Originally posted by: furballi
Intake air must make a sharp 90 degree turn when entering the case with the front door closed. This will result in more air turbulence and lower efficiency when compared to a traditional front vent design.
Noise will also have to make that turn. If you don't need the extra damping, take off the front door, or leave it open.
Originally posted by: furballi
The top-mounted vent allows dust particles to settle inside the case. It also redirects exhaust noise out the top of the PC.
As stated in the SPCR article, for extra quietness you should cover the top vent. As far as dust settling in: given that it's an exhaust fan, this could only happen while the machine is off. And depending on where you have your machine set up, it may not get lots of dust settling. But yes, you could potentially get a bit of dust settling in while the machine is off, if you don't drop a hankie over it or something.
Originally posted by: furballi
Note the positioning of the rectangular VIDEO air INTAKE duct (middle right of the back panel). This duct is positioned between the top hexagonal exhaust vent for the PC and the bottom rectangular exhaust vent for the power supply. Hot rising exhaust air is re-directed back into the case via the video air intake duct!
Yes, I think that is true, and I had already mentioned it on this thread.
Originally posted by: furballi
I prefer to apply Dynamat or equivalent to the side panels. This is a cheaper and more effective solution to the noise problem.
Nothing is stopping you from putting dampening material in the case, as mentioned in the SPCR article.
Originally posted by: furballi
We see the power supply cage at the bottom left of these pictures. An extra long power supply will come very close to the 120 mm case fan located midway in the bottom chamber, resulting in excessive air turbulence.
So use a power supply that is not extra long, and is otherwise suited for a front-to-back airflow.
Originally posted by: furballi
If we remove the 120 mm case fan as suggested by this article, then the heat from the four front hard drives would have to go through the power supply before exiting the case. This will result in a very HIGH temperature at the power supply.
As mentioned in the SPCR article, hard drives do not dissipate much heat at all, compared to the PSU, CPU, or (powerful) graphics card. Even after passing by the HDs, the air for the PSU will likely be cooler than case air in a more conventional system.
Originally posted by: furballi
Remember that in a traditional ATX case, the 100W of heat from the CPU is dissipated 360 degree into the motherboard (cooling fan blowing into the CPU). The rear 120 mm case fan AND the power supply share the duty of heat extraction. Very few power supplies will run at 80% efficiency. 75% is a more realistic number.
Are you saying that the case will have insufficient airflow to cool the CPU? With two 120mm exhaust fans and one 120mm intake fan? Or in some other configuration?
in many cases (including mine), a low-flow PSU and a single low-speed 120mm exhaust fan are sufficient to keep the CPU very cool.
Originally posted by: furballi
You pay big bucks for a case only to find that you should use SATA hard drives to provide adequate cooling to the power supply!
It does indeed look like airflow would be better with SATA rather than PATA cables. On the other hand, if you have only one or two HDs in the lower area, there will still be plenty of space under them for air to flow.
Originally posted by: furballi
I also don't like to mount the hard drive vertically, as this will place an uneven load on the main drive bearing assembly.
Do you have a source for the claim that this will damage the HD?