PC Air Cooling Tips: Fan and Wire Placement

[CJE-P]

Would you like to comment on the article PC Air Cooling Tips: Fan and Wire Placement ? Use this forum thread to share your ideas.

[Sterling_Aug]

It's not too bad of an article.

I go to even further extremes with my systems. I twist the power cables for the hard drives into a tight spiral. This makes for better cooling and less chance for dust to cling to them. I twist the power supply line to the mobo and then wrap it in clear 2" wide packing tape. All cables are then snaked thru the case and either cable tied in place or I use bread twist ties. In the past, I have split my IDE cables and rounded them myself, but that takes a lot of time.

[Kender]

This may seem like a really stupid question, but I was wondering if you could stack fans for increased output?

Does that even make sense?

I was thinking of screwing 2 fans together, one on top of the other.

Has anyone tried this? I mean, I'd do it myself, but I don't have a working mobo A.T.M.

[RamonGTP]

i don't think that would work too well... You'd be MUCH better off putting the fans next to each other.

[Sterling_Aug]

Stacking the fans increase the air pressure between the fans but lowers the output CFM.

Placing more fans side by side or across from each other gives better cooling in the long run.

[DaveLeclerc]

I was playing around doing that same thing a month ago. The CFM drops very noticeably, the fans get louder, and the CPU gets hotter. Its like a two person bike, one is always doing all the work. They seem to fight over who gets to work. Overall not very worth it, but it was fun playing with them.

[iconoclastic]

What no one has done recently is use an exhaust blower or turbine to remove the hot air from the system

Replaceing the fans with in power supply with an external furnace style blower in an appropriate size can reduce the amount of heat held in a system but even better would be the idea to place a blower on top of the case and direct all fans in the systems inward so that the air would exhaust out to top of the case

An overpreasured system will accelerate the air out of the top of the case if it has suficent exhaust capacilty

Case design is still another problem if you attempt to use filters to trap dust and do not clean them on a regular basis and cleaning for even the above average user often is based on ease of use or accessibility

Far to many cases have the power supply at the top of the case where it becomes part of a heat trap , the heat then radiates back into the case while building up directly above the power supply.

Even louvers located above the power supply would help to reduce the amount heat trapped and cool the power supply, case design might need a more areodynamic less square edges a rounded top ro adjusr the flow and ease the turbulance effect that cost in both efficency and money

We have cases that are still basicly the same design developed for the XT @ 4Mhz with all the same heat and air flow constraints.

No the board does not dictate the case design surprisingly economics does and drive placement is not mandated that each drive be stacked so close together that they have no air circulation between them because the manufacturers hasve not allocated any space between drives.

Think about it if you were to mount your 3.5 hard drive (s)perpendiculer to the drive cage you would have room to place a tape drive, memory card reader floopy in the standard 3 exposed bay configuration mount one hard drive to each side and still have good air flow for cooling

Most cases have sliding sides that lift off but perhaps hinging the case sides to the front would enable one to mount fans that would cool the drives as they moved air into the system.

Sealing the joint surfaces also helps the average user to keep components clean reducing turbulace within the case while wire wraps have been mentioned the best type would be automotive coil types that allow you to leave some wires out where they are needed and continue on to the destination

The standard molex plug configuation is based on wireing that may be too light (wire gauge) for the job required limiting the true number of connections available longer wires would need heavier gauges to be considered adiquite for the job at hand

This actually may be solved in part by the new ATA and USB drives.

Now you have one other thing to consider how fast is going to be too hot, have you ever seen the specifactions for the fans in your system and thier optium RPM have you blueprinted them to confirm what is too much or too little air flow

Just the thoughts of an old system builder with too much time on his hands.

[ichorid]

good points, but not enough

its too short, and most of it is obvious stuff.

nevermind, im sure itll help a lot of people

[iconoclastic]

Which was obivious? the original story or my comments?

So who wants to pay for a properly areodynamically designed case,,,,,,,,,that would maximize cooling without being water or refridgation cooled?

[Dracas]

Mac G5 Users.

