My C2D is 7C cooler with side panel off? Whats wrong with my airflow?

[DeepSky]

OK to start off heres my setup:

Thermaltake XaserIII (w/o purple side panel fan apparatus)
Titan Vanessa CPU cooler (w/ 90mm fan @ 46CFM)
And the rest is current in my sig...



So I turned the computer on leaving the side panel on so that the case was completely closed up...after 10 minutes of idle my coretemps were both 51 and not moving up or down.

So then I removed the side panel of my case...2 minutes pass and my coretemps were both 47...after 10 minutes my coretemps went all the way down to 43-44 and not moving.


I figure the airflow in my case must suck if leaving the side panel off cools down my CPU more than 7 degrees C.

Heres how my fans are set up now:

RED ARROWS: 80mm Fans
BLUE ARROW: 92mm CPU Fan
GREEN ARROW: 80mm PSU Fan

Any suggestions? Am I doing something fatally wrong here?

 

[J2T]

I'm not positive, but to me you need to get more fresh air in from the outside. Those drive cages look like they are probably blocking most of that front intake. Maybe try adding an intake fan on the side panel. Also I would think that top blowhole would server better to blow out since right now I would bet a majority of that fresh air is being sucked right out the PSU

 

[Burner127]

Hot air rises, so why do you want to have that 80mm fan at the top of your case push the heat back down on to your components?

 

[DeepSky]

Hot air rises, so why do you want to have that 80mm fan at the top of your case push the heat back down on to your components?

I'm retarded thats why

Thanks guys, i'm going to switch that around now.

Maybe try adding an intake fan on the side panel.

Would I want to bring in fresh air with this?

 

[mobitsfa]

Yes intake means bring air in.

 

[Burner127]

I'm retarded thats why

Thanks guys, i'm going to switch that around now.




Would I want to bring in fresh air with this?

If you can also switch the 92mm so that it pushes air towards the back of your machine where the other exhaust fans are-- that would be helpful too.

 

[mobitsfa]

Also, is there anyway you can put your cpu fan on the right side, so it's blowing air out through the back fans. That would be way better than how you have it now.

Edit: I was too late

 

[montaillou]

That internal fan that you have blowing air down towards your mobo - just my opinion, but I've always had fans in this config pulling up. If that's right on top of a hot spot, exhausting hot air away from it is more efficient than blowing on (opnion), and if you reverse your fan on top, they would work hand-in-hand I think.

Also, you might consider installing a something on the case floor for air intake. The other day I felt the bottom of my case and it was actually cold - probably 58f whereas the top of the case is probably 70f. I see it looks pretty cramped down there, 120mm would be best, but maybe a couple smaller fans side-by-side would work.

 

[nvidiaOCmaster]

CPU fan needs to point <<<


Top fan needs to be an exhaust.

Side panel intake, if its tword the bottom. If its on the top of the panel, don't bother.

 

[Cjwinnit]

This case is a prime candidate for modding.

Top fan should be exhaust. The front grills can be cut out, the back grills can be cut out and the top metal grille can be cut and the plastic cover can be modified. If you have the patience the grill in the window can be cut & filed, these things in combination will definately help. There's a huge thread on this case in Cooling. http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=270542

Also if it's possible, have the CPU heatsink set up so that the air flows up or backwards (either reverse the fan or remount the heatsink in a different modification).

 

[archilochus]

This might help, also. See pics in album to see changes made over time.

http://groups.msn.com/MOBYSHOME/_whatsnew.msnw

 

[MadMan007]

You can try the things people have said already but the key is try and test. There's no certainty that one thing would be better than another.

My personal example of this is in a similar case that has a top blow-hole. The fan originally came as an exhaust blowing air out. I decided to try it blowing air in and found no significant difference (maybe 1C but that could be a measurement or ambient issue) and even with the fan turned off the result was the same. That surprised me. One thing I'd thought of but never tried, maybe you could, is to use that fan as an intake with a duct to direct the air right near the CPU heatsink. The thinking is this would provide an injection of external air right in to the intake stream of the CPU heatsink, if you want to try it just make a mock-up out of cardboard then later make it pretty out of think Lexan.

 

[DeepSky]

well i've been test and trying stuff you've all suggested and I think I narrowed it down to crappy intake fans in the front.

I put the side of the case on (completely closed) and idle temps went from 40 to 48 in just over a minute. Then I open the whole front of the case clean the air filters on the fan and leave the front of the case open and idle temps go down to 43. Still not as good as the temps with the side of the case off, but livable.

So now I think i'm going to cut away the front 2 fan's grills and see if I can close the front panel w/o temps going any higher.



OH and I also remounted the heatsink so I could mount the fan directing air towards the exhaust. Any other suggestions?

 

[shadow300z]

I just stumbled across this thread and will add that I have a very similar setup and experience the exact same problem. Aside from the fact that my e6400 only gets down to about 40(C), when I close the case up it jumps to about 50(C).

Did you figure out the problem deepsky?