Unconvential fan idea

[cougem]

Hi, I usually like to think my idea of fan placement's alright. But this is a bit different from usual;

I've recently upgraded to water cooling and although at idle I get temps of around 28/29 degrees when there's a draught (regardless of temperature) if there's no air movement I can get idle temps of around 32/33. I know this may just be because there's no air movement over the thermistor, and that the temperatures may not be much lower, but I'm not actively cooling the motherboard chipset, and the hard drives and other components produce a pair amount of heat also.

Therefore I am considering some good aircooling to get flow through the case. Silence is pedigree and so I've decided on putting one (or two) 120mm fans (near silent thermaltake thunderblades, but should still shift easily enough air since it's for air movement rather than actual cooling) in the positions shown:



This isn't the norm I know, but due to the present of a window, and a rad housing above my case, and the ability to only have 1 80mm fan at the rear of the case, I don't have much choice.
It means I'll have the fan(s) on the other side of the drive bays, next to the motherboard, as shown (sort of) in the pic below:



I also have an 80mm fan shown here:



The top arrow shows the 80MM fan, while I may open up the PCI slots below to allow more air intake/outtake.

The question is, do you think this is a suitable idea, considering my options? And which way round would you put the fans? If I were to only use one 120mm fan, would you advise me using it as an exhaust so air is sucked in over the CPU (and GPU if I open up the PCI slots?) or have it blowing in, increasing pressure, and having the 80mm sucking air out of the case, over the processor? And would you opinions change if I were to use 120mm fans?

Thanks,

-coug

[bigben2k]

Honestly, I think it'd be a shame to ruin such a pretty case (really!).

In your position, I'd consider making something sleek looking. Consider a couple of small blowers (goto svc.com to see what I mean, no I'm not affiliated with them). You could them have an air intake slot (or two) that's about 1/2" high and 1 inch wide, cut into the right side panel. Cover those holes with a grill, to make it look like the small openings were drilled into the panel. These can be positionned under the HDDs (This process was linked to, recently).

You might not get as much air flow, but you'll definitely get enough for your purpose.

[freeloadingbum]

Originally Posted by cougem

The top arrow shows the 80MM fan, while I may open up the PCI slots below to allow more air intake/outtake.

If you have 4 empty PCI slots you can easily mount a 80mm fan there, works great

[cougem]

Ah OK. Ben did you mean you think adding a 120mm fan would ruin the looks, or you wouldn't dare risk it incase it went wrong and looked shoddy? Because I can get it done by a prefessional cutter with a hole cutter if that's your worry.

[bigben2k]

No, I meant that cutting a hole and adding a fan grill would ruin the sleek look of the case.

The slot blower would be even better. Overclockers reviewed a VGA cooler slot-fan that would probably be ideal.

[Colt357tw]

Cut the motherboard tray and induce some cool outside air to the back of your motherboard.

[Blackeagle]

Originally Posted by freeloadingbum

If you have 4 empty PCI slots you can easily mount a 80mm fan there, works great

I agree 100%, and even a modest powered 80mm fan will move far more air than those PCI slot blowers do.

With a second 80mm exhaust, then go with a 120mm intake fan where you showed down low. I'd not stack a second fan above myself, it looks like flow would be to restricted to gain you much. If you want a second intake you could do like colt45 said, put one in behind the MB tray. This would be even more restricted, but would cool the MB from behind, which would, I think, gain you more than a seoond one stacked above the lower 120mm would. But if you try one back of the MB I would go more than 80mm, anything more than that would gain nothing, as the restrictive area just isn't going to allow a very large cfm anyway.