[rmfought]

OK, case is Enermax CS-10181 and airflow was poor. So I took my trusty Dremel to it and cut out the side intake grills (blue plastic bullseye still in though). Setup is as follows:

2x80mm in front
2x80mm in side
1x80mm out back (upper slot)
1xPCI exhaust under video card

Results:

Before Mod, Case Closed (no filters)
Idle: Case 33C, CPU 41C
Load: Case 33C, CPU 44C

Before Mod, Case Side Open
Idle: Case 30C, CPU 37C
Load: Case 30C, CPU 42C

After Mod, Case Closed (no filters)
Idle: Case 30C, CPU 37C
Load: Case 30C, CPU 42

After Mod, Case Closed (filters on side fans)
Idle: Case 32C, CPU 40C
Load: Case 32C, CPU 44C

Pics (Dots on blue bullseyes are from dust!)




Room temp is ~24C. Conclusion: 2-4C drop in temps from removing the grills, but the filters (standard ones for the case) are just as bad at blocking airflow. I'm going to go ahead and cut out the blue bullseyes, do the front fans, and then experiment with different filter materials to see if I can get better airflow through them. I made a trip to Home Depot and got three varieties. I'd like to reach the point where my case temp is actually cooler with the case closed.

[archilochus]

You seem to be forgetting the top blow hole.It was the worst one on my Xaser III case. I would recommend placing a 120mm in the top position. Are your wires and cables out of the air paths?Check out this thread in the link.THE FANMAN

MOD THREAD LINK

BLOW HOLE PIC LINK

[clocker2]

Congratulations on your success so far...it gets more difficult from here on.
I had a XaserIII case which appears to be very similar to yours.

Given the sheer internal volume of the case it is difficult to establish significant airflow patterns with the stock 80mm fans. Moving up to 92mms will help a lot.
Increasing the size of your roof blowhole will also help as will unshrouding it as you have done for your sidepanel fans.

Good luck finding a reasonably effective filter material that doesn't significantly decrease airflow.
I gave up and just resigned myself to frequent blow outs.

[SewerBeing]

nice, I need to do it badly too. did your system become quieter?

[Strages]

If you design your cooling system right, you don't need filters!!!!! It's called PASCAL'S PRINCIPLE!! Both gases and liquid have a tendancy towards lower pressure zones, and air, being a gas, is goverened by this simple principle. If you design your airflow, like I did, to get you positive pressure (more intakes than exhaust) inside the case you get two benefits 1) lower temps; the more air molecules in the case, the tighter they are packed - which in turn gives you better convection (what you want in an air cooled setup) and then 2) less dust collection!! This works just like the opposite of a vacuum cleaner. A vacuum cleaner has a HUGE fan blowing air out, creating a HUGE low pressure zone inside the bag, which in turn sucks massive amounts of everything into the interior of the vacuum. Same thing works in a case, if you have negative pressure, your case acts like a huge vacuum cleaner. If you have positive pressure then the air inside your case wants to leave your case (ie, move to lower pressure, which in this application happens to be outside your case) so in turn, any dust you pull in gets exhausted out - so very little dust collection. I have no filters whatsoever over my fans and I have no visible dust build up on anything .

[rmfought]

Thanks for the replies - yeah, I got a lot of work to do yet.

I haven't played with the blowhole yet, it does look pretty restrictive but I'm sure the Dremel can cure that.

The 80mm fans are an assortment of generic models, nothing special. I'll have to check the model numbers and see what they are actually rated at. They may be worth replacing.

Didn't really notice the system being any quieter.

The positive pressure sounds like a great idea, I'll have to give it a go. I'd love not to have to mess with filters at all. I just have a lot of dust in my office. I tried 3 different filter materials tonight, and 2 of them only gave me a 1C increase in temps. Of course, their dust-collecting capabiltiies will take longer to evaluate.

I figure I'll finish modding the rest of the case, maybe gets some quality fans, see if I can't achieve positive case pressure and go from there.

Thanks for the tips guys!

[Como]

anyone have an idea of the stock antec filter's horridness? i've left mine in as i had forgotten about it till now...