Project: Microfly w/ full ATX

[sfsilicon]

This was inspired by whrswoldo's Watercooled Full ATX "Conroe" build in mATX Microfly project. I originally was planning to use the Abit F-I90HD mATX board with this case, but struggled with the boards stability. I also wanted at least 2 PCI slots for my FusionHDTV 5 Gold and Turtlebeach Montego DDL cards. With 3 slots I have space for a Firewire card or 802.11g wireless card.

Latest update: Apr-22 - Airflow mod pictures + new OC/Temp results

TO DO list:
* Address North Bridge cooling
---> Add active cooling
---> Add additional case side 80mm in-take fan
* Start overclocking - IN PROGRESS
* Add blue cold cathode lights
* Finish right plexiglas panel
---> Additional cut-outs for Sound and HDTV cards

CPU Specs:

* Blue Ultra Microfly mATX case
* Ultra ULT-500P 500W V-Series PSU
* EVGA Geforce 8800 GTS 320MB
* E6300 Core2 Duo
* Thermaltake TR2-M21 RX CPU Cooler
* Gigabyte 965P DS3 (rev 1)
* OCZ DDR2 PC2-6400 Platinum Dual Channel (OCZ2P8002GK rev 1)
* Black Samsung SH-S182D DVD recorder
* 300GB Maxtor SATA + 160GB WD SATA drives

I'm making some minor changes to:

a) Avoid cutting the side case panel
b) Allow use of mATX boards if I want to revert back
c) Clean cutouts for add-in cards and I/Os
d) Allow full use of the DS3's 3 PCI slots
e) Keep the 2 HDD bracket

The key downsides are:

1) Need to use a low profile CPU cooler
2) Loss of some stability due to cutting of braces
3) Everything is soooo tight

================================================================

On to the pictures:

A) Side bracket cut to allow for space for the cards. Middle bracket trimmed as well. Red marks what was removed.

B) Side view showing resulting clearance as result of trimming the middle bracket.

C) Sliding tray lip is flattened to make the highest point the raised lips of the middle cut out. This was done so that the plexiglas tray will lay even.

D) Shot of the plexiglas. I had some left over brass motherboard spacers. So I mounted these on top of the plexiglas. They are slightly shorter than the existing aluminum spacers, so I had to raise it so that the aluminum ones do not cause a short on the rear side of the motherboard.

E) Shot of the plexiglas tray installed into the case. The aluminum tray needs to be pushed in place first, then the plexiglas is drop on top and held in place by the protruding aluminum spacers.

F) Electric tape used as additional insulation against shorts.

G) Next step is to install the DS3 motherboard. Everything is pretty tight so it is best to install the CPU cooler first.

H) Another shot with the 8800 GTS installed and being held in place by a piece of tape. Might add brackets later, but I expect it to be held in place once I finish the new plexiglas side panel.

I) Add in the 2 SATA HDDs. It is good that the CPU fan hold up the structure for additional support. If stability becomes a problem I can add an additional screw so that the HDD bracket is connected to the CDROM bracket.

J) Overhead shot prior to installation of a CDROM and the PSU.

K) Side shot. Everything still nice and clean.

L) Everything installed and ready to fire-up for the first power on.

M) Lower angle to shot. The feet of the GPU brace is supposed to be on the inner side of the case, since the new side panel will be flush on the outer side. I need to adjust the plexiglas panel holes so that I can push the motherboard a bit back.

N) Cabling from the PSU is still a bit messy. I'll need to rewire and tie it down later.

Ok, ready to go. POWER ON! ...NOT!

Well the first power on didn't go well. The PC wouldn't post. I now have the MB out of the case, so I can confirm that none of the HW is defective. Then I'll reassemble the case and check more diligently for shorts or other issues. Off to bed for now.

 

[sfsilicon]

It looks like something was causing a short somewhere. I confirmed that all the parts were still alive, by disassembling all the parts and just running the motherboard with the 8800 GTS outside of the case. Then I went back and made some adjustments...

