Adding a fan

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 2:53 pm

Hi folks.

Time to add a 2nd fan to my big no-name brand PC case. Can anyone recommend a link? I'm not sure where one mounts fan # 2 in a case that was designed to house only 1 fan...

Thanks!

Johann

BingoTheClowno · Post by **BingoTheClowno** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 5:57 pm

Well, there are a lot of parameters you need to look at: CFM, or how much air it moves per second, what's the noise level at certain RPM (in DBAs) then the fan's construction, ball bearing, magnetic levitating etc.

Try http://www.quietpc.com/ or Google around there are plenty of resources regarding this topic.

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 6:40 pm

Thanks BingoTheClownO. But I'm just interested in mounting, not choosing a brand.

The only sensible location to mount a 2nd fan seems to me to be the side cover. But then do I cut a hole in the side door of my PC? Or build something from scratch? Or...

Cheers,

Johann

Post by **garyb** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 6:50 pm

On 2004-06-23 19:40, blazesboylan wrote:
The only sensible location to mount a 2nd fan seems to me to be the side cover. But then do I cut a hole in the side door of my PC?

if you have the tools....

it might make more sense to get a better case though.

valis · Post by **valis** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 6:52 pm

Almost every case is designed for at least 1 inlet and 1 outlet fan, its possible you're just missing the cage that the fan goes inside on many cases (plastic rectangular thing that attaches to the front or rear via a screw or 'tabs' on the device).

Alternatively there are case mods for adding new side panels (such as the transparent ones) to your case. Many of these offer a side-fan.

There are also Drive bay fans, RAM coolers, PCI slot fans etc. Or add a dual fan (with thermal/speed control) PSU for moving more volume without having faster vans.

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 6:54 pm

Hmmm... I figured someone would suggest that.

Maybe I'll just cut a sheet of aluminum foil and duct tape the fan to it. I wonder if that would work...

*Sigh.*

Johann

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 6:56 pm

On 2004-06-23 19:52, valis wrote:
Almost every case is designed for at least 1 inlet and 1 outlet fan, its possible you're just missing the cage that the fan goes inside on many cases (plastic rectangular thing that attaches to the front or rear via a screw or 'tabs' on the device).

Aha! OK, now we're talking... I'll have to investigate further. Thanks Valis!

Johann

astroman · Post by **astroman** » Wed Jun 23, 2004 8:07 pm

On 2004-06-23 19:54, blazesboylan wrote:
...Maybe I'll just cut a sheet of aluminum foil and duct tape the fan to it. I wonder if that would work...

I once 'taped' a fan (with double adhesive) on the backside of a PSU, but as soon as the thing developes some heat the construction gets slippy and the fan pops off.

Btw I prefer cut off any metal parts from the predefined fan locations of the case.
It's significantly more quiet if nothing disturbs the airflow - but of course emv-compliancy is lost

cheers, Tom

RoonSmits · Post by **RoonSmits** » Sun Jun 27, 2004 5:13 pm

Hi,

check out ione of my earlier posts:
http://www.planetz.com/forums/viewtopic ... 5&forum=19

It's all about measuring the effective ness of adding the fan as shown in the picture:
http://www.studio-sl19.com/public/music ... 0x1200.JPG

All three fans you see are Zalman, which are pretty quiet.

regards
Ronald

firubbi · Post by **firubbi** » Sun Jun 27, 2004 10:41 pm

Class idea Ronald.

we all should put our setup under our signature.

regards
Ronald
P-IV 3Ghz/Asus P4C800dlx/2Gb RAM/Asus nVidia FX5700vga/2x17" Iiyama LCD/20+120Gb Maxtor/Pulsar II/PowerSampler/Luna II/2xbreakout box/Logic 5.5.1/Logic Control/Yamaha CS1x.

Dust collectors of the month: Casio CZ101/Korg poly800/Korg DW6000

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 2:11 am

Hi Ronald.

So, errrrrm... What are you going to do with the side of your case? You've got 2 fans pointing toward where the case side door would go, if I'm not mistaken?

This was exactly my dilemma. I've been running around for the last few days so still haven't checked Valis' suggestion...

Thanks!

Johann

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 3:55 am

Hi Blazes

I would personally recommend not to start drilling random holes in the (side of the) case - this could disrupt the air-flow inside the case and possibly a) not improve cooling and b) increase noise (neither of which are very desirable).

I've been having a look at all the PCs in our office - most seem to have an inlet fan at the front and use the PSU fan for extraction. Mine only has a PSU fan!

Are you sure that you need more cooling? If so, I would suggest buying a suitable case rather than modifying one which wasn't designed for the task. But...perhaps you don't need one? My PC at home is stuffed full of cards, HDDs etc. I only run the front inlet fan and the PSU fan blows it out the back. (I think that there's an additional fan / space for a fan - I'll have to check!

)

Royston

valis · Post by **valis** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 5:17 am

If you've got enough in your case generating heat more cooling can certainly help a lot. However airflow is also an important consideration and bringing that up is worthwhile. There's a lot that can be done with just a few zip-ties and some wire looming inside of a case to improve matters, and then when new fans are added thought should be given to where they are positioned and how they change hte airflow.

http://www.supermicro.com/products/chas ... 62-420.cfm

That's my case above, a tad extreme for most home users but on my motherboard both 64bit pci slots and all 4 32bit slots are used, I've also got 2 cpu's and 4 harddrives (2 are 10000rpm) making heat inside. My system runs 28-30 degrees C at idle and 34-26 deg. C under full load (on both cpu temps, the mobo temp and teh psu's ambient case temp). Without adequate cooling it would be in the 50-60 degrees C range easily under load.

