intake outtake?

which way is intake, and which was is outake? How can i tell?

Also, when installing on the cpu, how do i know which way to place the fan?

Welcome to the Forums. I hope the following helps. Intake refers to the fans that blow air into your case. Out-take or exhaust refers to air blowing air out of your case. Usually you'll want your fan blowing towards your CPU. You can tell the direction of the air flow of fan by looking on the side of it for an arrow that points towards the direction of the air flow.

i have the panflo fan, and i do see the arrow. I also have the alpha heatsink. I've looked at pictures of people using the same hsf as me, and they have the airflow blowing away from the cpu. I also looked at my current computer that was made by hp, they also have the aifrlow blowing away from the cpu. If I'm always seeing pictures of these fans blowing air away from the cpu, then why are people in these forums telling me to blow air to my cpu?

Also, in my hp computer it has an air duct blowing air to my cpu, and the fan is blowing away from my cpu, why would they do this? The 2 fans are fightning eachother.

So far 2 people have told me to blow air to the cpu, while my investigations with pictures and opening up computers reveal the fans blowing away from the computer...

I was using the Alpha PAL8045 before and best cooling with it is with the fan blowing away from it. Still it will cool okay with the fan blowing into it. I tried it both ways and found it a little better with the fan blowing away from the CPU/heatsink. Like I said before "usually" you want the fan blowing towards your heat sink. The Alpha is one of the exceptions.

However, if you're ducting air to your your Alpha/CPU, then it makes sense to have your heat sink fan blowing towards the Alpha.