1) Added extra support under the right edge of the plexiglas board. It was bending quite a bit from the pressure from the CPU cooler right above it and could have cause the bottom of the motherboard to touch something. I also ended up tripling the tape on the old distance stubs for extra safety.

2) The 8800 GTS might have been touching the metal of this brace so I added some extra tape here.

3) I took the oppertunity while the whole case was apart to adjust the position of the plexiglas board so that the 8800 GTS's brace is now inside of the case.

4) Viola! It works!!! With the side and top covers back on it is much more stable. Last step is to cut the new plexiglas side panel and put in some left over cold cathode tubes.

 

[o0akoni0o]

how are your temps with that setup? are you going to add any extra cooling because it seems as if the heat from your cpu doesn't have anywhere to go?

 

[sfsilicon]

I haven't focused too much on temperatures, since I haven't started OC'ing the system yet. A quick look at Gigabyte's monitoring tool shows: 43C for System and 31C for the CPU. That is at all stock settings for a e6300 and one side panel open as in the picture. Also note that Gigabyte's fan speed control is on and the fan hardly switches to full speed.

BTW, does anyone know where the system temperature is being measured? I'm surprised it is higher than the CPU temp. At the same time the Microfly case sensor (front display) is showing 36C.

I won't have much time to fool around with it much today. I'll post more information on the temperatures once I have time to run prime at stock and I upgrade the bios (still running F5 on a Rev 1 board) and drivers to the latest revs.

I'm still debating if I should switch to a Blue Orb 2 and additional cooling for the NB (which had a really bad thermal pad, which I cleaned off and replaced with new thermal paste). I can also add fans on the side panels, but I'm thinking the CPU cooler is right in front of the front case fan which pulls air in. I'd start off with an exhaust fan on the left side panel if the 12cm case and PSU fans don't provide enough air flow through the case.

Happy Easter everyone!

 

[kent]

That's really slick man.

 

[Darkmp40]

Pretty sweet, me and a friend did that to his computer, but we actually cut the holes in the side part of the case to cover it up and then took an old atx case and got teh back part and welded taht to the case side.

Keep up the good work

 

[sfsilicon]

Completed some initial thermal testing. Here are the results:

E6300 @ stock 1.8GHz w/ Thermaltake TR2-M21 RX cooler

Dual SuperPI Load (2 threads)
-> Gigabyte temp monitor: System = 44 / CPU = 54

Intel Thermal Analysis Tool
* idle: cpu0 45, cpu1 42
* load: cpu0 70, cpu1 70 (stopped testing after a few minutes at 70C)
-> Gigabyte temp monitor: System 44 / CPU 70

I'm looking to pick-up a Zalman CNPS7700-Cu and a Thermaltake Blue Orb II from Fry's after work. Hopefully this will fix improve my temps, so I can start OC'ing.

Can someone recommend a good NB cooler? Any one have experience with just slapping on a small fan on existing Gigabyte NB heatsink? Is there a sensor for the NB temp that can be read via SW? My current NB heatsink gets quite warm.

 

[Moe.RON]

I want to know why Ultra doesn't release these cases with the ability to fit in a full atx mobo. I've seen a bunch of these threads and always thought they were a good idea. Not sure why Ultra doesn't capitalize on the fact and just release an atx capable Microfly.

 

[jedihobbit]

As a MicroFly fan all I can saw is WOW!

 

[Skott]

I want to know why Ultra doesn't release these cases with the ability to fit in a full atx mobo. I've seen a bunch of these threads and always thought they were a good idea. Not sure why Ultra doesn't capitalize on the fact and just release an atx capable Microfly.

Or any other SFF case manufacturer for that matter. Size is increased but not by huge margins anyway. Obviously it can be done and still make it easily portable. It would solve alot of problems trying to find good overclocking mobos especially on the Conroe side of the technology.

My best guess is that they dont want to eat into the mATX market which is what would happen if they made SFF cases fit a ATX mobo. Alot of people would probably buy them and put ATX mobos inside instead of mATX mobos. I know I would.

