cooler is sucking air in and throwing it out the back then that leaves no air for the gpu fan to pull in and throw out!

 

[geofelt]

if the slot cooler is sucking air in and throwing it out the back then that leaves no air for the gpu fan to pull in and throw out!

In the case of a 8800GTS-640, the slot cooler is sucking hot air that escapes from the four slots in the card. The vga card still gets it's supply of cool air from the front intake fans.
Without the slot cooler, the air from the slits gets recirculated, heating up the air that circulates through both the cpu and the vga card.

 

[V3NOM]

ok well i think we had all better stop this silly bickering and have a proper solution: DUMP IT IN A LAKE!

 

[iluvgillgill]

^+1

LOL

 

[Superhal]

i think bottom line is that if the gpu is sucking directly over the exhaust fan, it's a bad idea.

in any other situation, a pci exhaust fan seems to help.

 

[V3NOM]

indeed. however i still think dumping it in a lake...

 

[Superhal]

while in the lake, make sure the exhaust fan and the gpu fan don't suck in opposite directions.

 

[iluvgillgill]

and the CPU fan as well!point it towards the exhaust or PSU if its got a 120mm extraction fan.

 

[albxor]

i think i'm going to forget the pci fan for the moment.

 

[V3NOM]

yeah, so do i, but just remember if you have a little pond....