120mm fan on back

[cowgod2007]

So I'm getting a new 120mm fan for the back of my case. Wondering if i should make the fan suck air inside the case or blow air out of the case. I have a front 120mm fan blowing air out the front and a side fan rite on top of my gpu blowing air out of there. Which way hould air be blown: out or in? Btw, I have a stock AMD cooler for my amd phenom II x3, if that makes any difference.

 

[Motopsychojdn]

rear fan, exhaust
Moto

 

[jefe323]

the rear fan should be an exhaust

 

[hunter315]

Customarily, fans on the front and side blow in while fans on the top and back blow out because fans on the front tend to be lower so the airflow is towards the back and upward which is how hot air travels anyway.

 

[cowgod2007]

Customarily, fans on the front and side blow in while fans on the top and back blow out because fans on the front tend to be lower so the airflow is towards the back and upward which is how hot air travels anyway.

Makes sense. But I usually set my side panel fans to blow out and I've generally gotten great results. If anyone wanted to know, I have the NZXT Beta Evo case.

 

[Motopsychojdn]

If it works for you it works, No-one can argue with success
My own Roof fans are intakes,not exhausts
but the guidelines/customary orientation are just that, guidelines, nothing to stop you tweaking to see what suits your Rig better though
Moto

 

[damasvara]

Makes sense. But I usually set my side panel fans to blow out and I've generally gotten great results. If anyone wanted to know, I have the NZXT Beta Evo case.

Does the side fan is a 200mm one? If so, making it an exhaust is a wise decision.

Well, in terms of hot and cool air, the positioning of rear and front doesn't really matters. It's the upper or lower installation you should be considering.

In fact, considering the intake usually sucks in dust, a rear intake fan (close to the wall, I assume) can minimize the pile up. Meaning, less maintenance intervals.

There is one more consideration, the negative and positive air balance. Although, I don't really take this into account, since my rig is a cool one (undervolted).

Just make some experiments on fan placements while monitoring the temperature.

For reference, I've got mine with 1 x 120mm side lower intake, 1 x 80mm side upper exhaust, 2 x 6mm rear upper exhaust (comes with the case) and 1 80mm other side upper exhaust (near the HDD). With my low voltage tweak, the ambient temperature never reach 40 degree Celsius.

But as Moto said, which ever works for you is good enough.