 

[Moe.RON]

Oh I definitely would too, but I don't see the problem with eating into the matx market. I doubt the case manufacturers care about what form factor they're pushing, as long as they're selling cases, but I could be wrong I think matx still has it's market niche. When you want a stock small system it's great. Integrated graphics usually on them and they make great cheap computers. But for lan boxes those matx boards don't cut it.

Still, I want my full atx SFF! Come on Ultra, or Aspire with their qpack for that matter.

 

[sfsilicon]

Ok, here are some pics from the two new coolers I tested:

1) Thermaltake Blue Orb II
2) Zalman CNPS8000

Both fit though the Blue Orb is a tight fit. I'll add the temp measurements later, but thankfully both were significantly less than the Thermaltake TR2-M21 RX. Interestingly the one I thought would be hands down better was not.

A) The two contenders side by side

ZALMAN CNPS8000

B) The Zalman mounting mechanism

C) Mounted to the Gigabyte 965P-ds3

D) Lots of room to spare

E) Not touching the HDD brace for the first time

F) Side shot, both the NB heatsink and front fan have good clearance

THERMALTAKE BLUE ORB II

G) Tight fit, this was just a test without screwing the cooler the motherboard

H) Sideshot, you can see the brace and the motherboard bending

I) Topshot

Here is how I measured NB temperature. I'm using the Microfly's CPU case sensor

 

[sfsilicon]

Here are the results. The Zalman comes out on top despite the massive 12cm fan of the Blue Orb II. I was also surprised the NB temps didn't go down a bit with the BO2. I'm going to mount a fan on the NB after this.

E6300 @ 1.8GHz all stock

ZAHLMAN CNPS8000
==================================================
Gigabyte temp monitor:
Idle: System 39C, CPU 27C, NB 46.4C
Dual SuperPI Load: System 43C, CPU 45C, NB 51.7C
Cpu0 50C, Cpu1 48C

Intel Thermal Analysis Tool
idle: cpu0 34C, cpu1 32C
load: cpu0 58C, cpu1 56C
System 40C, CPU 55C, NB 46.7C

Thermaltake Blue Orb II
==================================================
Gigabyte temp monitor:
Idle: System 39C, CPU 27C, NB 42.5C
Dual SuperPI Load: System 43C, CPU 49C, NB 47.7C
Cpu0 54C, Cpu1 52C

Intel Thermal Analysis Tool
idle: cpu0 34C, cpu1 32C
load: cpu0 62C, cpu1 60C
System 43C, CPU 60C, NB 45.4C

THERMALTAKE TR2-M21 RX
==================================================
Gigabyte temp monitor
Idle: System 43C, CPU 31C
Dual SuperPI Load: System 44C, CPU 54C

Intel Thermal Analysis Tool
idle: cpu0 45C, cpu1 42C
load: cpu0 70C, cpu1 70C (stopped after hitting 70C)
System 44C, CPU 70C, NB no measurement

 

[MC FLMJIG]

Sweet job. Looking to see the side now. Keep going!!!

 

[sfsilicon]

Here are the first pictures of the side panel.

1) Marking the cut-out prior to using the Dremel

2) Ready to cut. Used a disk cutter at low speed. Cutting plexiglas is a bitxx.

3) One of many fittings to make sure the holes are in the right place. I actually cut it a bit high so I have some excess at the bottom. It was supposed to be flush.

4) Side panel mounted. I'm using some left over screws to hold it in place. It should look better once the protective plastic is removed. I'll do that after I trim the excess top and bottom plastic. I also need to cut holes for the other PCI cards.

 

[Unknown-One]

Hmm, this gives me an idea. Would it be possible to move the motherboard over to the other side of the case, leaving a good sized gap between the ports on the motherboard and the case side panel?

That would allow you to run all your cables in through the back, plug them in, and still get the side of the case on...if you wanted to go all out, you could rewire the ports from the motherboard to the back of the case, nobody would ever know you have a full ATX board in there

 

[sfsilicon]

Hmm, this gives me an idea. Would it be possible to move the motherboard over to the other side of the case, leaving a good sized gap between the ports on the motherboard and the case side panel?

