Solutions to cool my case down

F

Flogger23m

Fully [H]
Joined
Jun 19, 2009
Messages
16,955
My video card is running pretty hot. Getting up to 88 degrees C when playing a game like STALKER CS or Crysis. A bit too hot for me. I am running the fan at 86%. I can turn it up to 100%, but I have a feeling running it that high will wear it out. Either way, it is running a bit too hot.

My case is an Antec Sonata 3. It is small, and not much room. My video card is too long, so I can not install the extra 120mm case fan.

I installed an Evercool Fox 1 case fan in the back slots of the case, but that never brought my video card temps down.

Aside from that, there are no places to mount my spare Antec 120mm and 80mm fans.

Will get some better pics, but this is what my case looks like:

http://img819.imageshack.us/img819/6192/dsc00770e.jpg

As you can see, not a lot of room to work with.

I was thinking, can I just some how mount my spare 120mm fan on the bottom of the case? Will that actually create good air flow to keep the heat down? And if I can, how can I mount it? Duct tape? :p

Can also throw one on the case door.

I've tried cleaning my video card out with compressed air, which helped a little. Still running at 86 degrees C on a hot day. Will try to clean it again, but still, I think these temps are bit high.
 
If it was me I'd get one of those Dragonlord K62 cases that newegg has and switch to that.


As you can see, not a lot of room to work with.

I was thinking, can I just some how mount my spare 120mm fan on the bottom of the case? Will that actually create good air flow to keep the heat down? And if I can, how can I mount it? Duct tape?

Can also throw one on the case door.
Click to expand...

You can't just stick fans any old where - it needs to draw air from somewhere or exhaust air directly outside the case to really work well. So if you really wanted a mod to work you need to cut holes in your case.

So yeah long as you cut a hole in the door, or the roof of the floor (though you would have to jack up the case for the floor intake). With a roof hole you might try exhaust - for the floor intake and for the door my guess is that you could go either way.

There are videos on youtube and such about how to cut the hole but its fairly involved and might not work for you..plus you might end up needing to buy tools to do it right. So again I'd get a new case. That's just too much computer in too small a case..
 
If it was me I'd get one of those Dragonlord K62 cases that newegg has and switch to that.


As you can see, not a lot of room to work with.

I was thinking, can I just some how mount my spare 120mm fan on the bottom of the case? Will that actually create good air flow to keep the heat down? And if I can, how can I mount it? Duct tape?

Can also throw one on the case door.
Click to expand...

You can't just stick fans any old where - it needs to draw air from somewhere or exhaust air directly outside the case to really work well. So if you really wanted a mod to work you need to cut holes in your case.

So yeah long as you cut a hole in the door, or the roof of the floor (though you would have to jack up the case for the floor intake). With a roof hole you might try exhaust - for the floor intake and for the door my guess is that you could go either way.

There are videos on youtube and such about how to cut the hole but its fairly involved and might not work for you..plus you might end up needing to buy tools to do it right. So again I'd get a new case. That's just too much computer in too small a case..
 
Yeah, I was afraid I'd have to cut the side panel.

Will look into the Dragonlord K62, at least the price is not too bad.

But do you happen to know if there is any case with decent space, decent air flow, that does not have a transparent side panel for around $130 or less?
 
In my Sonata 3 I mounted a fan beneath the hard drives (mounted 2 drives in the bays then a 120mm fan below it). It draws a bit of air, but unfortunately the case is pretty poorly designed for airflow, that's why I replaced my Sonata 3.

The thing I liked about the Sonata 3 was great build quality, every thing is solid and heavy and fits together nicely... unfortunately it has terrible airflow.
 
Tudz said:
The thing I liked about the Sonata 3 was great build quality, every thing is solid and heavy and fits together nicely... unfortunately it has terrible airflow.
Click to expand...

This.
The Sonatas are meant for silence, not really for keeping today's gpu's cool.

Really, you can improve what you have, but the cost isn't worth it. You're going to pay about $30 for a 4 3/4" hole saw and then you'll also have to drill out the 4 holes to mount the fan to the case. Plus you'll need a dust filter and probably a grill, so there's another couple bucks.

I would recommend picking up another case. K62 is a nice case, IMHO it's a little overpriced.
I would probably stick with the Antec line and get a Three Hundred or a Three Hundred Illusion which is an even better deal because it comes fully stocked with fans for only $10 more whereas the standard 300 only has the rear and top one. You could install the side fan if you wanted to as well. 300/300I also has a very easy to remove dust filter; 3 clips hold the front panel to the frame, you just remove 2 thumbscrews to pull the side panel off, press in the 3 clips for the front panel, and then remove the filter from the front panel with 4 little clips of it's own. Rinse it off, stick it back on - very easy. ;)

You can then list your S3 FS here and probably recoup most of the costs you spent on the 300I. :)
 
The Antec 300 looks nice to me. Do you know if there is enough room between the drive bays for a long video card? The Sonata 3 is a mid size tower, and I can barely fit my GTX 260 in there.

Would like to get something that would have enough room for a bigger card in case I upgrade it.
 
260's will fit just fine. You may have to move your drives above or below them (depending on how many drives you have and where you put them) but larger cards do fit ok.
 
Antec 300 is a great value case.. and has free shipping. So I can't argue with it..But if you built more PCs some of the features on the dragonlord are pretty sweet.


300:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UX_nXwX_EzU

Antec 300 has basically no features for quiet computing - being steel its not so bad. But its not attempting to be quiet at all..

Dragonlord:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2MdUGxWEcU

Of course normally this case is an extra 40 bucks or so..
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top