They may be designed for cooling, but they certainly are ugly

[CyberSpaceCowboy]

This may me slightly off topic. I have variable speed fans with remote sensors and one of those cheap drive bay digital temp readouts with remote bulb sensors (not interfacing with the BIOS temp sensors).

What's the best location to place wired sensors? Will taping them directly to the CPU and GPU heatsinks give an accurate reading or would it read high? Will Scotch tape (and the sensor) bulbs themselves stand up to the heat?

I've got the case side porthole fan blowing in, towards the CPU and GPU. It came facing the other way with the case.

When I play GTA3, the CD comes out noticably warm. This is the only game that does this. I think a top porthole fan would cool better than one of those drive bay mount fans.

[iconoclastic]

Originally posted by CyberSpaceCowboy
This may me slightly off topic. I have variable speed fans with remote sensors and one of those cheap drive bay digital temp readouts with remote bulb sensors (not interfacing with the BIOS temp sensors).
What's the best location to place wired sensors? Will taping them directly to the CPU and GPU heatsinks give an accurate reading or would it read high? Will Scotch tape (and the sensor) bulbs themselves stand up to the heat?

1st things first the perfect place for that sensor would be directly under the CPU any tape would need to be heat resistant to 100C to remain in place

I've got the case side porthole fan blowing in, towards the CPU and GPU. It came facing the other way with the case.

Now go to some place that sells fabrics and buy some nylon ribbon or silk ribbon cut little strips and tie them about the inside of the case and near your various fans get out your digitral camera and check the air flow as you adjust and move your fans photograph or mave some short movies till you can optimise the results remember that in some conditions you could negate the quality and capability of the fans you are useing
the air in your system should have a circulation pattern that moves the air about your system to a controlled exhaust port and out of the power supply as well ( in a smooth consistent pattern.)

Think of air like water in a stream if it crashes against it self it stalls and becomes stagnent (getting hotter) ,


When I play GTA3, the CD comes out noticably warm. This is the only game that does this. I think a top porthole fan would cool better than one of those drive bay mount fans.

Drive bay fans need to move the cooler room air past the drive(s) to the inside of the system and then to an exit point,
The exit only fan might not have enough volumne without those needed drive bay fans when the drives are spinning at 7200+rpm and creating stagnent heat pockets above and below the drives

you have to have a balanced air flow just slightly overpreasured (more cool air in than hot out but not a great difference between the two temprature ranges ,

[CaptHandsome]

I know this post is pretty old but I happened upon it and I find it funny how some people OBSESS over cooling.....and I'm not bashing because I am guilty as well. First off I think water cooling is a STUPID expensive way to cool your computer. Also, cooling is partly for performance stability and partly for the longevity of your components. But how many fanatics do you know that go and drop a few hundred bucks here and there for brand new components every month? I know quite a few myself. So with that said, what is the point of such extreme cooling when only half of its purpose is really being used? Also, take a look at retail systems (ie Dell, HP, Compaq, Gateway etc). They almost never have more than 1 fan if that, and the one fan is usually on the cpu if you are lucky (my old system was and HP that didnt have a cpu fan, only 1 exhaust fan on the psu, and one of those crappy heat ducts OVER the cpu...but still no fan...all together 2 fans in the whole system, one on the psu and one on the PCI radeon card i got cuz there was no AGP slot on my mobo). Obviously those computers generally arent for the oc'ers and performance users that most of us associate w/extensive cooling but that is still something to think about. Dell computers are, for the most part, quite reliable and i have a few friends who play UT2003, Raven Shield, and other high perf. games and they've never had problems. So thats about it. I figure for most people more than 3 fans is overkill, and for oc'ers and the like, more than 4 case fans is just for bragging right. Cuz, who wants an ugly case that stays hot all the time and doesnt have pretty lights shinning in your face at night, keeping you awake?? NO ONE!!!!

[polarnomad]

Quick question. I have slots for four fans in my case (two front, two rear), of which two are currently taken up by fans (one front, one rear). Which means that there are gaping holes in the vacant slots below both of the fans. Should I plug those holes up to optimize airflow?

[Ankun]

i'd spend a couple bucks and get 2 more fans rather than plug em.