That's an interesting idea. I might be able to even use a taller CPU cooler, if I positioned it right under the space where beneath the DVD. Another plus would be that I could use the existing side panel.

On the down side there would be quite a bit of cable management internally. Hmmmm... Need to look into that. The nice thing is that with the plexiglas trays all I have to do is cut a new one and drill some holes.

 

[Commander_HK47]

What happened to the OP I would like to see more of this cool project, its addicting to read and look. (Really opens insight into the opportunities for me as my next rig will be SSF). So thanks for sharing your work sfsilicon.

 

[Commander_HK47]

Edit:
If you haven't already slatted it as a "to-do", i would advise cutting out the honeycomb fan guard(120mm exhaust port) as you will notice a increase in affective airflow/air pressure witch should yield better internal environmental temps when all 6 sides of the case are closed off.

 

[sfsilicon]

Just some small updates, been busy with other stuff...

Thanks to Commander_HK47 for reminding me to cut out the grills. I won't be cutting the rear grill too much of a safety risk, but I went ahead to cut out the front fan grill. The fan still has to struggle with pulling in air from the smaller vents in the case's plastic front panel.

1) Before

2) and After

I'm still not happy with the NB cooling. My last attempt to tape a 60mm fan on top of the heat sink was quite noise and wasn't mounted well. I'm looking into testing the CoolerThermaltake CL-C0034 Extreme Spirit II Northbridge Chipset Cooler. The main problem I am having is with most of the CPU coolers bumping right up to the NB.

Here is a quick kludge to use the 60mm fan and some left over plexiglas from cutting the side panel.

A) 45 degree shot

B) Side shot

C) Another 45 degree shot

D) Top shot

I'm going to add a TO DO list to my 1st post. I'm seriously thinking of adding a side fan to pull in air on the left side. I think air in-take is one of my problems to get the NB running.

 

[Silversierra]

Pretty neat mod.

I won't be cutting the rear grill too much of a safety risk

It wouldn't be a safety risk as long as you put a 120mm fan grill in, like this.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811999204

A fan grill lets more air escape and is less noisy than a punched case fan grill.

 

[sfsilicon]

Pretty neat mod.

It wouldn't be a safety risk as long as you put a 120mm fan grill in, like this.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811999204

A fan grill lets more air escape and is less noisy than a punched case fan grill.

Thanks for the tip. I'll check that out.

 

[Conano]

subcribed.

 

[Commander_HK47]

Yeah, if safety is an issue for you(children/pets/other) then use the fan guard grill but you DO need to cutt that rear honey come style exhaust port, as it is your primary means of evacuating the hot air from inside the box and if it remains obstructed as such it will continue to prove to be a heat issue(in fact i would make it a priority for the 120mm fan being able to put out a high CFM ratio)

As for the North bridge and its temperatures, its stuck between a rock and a hard place so to speak. That is to say your north bride is stuck in an eddie current of heat. This is caused by your CPU's heat sink fan pushing air down then forcing some of that heat to travel over the NB heat sink, the issue is further complicated by the heat being radiated of the back side of the video card's PCB. with out giving you the whole 9 yards on thermal dynamics, flip that 40/60mm fan so that it pushes air up and not down(heat rises). This should help some(a lot more that pushing the hot air back down).

If you have a metal filing set / or the right accessories for a rotary cutting wheel, i would take the excess trim around that front intake all the way down to just a smooth octagon shape if you want to be professional about it.

There are a few other things i would suggest but don't want to be pushy, as its not my project(at lest not yet, as i will be doing this same project but with a R600/8800 Ultra instead after i get out of Air Force tech school)

Can that box take a 12" X 9.6" ATX board?

 

[cipher_nemo]

I'm curious as to how your E6300 got to 70C+ at stock speed with that first cooler? Anything that high for a Core2 Duo is bad news, and your blue cooler (even if cheap) should have had no problem keeping it cool under load. Chances are, either the surface of that cooler was rough or it didn't make proper contact for some other reason.

