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Creating the Most Efficient / Quiet Air Cooling

C

Cod

Gawd
Joined
Mar 21, 2003
Messages
642
I need some help from the cooling and silence gurus. Here is my current airflow setup:



The green arrows represent air coming in and yellow arrows is air leaving. The problem is, my PC sits in a TV stand with very little space around the edges. As depicted, there are 2-inches on each side, 3-inches to the rear, and 1.5-inches above. The 120mm fans are Scythe 120mm (SY1225SL12LM-P) for quiet, efficient cooling. There are two 80mm exhaust grates and a single "air" grate in the top-rear of the case, so air escapes through it as well (not shown in image). Last, I'm using the Intel stock cooler (NH-L12 ordered this morning) and the stock fans on the MSI R7850. I should mention the TV stand has a 4cm hole centered behind the PC for all the wires.

My problem is keeping the system cool after an hour or so of gaming. The temps aren't out of control, but as my gaming session goes on, the system gets louder and louder in order to keep the load temps down. Temps at stock are around 64C (CPU) and 70C (GPU). The ambient temp is around 26C (live in Hawaii). I plan on OC'ing in the future, but want to get all the stock temps a little lower first and ensure the overall cooling is efficient (especially around the GPU). The other issue I'm having is getting the hot air of of the TV stand (or at least off the bottom shelf).

Is there any way to make the cooling more efficient while maintaining a certain level of silence? Would adding a single 80mm exhaust fan in the rear help? Would a PCI slot cooler help? Regardless, I HAVE to ensure the system is rather quiet since my wife and kids use it to stream stuff.

Sorry for the long post. Any help is greatly appreciated.
 
If your case is the one in your sig, the GD05, then the short answer would be no. The fans on the case aren't exactly silent, and even running undervolted can still be heard. I have it as an htpc in a similar space, and the only way to bring the temps and noise down some, was to remove the back cover of my tv stand. I cutout the backpanel, where the yellow arrows are in your diagram, giving the hot air more room to move.

The only way I managed to get it very quiet ( again, not silent) was to have none of the fans running, and using a passively cooled 7750 card. I could still hear the cpu fan and hard drives working though.
However, temps would get too high after extensive tv viewing/dvr scheduling, and any decent games were not playable.

At this point, the only thing to do to make this as close to silent as possible, is have no hd drives, run only with ssd's, use a quieter low profile cpu fan, quiet psu and passively cooled gfx card. And temps would still be an issue if used as mine has been for the past 14 months (ie daily tv viewing/recording/light gaming).
 
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Like sonic said, you basically NEED to give the air somewhere to go. I cut out an exhaust vent at the back of the stand and put a fan there. When I got my tv stand with the compartments and the cardboard backing I guess it is my PS3 would get insanely hot. I cut a 120mm hole at the back and mounted a fan to pull fresh air thru the compartment and my PS3 is nice and cool.

Excuse the dust lol

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Thanks for the inputs.

Sonicboom, silence is not the problem right now. I've got the thing inaudible most of the time and just barely audible under heavy loads (when GPU fans get above 50%). I replaced all the case fans before I turned the computer on for the first time then immediately installed SpeedFan to setup a custom profile. So the case fans are inaudible as well.

devil_trigger, I thought about cutting a hole in the rear of the TV stand; however, the stand has a solid wood back and not sure how well that idea would be received by the wifey.

Would adding a very low noise 80mm fan for exhaust in the rear help at all? My thinking is the faster I can get the hot air out the better; however, once its out, it has to go through the hole or up and out over the cable box (top shelf). If there is no added benefit from an exhaust fan or PCI cooler, I guess my next option would be to bump up the fan settings a few % points at a time and test to ensure it stays quiet enough. I have some wiggle room on the noise front since I currently have all fans set at absolute minimums unless the temps get above 55C (only under load). I'm beginning to think after adding the aftermarket cooler, bumping up the fan speeds a few may be the best bet.
 
Ah, gotcha. Well modding the tv stand was really my last alternative, so I can see how it may not be the optimal choice. I would try speeding the fans up a bit then, and maybe you can reach an acceptable, lower temperature. How well do the fans you have now cool the case if you turned them on full blast?
Adding an extra 80mm may help, but outside of it going full speed it cannot move too much air, and if it does, it becomes noticeable.
 
6x 120mm fans intake with only 2x 80mm exhaust... over 6 times as much intake as exhaust area! ?!?!? Lots of static pressure but not much airflow. Could you turn the 2x 120 on left side into exhaust? Not sure of layout in your case so don't know if it's possible or not.

