Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Thinking about making a CPU duct so I can suck in cooler air from outside the case and blow it onto the CPU fan, not sure what to make it out of though! CPU is an AMD 2.8GHz Dual Core with stock cooler. Or should I be sucking hot air FROM the CPU and not BLOWING cooler air onto it?

Ideally I want to use an 80mm fan at the back of the case and make a right angle duct down to the 60mm fan on the CPU. I could do one from the side as I have 2 fans there too pulling air out so I could turn one around and it would be more or less straight but fancy the right angle approach as it would give more space for air flow.

Thought about square rubber tube (if that exists) or round rubber tube with thin walls so it can be stretched over a square 80mm fan and square 60mm fan, not sure if that can be 'bought' offshelf?

The reasoning behind this is my mobo/gfx card use passive cooling, no fans, and so radiates heat into the case. I have two 80mm fans in the side pulling air out and one 80mm fan at the back exhausting too and space for 1 more fan at the rear which is the one I want to use for the duct fan.

I also have a 120mm fan inside the case hung under the HDD bay blowing directly across the gfx card towards the rear of the case and another 120mm fan hung under the PSU with an inch gap blowing stright down onto the gfx card too, so all hot air is being blown towards the 80mm fans and exhausted.

But I think some of the hot air is getting sucked in by the CPU fan and making it spin faster and gets noisier, so that's the reason to make a CPU duct rather than fork out more money for different CPU cooler!

Maybe flawed logic but I like the idea of a duct as it won't be recycling hot air from inside the case!

Thoughts/criticisms/rofls/lmaos welcome :) Might go googling for info now!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm i understand the logic you want to use - infact i have see a few dells and compaq's use them. what i wouldnt do is put anything over the heat sink! The fan pulls air onto the heatsink to displace the warm air. If you cover this up - this one happen efficiently, if your using rubber tubing - then your nuts! :p

Theoretically - you get a 80/90mm case fan, and use that at full speed... (your case will have mountings for this anyway.... and duct from that onto the heatsink.... you will want to just mount the ducting 'on top' of the heatsink and not over it.... as that will defeat it's purpose!

You could use some largeish plastic bendy tubing come to think of it....

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

All those fans will interact with each other.

First priority is allways air in the front.

Whichever arrangement you use will have a negative effect, but I would go for this type of stuff to make it.
http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/...01310&ts=05716

Overclockers is a good place to start:
http://www.overclockers.com/articles1256/

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

It generally tends to work better feeding cool air onto a cooler, rather than trying to suck hot air from it.

Well, you've got multiple options for ducting, but I think your rubber idea is stretching things a bit. :D

To start with, you've got 2 types here:
Linkage
If you're only dealing with 80mm fixings, then the square ones look like a good choice, though you might have to do a bit of improvising somewhere along the line, as odds are that the straight & corner ducts won't add up to the exact length you need.

There's a few options here. The 80mm flexible tube kit looks like it'll cover most of your requirements, plus the various fan adapters would mean you could use it with different sized fans if you need.

Some pics might help. ;)

I doubt the temperature would increase the speed of the fan, considering that the resistance of items that conduct electricity increases as they get hotter. Admittedly your average fan in your average PC isn't likely to encounter temperatures that would affect it by a noticeable amount.

That does make sense, and as I said, getting cool air into where it's needed is your best bet. Then, depending on the layout of your PC, you might be able to get some more improvement by doing something about how the warm air exits the system.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

What about this:

http://www.kustompcs.co.uk/acatalog/info_2851.html

They also sell an 80mm to 60mm adaptor:

http://www.kustompcs.co.uk/acatalog/...ackets_27.html

So I could remove the 60mm fan from the heatsink, screw the adaptor to the duct then screw it onto the heatsink, then attach the other end to the 80mm fan and use the chimney on the outside.

That sound workable?

Posted at same time as you Alien :)

Groan!! That's just so punny, sorry, funny :D

Can't do pics, no camera and I don't do 'mobile phones'!!

@data: found links similar at overclockers while googling, home made ducts though! Might try a home made one to test what happens!!

@cmatt: so only 1 fan is needed, no CPU fan, just a case fan blowing down a duct onto the heatsink? The sunbeam duct seems to screw directly onto the CPU heatsink?

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

The pre-made ones are a little unweildy, unless you shorten the pipe. They are also not the best flowing thing you could use.
Have a lokk at this article:
http://www.overclockers.com/tips1187/

Mine :D:
http://i104.photobucket.com/albums/m...al/CPUDuct.jpg

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

This is just a bad bad idea. Buy a decent cooler and a decent extractor for the rear with good ratings. The cpu cooler these days tend to cool other areas like passive cooled north bridge . I see no real valid reason to do this

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

make your own ducting sir...

however just to point out... in custom pc - i saw a UUUUUBER cool (badoom tsh) heatsink - that was huge, ontop of it went 2 80mm case fans, i think it was zalman...

anyway - this one is very similar to what im trying to describe (and screwing said description up in the process):

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...=57&subcat=821

you could in theory keep the cpu fan....