I'm glad your Zalman is keeping it cool now. I always trust coolers from Artic Cooling, Zalman, Scythe, and sometimes Thermalright to do a good job.

BTW, what are you using to put full load on your CPU? I haven't seen any mention of Prime 95. I'd recommend downloading Prime95 and trying it out if you don't already have a copy. It's free and it does a great job at torture testing PCs for the long haul.

 

[sfsilicon]

Yeah, if safety is an issue for you(children/pets/other) then use the fan guard grill but you DO need to cutt that rear honey come style exhaust port, as it is your primary means of evacuating the hot air from inside the box and if it remains obstructed as such it will continue to prove to be a heat issue(in fact i would make it a priority for the 120mm fan being able to put out a high CFM ratio)

Ok, sold.

As for the North bridge and its temperatures, its stuck between a rock and a hard place so to speak. That is to say your north bride is stuck in an eddie current of heat. This is caused by your CPU's heat sink fan pushing air down then forcing some of that heat to travel over the NB heat sink, the issue is further complicated by the heat being radiated of the back side of the video card's PCB. with out giving you the whole 9 yards on thermal dynamics, flip that 40/60mm fan so that it pushes air up and not down(heat rises). This should help some(a lot more that pushing the hot air back down).

Good points about the NB, CPU cooler and GPU. I'll try reversing the fanand see if the NB temp drops. I also need to work on the side case fan. I'll need to get a grill for that too.

If you have a metal filing set / or the right accessories for a rotary cutting wheel, i would take the excess trim around that front intake all the way down to just a smooth octagon shape if you want to be professional about it.

There are a few other things i would suggest but don't want to be pushy, as its not my project(at lest not yet, as i will be doing this same project but with a R600/8800 Ultra instead after i get out of Air Force tech school)

Ya, I get your point and if I listed all the kludges I have been doing with electrical tape and other stuff you'd laugh. No harm done. All comments are welcome. It's a fun project, but sadly I have so little time to work on it.

 

[sfsilicon]

Can that box take a 12" X 9.6" ATX board?

My current tray is 12" x 8.5" I wouldn't go much long than 12", but I'm guessing the ATX standard doesn't allow that.

I measured the width of the Microfly and you should be able to fit 10" easily. I have a lot of space from the end of the motherboard to the left case panel. You might be able to a bit more in too (total width of the Microfly is 11").

 

[Commander_HK47]

Contact Ultra and see if you can get commission on a sale, as I'm buying one right now!(black)

 

[sfsilicon]

I'm curious as to how your E6300 got to 70C+ at stock speed with that first cooler? Anything that high for a Core2 Duo is bad news, and your blue cooler (even if cheap) should have had no problem keeping it cool under load. Chances are, either the surface of that cooler was rough or it didn't make proper contact for some other reason.

Concerning the el'cheapo Thermaltake, it's possible that it didn't have good contact, but I doubt it. It has a small coper core and aluminum fins with no heat pipes and a small 80mm fan. I think it was designed to be a cheap pairing for OEM chips.

I'm glad your Zalman is keeping it cool now. I always trust coolers from Artic Cooling, Zalman, Scythe, and sometimes Thermalright to do a good job.

I was hesitant to buy the CNPS8000 due to mixed reviews on it and the close to $50 price tag. I was actually expecting (hoping) the Blue Orb to do better. Maybe in a normal case it would, but with things being so tight in my Microfly the smaller Zalman (better overall case airflow) is beating it.

BTW, what are you using to put full load on your CPU? I haven't seen any mention of Prime 95. I'd recommend downloading Prime95 and trying it out if you don't already have a copy. It's free and it does a great job at torture testing PCs for the long haul.

Not sure if you've used Intel TAT before. I didn't until I read about it on [H]. My understanding is that it creates full heat stress on the cores by providing constant thermal loading where as dual SuperPi and Prime95 do not. Prime95 and SuperPi do better at stressing the overall system which include the memory and NB, so they are better for overall stability testing.