You could try boxing the intake fans away from exhaust. Cardboard down right side of case to back with cutouts for fans. This will seperate the hot exhaust from the cool intake.
 
sonicboom said:
How well do the fans you have now cool the case if you turned them on full blast?
Click to expand...
Here are the case fans I'm using: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835185144. They each push a lot of air (up to 75 CFM) and run pretty quietly at all speeds. I run them at 30 - 40% most of the time with a steady rise with temps. At 80%, the fans manage to help keep the CPU / mobo temps around 70C when running an Intel Burn Test. When I replace the stock Intel cooler, the case fans won't have to work as hard, so I may get a little more headroom for upping speeds.

doyll said:
6x 120mm fans intake with only 2x 80mm exhaust... over 6 times as much intake as exhaust area! ?!?!? Lots of static pressure but not much airflow. Could you turn the 2x 120 on left side into exhaust? Not sure of layout in your case so don't know if it's possible or not..
Click to expand...
Its only 3 intake fans actually, I just use two arrows for each fan. Sorry for the confusion. And the two 80mm grates in the rear do not have fans installed. Its just grate holes for the air to flow through. Here's a product image of the case's rear to give you an idea about what I'm talking about http://www.idg.no/multimedia/archive/00045/Silverstone_GD05B_ba_45349a.jpg. Notice the grates at the top left of the case's rear. There are holes to install fans there if I want to use them.

Here is a sample of what the inside of my computer looks like with all parts installed (note this is NOT my computer): http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/9072/use1879.jpg
 
Okay. All makes sense now.

You need to separate the hot exhaust from the cool intake.

As said can be done using dividers on each side of case so air being pushed out back come up over top and out front while the air along side of case is pulled in on the sides and goes into case.

Other option you might try is turning the left side intake into an exhaust and only have a divider on the right side.

I really can't emphasize enough how important keeping the hot exhaust separated from cool intake is. I just finished evaluating Thermalright's new AXP-100 yesterday. One review I read had 7c cooler results using the TY-100 pulling from AXP-100 than it did pushing.. on an open bench test. I did the tests and got the same. Now I knew the fan couldn't perform that much better pulling than pushing soI started putting temperature probes over the intake. Even on a open bench with a TY-140 @ 1300rpm 40cm away and 15cm high blowing air 22c air over my test setup the a probe 1cm above TY-100 @2400rom was 6.5c hotter at idle and 8c hotter during load test.

Your case setting on shelf enclosed on all sides except front is recirculating the hot exhaust back into case...
 
What do you mean by a divider? Is it something in the TV stand? Case? I'm a little confused as to exactly what you're talking about.

Thanks for the help.
 
Cut piece of cardboard to fit from the the front of shelf to back the same height as the shelf. Cut holes in it so your case intake fans can draw air. Put one on each side of the of your case.

This will keep the hot exhaust coming out of back of case from getting into the intake fans on the side of your case.

Hope that makes more sense.
 
Okay, so I tried the cardboard Idea and I must say that I'm impressed. Temps dropped 2-degrees during Intel Burn Test and were 2-degrees lower after three hours of gaming as well (compared to usual temps). I just cut a piece of cardboard to completely block off the back of the case from the side. I'm thinking about putting one on the other side as well. I did noticed tonight though, the PCI slot covers and video card slot covers are rather hot to the touch after a gaming session. Any way to cool this area? Or is that just the nature of the beast since hot air is blowing out for so long w/ nowhere to go, but up or out a little wire hole?

Thanks for the help everyone. Hopefully the aftermarket cooler will help as well.
 
It's completely due to the fact that you have virtually nowhere for the hot air to go inside that cabinet.
 
Tsumi said:
It's completely due to the fact that you have virtually nowhere for the hot air to go inside that cabinet.
Click to expand...
That's what I figured...guess I have to figure something out w/o pissing off the Mrs.
 
Try removing the PCI slot covers so air can flow out the back. It's all about getting cool air into case/coolers and hot air away/out. The less hot air is allowed to mix with cool air the cooler system runs.

I got the new Thermalright AXP-100 HTPC cooler a week ago and was playing with it. A French reviewer using same system I have and getting similar temps (2c warmer) reversed the TY-100 fan to pull air out of AXP-100 and got temps 6-8c cooler.. Now I can see getting 1-2c difference, but 6-8c??? Do I tried it and got similar results.. hum... I have a couple of remote temperature probes and always use/take room ambient and cooler exhaust temps... cooler exhaust was running hotter using TY-100 push than pull. So I put a probe 3cm above TY-100 and found the intake was 8c hotter than ambient!! The cooler exhaust was circling out bottom of cooler up past RAM, I/O sockets and GPU back into intake... even after I set a 140mm fan @1300rpm 15cm away and off of bench blowing over AXP-100.

I now have a nice little mount with temperature probe on it to put in front of cooler intake whenever I test. Room ambient plays a part but cooler intake is way more important.
 
Just installed the Noctua NH-L12 and getting idle temps between 29C - 36C across the cores. Ambient temp is around 23C. Any thoughts? This doesn't seem much better than the stock temps, which is why I may do a reinstall in a few days.
 
A better cooler isn't going to do much better if there is no where for all the hot air to go, like has been said over and over. Not trying to sound rude or anything. Like I said with my ps3, it was extremely hot to the touch before I found a way to exhaust the hot air, and now it barely feels warm after the same amount of time. Aim a household fan at it till you figure something out, that will probably help move the hot air away.
 
How much clearance is there between cooler fan and case? You need at least 30-40mm.

Might try turning the fan over and see if that helps. It improved my AXP-100 by 8c.

But it's all dependent on the cooler getting cool air to cool with. No cool air means no cooling and your CPU will never be cool.

If the case is not cool nothing in it will be cool.
 
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