Side panel fan help

[Whiteshadow]

Hello again.

I have a question about side panel fans.
I currently have a Cooler Master 690 ii Advanced which has 2 side panel fan slots.
Ive tried different setups but they all seem to have little if any effect. Using fans as intake only seems to blow dust directly onto the components and into my graphics cards heat sink (asus eah 6850) with no significant temperature changes. Ive also tried using the lower slot as exhaust which is next to my graphics card while using FurMark but that actualy increases the max temp of the gpu from 72C to 74C.

Is there actualy a good reason for using side panel fans?
Could someone please inform me what side fans can be used for and if so, what configurations they should be set up as?

Another quick question- If anyone has a 'CM hyper 412 slim' cpu cooler, could you please tell me if both of the fans are PWM compatible and use a single mobo connection.

Thanks in advance.

 

[bluezero5]

if you have more than 1 GPU, the side panel fans are actually very helpful is feeding in air to the GPU's exhaust, when there's not enough air, the pressure drops a little, and that makes the GPU hotter according to Pressure law. PV=nRT. Therefore keeping the pressure as high as possible with fresh air is recommended. especially when you have multiple cards where airflows becomes restrictive.

just 1 card though. yeah, won't help much. Only useful if you have more exhaust than intakes in those cases.