 

[sfsilicon]

Contact Ultra and see if you can get commission on a sale, as I'm buying one right now!(black)

Good for you. Welcome to the club! Don't forget to post pictures when you start moding it.

 

[Commander_HK47]

^^^ i will

Btw, I thought of another fan place meant location. I don't know what your metal working skills are like, but buy the picks your cutting skills arn't to shabby Anyways i was thinking(and gonna do this for mine) placing a 92mm fan where the card slost are normally at on this case, however a 92mm fan is about 5 card slots in width, and around one card slot in hight. so the difference would have to be taken out of the left side( facing the front so edge closer to the 12cm fan) or option B take some out of the right and left side. Then bracket it(the 90/92mm fan)in with a new frame.

 

[cipher_nemo]

I was hesitant to buy the CNPS8000 due to mixed reviews on it and the close to $50 price tag.

I don't blame you, because Zalman CPU coolers are some of the most expensive ones out there. They do a good job, but I personally think they're overpriced; hence my appreciate of Arctic Cooling coolers ($30 is much easier on the wallet). Unfortunately, Arctic Cooling doesn't have a good selection of different sized cooler which is crucial for your build. I think you got the best you can get for the limited space you have, aside from doing some sort of custom cooler modding nightmare.

Not sure if you've used Intel TAT before. I didn't until I read about it on [H]. My understanding is that it creates full heat stress on the cores by providing constant thermal loading where as dual SuperPi and Prime95 do not. Prime95 and SuperPi do better at stressing the overall system which include the memory and NB, so they are better for overall stability testing.

I have it and use it to mark peak temps, but it's in no way a real world torture test. Here's my 2 cents. ...

For example, you'll never be able to reach the temps Intel's thermal tool achieves because nothing can load a processor with the same uninterrupted, continuous cycle-loop that this tool uses. With Prime95, you can get close to the same temps, but may be a degree or two C less if run for hours. Torture tests like Prime95 are a better test of the system's ability to process data under intensive load for extended periods of time. Prime95 isn't a good test of maximum heat like Intel TAT, but it is a better test of accuracy under load. Prime95 will ask a CPU to calculate primes, and then compare the results it gets with known correct calculations. Under higher temps, processors may or may not calculate correctly. This will give you a better idea of a PC's ability to survive under real world conditions. Intel TAT just finds max temps, it doesn't verify the CPU's ability to perform under those temps.

Even though unrealistic, if you want to see how accurate your CPU is under temps achieved by Intel TAT, run two (one for each core with -A1 and -A2 in shortcuts, or up to -A4 for quad core, etc.) Prime95 torture test for In-place large FFTs, then start a thermal load for each core with Intel TAT.

Intel TAT and Prime95 are different beasts with different uses. Thermal limits achieve in Intel TAT might be good for laptop manufacturers, but knowing the max temp of your CPU isn't as useful as knowing its max temp and accuracy under a realistic load. 3DMark is also a good real world test, but commercial licensing stinks.

 

[sfsilicon]

After loading the F10 bios, I started OC'ing last night. I easily hit 3 GHz, but ran into a wall at 450 FSB (could be my OCZ2P8002GK rev 1) where the PC froze. I then went ahead and ran 3DMARK06 8 hrs over night and passed. Next step is to run prime.

Gigabyte 965P-ds3 rev 1.0 | F10 bios set as per here
E6300 @ 3080MHz | 440FSB | DDR2 880MHz | 3DMARK06 8642
8hrs | NB 50.8C | TAT idle cpu0 45C cpu1 42C, load cpu0 stopped at 70C cpu1 65

The only problem I'm facing is that cpu0 temps using TAT are high at 70C. I also have the plexiglas panel off. Still for the formfactor I'm pretty happy.

 

[Commander_HK47]

If i where you i would invest(not necessarily monetarily wise though ) in improving air flow, ie open more of the vents up in the front of the case(the little punch holes), shouldn't see them sence they would normally be covered by the front faceplate ("brazzle", did I spell that correctly )

 

[sfsilicon]

More stress test results for the E6300 @ 3GHz. On the sound side the fans are pretty loud since I turned off the fan speed adjustment on the DS3.