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/produc...=821&mfrid=345 just listen to me and fit one of these

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

my friend got one of these: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...=57&subcat=821

no complaints from him :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I have a Dell Dimension here (2.26GHz) with the following configuration

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Blowing cool air in over the hottest part of the PC might seem to make sense, but what then about all that warm air you've just created inside the case that's going to warm everything else up.

The only time I've seen ducting inside a case, is on some Dell server, and that's attached to an extract fan. The need for that becomes quite clear when the case gets filled with loads of disks and stuff so the air paths insdie the case can get too obstructed. Having said that my current Dell server has something like 10 different fans :disturbd:

It must be much better to concentrate on exhausting the warm air to outside.

My view, decent case with a front in, and rear out fan, plus the PSU extract fan, and a decent (not stock supplied) CPU cooler should do the job nicely.

---------- Post added at 10:53 ---------- Previous post was at 10:50 ----------

Why the change from the Artic Cooler Freezer CPU fans you used to suggest :confused:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I've always fancied a go at making a convection cooled PC. The plan is to cut a 6" hole in the top of the case and fit a good lenght (at least 2m) of extractor fan hose to it. This would run, as much as possible, straight up. I've never thought of connecting it to the outside but that would be good too. The idea is that the heat inside the pipe will cause the air to rise thus creating its own draught. With another bit of hose on the inlet we could have a balanced flue design!

Wherever the air comes from, try to make sure it's dust free so it doesn't all end up inside the case. Unfortunately, floors are particularly dusty and a bad place to have an air inlet.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/pimg/HS-002-NC_60.jpg

as zing said its clear these style of coolers are far better at removing heat and more to the point directing it to the rear to be expelled, or above if your power supply has a large extraction fan fitting above the CPU slot.

a key idea most people forget is remembering to ballance both intake and outtake air pressure, thats a must for good cooling and distribution, remember also, front to back is the way todays standard cases are designed as far as air flow is concerned.

http://www.g4tv.com/screensavers/fea...e_Airflow.html

http://icrontic.com/articles/pc_airf..._cooling_guide
https://www.cableforum.co.uk/images/...2007/07/19.jpg

https://www.cableforum.co.uk/images/...2007/07/20.jpg

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

well simply because my AC when I upped the vcore on my e6600 and hit over 2.8 ghz the fan would spin at its max and be to loud . The noctua doesnt speed up. For stock machines the AC is fine

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Ah that makes sense. Although my E6600 is clocked, and runs 24/7 at 100% due to Distributed computing stuff, I haven't noted excessive noise with the Arctic Freezer. Still I'll bear in mind the Noctura when I get a quad core :D

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Just my 2p on this,
The cpu cooler will be your limiting factor. Most highend air coolers these days are side draft coolers because there is less air resistnace blowing across the heatsink than down it where ultimatly it hits a solid wall. That and heat pipes have mostly fixed the issues with side draft coolers. Its best to have these setup so that they the hot air to the back of the case where it is then sucked out by your rear fans. The only downside is loss of cooling air to the motherboard itself around the cpu.

One thing you can do is make use of spare 5 1/4" drive bays. I did see the other day that mapplins do centrifugal fans which sit in the place of a rom drive. you could use some of these to pull in air at the front of the case and duct it directly into the path of your cpu cooler as height wise they should be fairly close and so the flow should be mostly horizontal.

However i have no experience with these things as im entirely water cooled these days :D

Edit - http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?...48839&doy=19m7
This is what i saw but as i said i've no experience with them and centrifugual fans can be quite noisey (FX5800 anyone :))

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Some of those coolers look pretty expensive, not to mention HEAVY, and maybe too noisy :disturbd: I want to reduce fan noise!

A mates bought a Zalman CNPS9500:
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=256319

he asked me to fit it for him and it's HUGE and HEAVY!!! It's heavier than the weight recommended for the socket, that's a concern! It has a fan controller and it's quiet, but it can get noisy if you want to get the temps down more.

The recommended weight for socket AM2 is 450g, the Zalman weighs 530g and Zing, that bloody Noctua NH-U12F weighs 790g :Yikes: I've just built this system and it's gotta last a few years, don't want some fancy cooler doing some unseen damage due to it's weight! :dunce:

My PSU doesn't have a fan underneath so all hot air must be exhausted at the rear, that's why I have 3 x 80mm fans exhausting air. The CPU Fan has a 4 pin header as AM2 supports PWM fan control, so I think that's why the CPU Fan speed gets louder as the temp goes up.

And as I understand the ducting, it's best to have a gap between the end of the duct and CPU heatsink so the cooler air has a clear path down and air won't get obstructed if it hits the heatsink directly if the duct is touching it.

So I have 2 scenarios: Better HSF or Ducting!