Its been my observation that keeping computers a constant temperature (roughly 70 degrees F or room temperature) greatly extends their lifespan, rather than letting them go through cycles of heating up & cooling down. Of course my case is still bloody loud even with all the fans replaced by silent ones.

BingoTheClowno · Post by **BingoTheClowno** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 10:29 am

I have exactly the same case

The biggest source of noise is the huge fan in the back and also the power suply fans. What I did was, I powered the big fan with half the specified voltage (~7 V instead of 12V, connect between red and yellow wires) which slowed the speed down and improved the noise level. But most of the time I use my full cup headphones to shield me from the noise

Another extreme thing I tried was to file a little the fan blades to try to make them sharper and reduce the "shearing" noise.

That was my theory but it still remains unproven

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: BingoTheClowno on 2004-06-28 11:44 ]</font>

valis · Post by **valis** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 12:32 pm

I replaced the 120mm fan with a speed controlled one. Put more speed control fans on the top rear, bottom front and dual top side intakes for a total of 4 80mm fans. I clocked each fan down slowly and monitored temps and airflow until they were quiet but the case didn't sit more than a few degrees above where it had been with the fans at full throttle (used sisandra to keep the pc under load & hot).

I did several treatments with inexpensive sound matting in the case to dampen it. Car audio makers market the stuff as 'Dynamat' here in the US at vastly overpriced costs, and for car audio you can substitute many things including even carbon underlay material used for linoleum tile installation. That's a bit too sticky to use in a PC case though, there's usually something inexpensive and usable in my local computer warehouses. When applying it I didn't completely line the case as that would reduce the case's ability to act as a sink for the heat inside. Much like car audio installations, its better to cut into strips and dampen with lining the resonant area then crossing through it.

Putting some sound absorbing material behind the plastic drive-bay covers up front helped dampen the drive noise, and I applied some to the sides of the drive-cases as well to dampen resonances there. Then I put shrouds on the side-vents so that the airflow only came from rear and this effectively reduced the slight whine from the downclocked fans there.

Only thing that really bugs me at this point is the xeon coolers, they're stock wind tunnels. At the time I bought this case no other heatsink would fit on the motherboard I own since the VRM's are too close to the cpu's for most athlon/p4 compatible heatsinks. I've sort of gotten used to it and forgotten to look into what I could replace them with, but I really should as it would be annoying had my brain not started automatically editing it out.

Of course with an A/C running in summer its hardly the loudest thing in the room, but tack on 2 more pc's in here and its starting to get to be a bit much. I have also drawn up plans and costed buidling ventilated cabinets for the computers to completely isolate them from the room using ducted baffles for the vents and HEPA filters on the intake vents to help keep dust out. I'll get around to that someday I hope

BingoTheClowno · Post by **BingoTheClowno** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 1:06 pm

Yes, isolated cabinets are the solution. I have already ordered the sound absorbing foam that I want to line the interior walls of the cabinet. It's a 3" foam with a Noise Reduction Coefficient (NRC) of 1 from http://www.mcmaster.com, part number 9162T271.

Regarding the metal case lining, I didn't line the interior of the case for the same reason and also because I want to mount the hardrives on the inside cover or door, on a additional aluminum plate that will help disipate the heat.

That's all planned but I'll see when I will get a chance of doing all of these things too.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: BingoTheClowno on 2004-06-28 14:10 ]</font>

RoonSmits · Post by **RoonSmits** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 1:28 pm

On 2004-06-28 03:11, blazesboylan wrote:
Hi Ronald.

So, errrrrm... What are you going to do with the side of your case? You've got 2 fans pointing toward where the case side door would go, if I'm not mistaken?

This was exactly my dilemma. I've been running around for the last few days so still haven't checked Valis' suggestion...

Thanks!

Johann

Well all temperatures listed in my post are with the case closed. I noticed that even when the case is closed, the effect of the fans is adequate.

regards
Ronald

RoonSmits · Post by **RoonSmits** » Mon Jun 28, 2004 1:34 pm

On 2004-06-27 23:41, firubbi wrote:
Class idea Ronald.
we all should put our setup under our signature.

Hi Firubbi,

well, this saves me listing my setup over and over again, esp. in case I need to supply it when asking for advice to solve a problem, but on the other hand it kinda soundz like boasting, (sorry if people see it like that) but that sure ain't my thing.

regards
Ronald

(here it is again. . . .that sig

)

blazesboylan · Post by **blazesboylan** » Tue Jun 29, 2004 12:13 am

Uy! OK I guess I underestimated the complexity of installing a new fan... I don't have a 'puter-mometer thingie at this point but will have to do something about that.

Can anyone recommend a thermometer type thing that can be used "remotely"? I want to just plug the thermometer inside the case and then run a cable 6-10 feet (2-3 metres) to put the guage in a place that is actually visible. Every thermometer I've found is designed to be mounted in a drive bay.

As Royston says, I may not even need another fan. I've got a PSU fan + 1 back-of-computer fan (in addition to whatever is on the individual processors). I'm about to add a card so figured I should probably keep the 'puter cool. But maybe it's not necessary.

We shall see.

Thanks for the tips all! Cheers,

Johann

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Tue Jun 29, 2004 2:48 am

You could always add a radiator!

http://www.xoxide.com/watcoolcas.html

My MOBO came with some utilities to monitor CPU temp, MOBO temp (if I remember correctly) and fan speeds. I can set it up so that it will give me an alarm should the temperatures or fan speeds cross certain thresholds (which the program allows me to set). Not sure about the thermometer thing though...there are some wireless ones, e.g.

http://www.comforthouse.com/comfort/wirmulsenthe.html
http://scientificsonline.com/product.as ... 1088495175

(from google search: "remote thermometer")

Dunno if the radio frequencies would interfere with the 'puter though - probably not.

Royston