Dual Super PI (32M)
==================================================
Idle CPU0 42C, CPU1 40C
Load CPU0 57C, CPU1 54C

Dual Prime95 Torture Test
==================================================
12h passed
Load cpu0 68C, cpu1 67C

Bought the 12cm grill so I'll look into modding the rear case fan grill. Also looking into cutting holes on the front plastic bezel of the case to improve front fan airflow. Commander_HK47 have you seen how the Microfly pulls air in from the front through the plastic bezel? It pulls it in throught small vents near the case handle. Not really good for air flow. I'm wondering if I'd be better reversing the the fan to push air out. I also want to test rotating the CPU cooler by 90 degrees (the heat pipes become a bit of a hassle). Might add a dedicate 40mm fan on the NB, since I noticed blowing compressed air over it would drop the temps by 3+ degrees. Also found two 80mm SUNON fans and will experiment blowing air from different angles (left side and right side to see what is more efficient).

Picked up a $129 + tax E4300 from Fry's still deciding if I want to install it and try to shoot for 3.5GHz+. From the OC databse this doesn't look too promising.

 

[Ozone77]

If I were you, I would open up the floppy bay for an air intake (later, you can put a filter in there and/or make it look nice with a perforated bay cover, like the ones they use in many cooler master cases). Are you using both 5.25 bays? if not, you may also consider using the lower bay as an intake too (keep the CD/DVD on the top one). After you open up those two, you'll get a ton of fresh air straight into the CPU cooler.

If your temperatures drop enough after you open up the front, I would get rid of the 60mm NB and the 80mm front intake fans, this will make your system quieter (or you can use them elsewhere).

If you want to improve your air-flow even more, put a plexi sheet that covers the bottom of the floppy cage (where you now have the braket for the 60mm fan), then cut a hole on it that matches the Zalman fan. That way the Zalman will suck-in fresh air, and all the hot air will be forced to the sides of the mobo. Then the hot air will move to the "right" (around de ge-force) and be sucked out of the case by the PSU, the GPU and the 120mm exaust fans.

Oh yeah, consider lowering the voltage of the 120mm exaust.

My two cents.

 

[cipher_nemo]

... If you want to improve your air-flow even more, put a plexi sheet that covers the bottom of the floppy cage (where you now have the braket for the 60mm fan), then cut a hole on it that matches the Zalman fan. That way the Zalman will suck-in fresh air, and all the hot air will be forced to the sides of the mobo. ...

That struck a chord with me and sounds like a great idea. So sfsilicon, this might help your long term stress testing temps from reaching 60-something degrees C.

 

[xnikx]

cut a hole for the vent of the 8800

 

[cipher_nemo]

Wow, I missed that. Yes, that 8800 should have a vent because it's the main exhaust for the entire card!

 

[sfsilicon]

Did a whole bunch of modifications last night:

• Cut and replaced rear 12cm fan grill
• Cutout 2 holes in the left panel and added 80mm fans
• Added 40mm fan directly on top of NB
• Reversed 60mm fan to blow upward vs. towards the NB
• Reversed front fan to exhaust, cleaned cut-out to a nice hexagonal shape, added drill holes to the front bezel to improve airflow
• Closed rear case I/O panel
• Built 3 fan distribution tree, so I can control rear case fan and side 80mm fans using the Zalman fan speed module
• Reattached right panel

In my experiments yesterday I had some good temperature drops with blowing air directly at the NB (5C drop) and blowing air from the right panel vs from the left with the 2 80mm fans, thus the above changes.

The 8800 exhaust was not an issue, since the right panel was off. Also looked into opening the floppy and/or 2nd 5-1/4 bay to allow the CPU cooler to draw air in, but decided not to pursue this for now since it is pretty tight and I need to do custom cut-out/funnel to make sure that the cooler can pull in properly.

After finishing all the mod at around midnight I proceeded to power-on the computer and was welcomed by a nice long warning tone. Totally disgusted I quit for the night. Pictures and temp results to follow.