Ducting sounds plausible due to having a bigger fan than on the CPU pushing more CFM's down the duct to the heatsink, so the cooler outside air hitting the heatsink will also mean less heat coming off the heatsink and being blown into the case. The combination of the 80mm fans exhausting and 120mm fans directing the hot air to the rear of the case should keep it cool. I also have an 80mm intake fan at the front blowing cool air onto the 120mm fan under the HDD bay, so in theory (famous last words) it sounds 'cool' :)

On the other hand, a f00king big heatsink and fan the size of a breeze block hanging off you CPU socket looks a bit worrying! Yes, some have a bracket on the back of the motherboard they clamp onto, but it's still heavy! They probabaly do work but some can't have the fan moved so air is either blown straight down or sideways, something that needs to be considered when orienting fans.

In all honesty, I've spent way too much already to splash out on a £30-£40 HSF, hence the ducting query, i'm not made of money unfortunately so I just can't afford that option yet!

If people still feel ducting is a waste of time then I'll just have to wait until I can afford a HSF, but I'd still like to try just for curiosity sake :angel:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Dude the noctua does not fit the same as the stock fan it has its own assembly and is heavy but will be fine. It will also be a lot less noisy than stock cuz its a bigger fan shifting more air and spinning slower

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Ducting can help, and well old cerial boxes and some tape will do a very ad-hoc and cheap solution!
I did it many years ago when the side panel of my case had a fan on it slightly out of line with the cpu, i ducted the two together and dropped cpu temps by 5c ish.

And yeah as Zing has said all the heavy heatsinks will have there own mounting bracket which does away with the normal weight limit

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

But I can't afford a new HSF at the moment :(

Anyone want to donate one :angel:, LOL!!!

The CPU Fan is definitely adjusting it's speed to the CPU temp, just did a 3DMark06 and you can hear the CPU fan get louder the longer the tests run.

Only thing I can do is mess about with a duct and see what happens until I can afford a new HSF, it seems most people think that's a better option!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I dont think it is ;)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

tbh - new processor + mobo (possibly) after you have cooked both, will outweigh the cost of a bit of copper and a fan for £30 :tu:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

What? Worth messing about with ducting or the CPU FAN?

If you mean the CPU Fan, it definitely is as ANUS Probe, sorry, ASUS Probe shows the CPU Fan at 3,300 RPM, after 3DMark06 it was 5,600 RPM and noticeably louder! Also, the pinout for the CPU Fan connector has one pin labelled RPM Adjustment.

From the manual:
It also wasn't the PSU either as I put my ear to that and it was all quiet :)

@cmatt: Big badda BOOM! I'll try not to make too loud a bang then :erm:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

my fan is keeping my overclocked cpu with raised vcore cool and is spinning @ 1300 rpm point extended made proven job done ;)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

OK, OK I'll consider the Noctua! :)

But I still want to try ducting :D

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Cool hope it goes well for ya ;)

Bare in mind I dont think anyone who offers IT advice on this forum recommends using the stock cooler

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I know zing, stock = n00b :) What, you just call me a n00b :D

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I hope it works for you mate the ducting that is although I cant really see it as the fans spinning quite quick and ducting around it could create a bass effect on it making the sound frequency lower but deeper . I could be talking poop but I dont believe I am. Let us know how your bodge errrrr ducting works ;)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

qft - although im strapped for cash so er will be using the stock cooler till i can afford that turniq that i posted earlier :p:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

No CPU cooler will remove the original issue. ( I like Scythe btw)

Get a pci slot cooler. It sits next to your card. They're about a fiver in maplins for a slim one. Better ones are wider, but you lose two slots. It will make your video card "quasi-active". :D
Like these:
http://www.xoxide.com/slotcooler2.html

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I had a passive cooled 6600 and screwed an 80mm fan to the heatsink job done again ;)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I have a watercooled x1900xt with a slow spinning 92mm fan blowing over it to keep the vrm's cool (part of the water cooler) my cpu is also water cooled.

I have two x 80mm case fans ticking over at 1200rpm, and the 3 x 120 mm fans on the water cooling are ticking over at 1300rpm i believe. no idea what speed the psu fan is going at but its a 120mm jobby just ticking over

The loudest part of my computer atm is my older wd hard drive, i can hear that one spining up / down.

So :p:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I have 3 120 mm fans (1 in front 1 out back and 1 on noctua)and a zalman on my gfx its a lot quieter than it was lol

dont you hear the pump?

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

ahh water cooling - never tried it - but i beleive zalman do a fanless one which sits away from the case and its passively cooled...

anyone had much joy's with these? :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I see this has turned into a 'heated' discussion :LOL:

Well, i've bodg..., damn, carefully crafted a CPU duct out of thick printer paper and sellotape and it seems to be OK so far! The fan on the CPU is actually 70mm so I put the duct over the fan so it's enclosed and can only draw air from the within the duct that's being blown in from outside. Also stuck a bit of filter material over the inlet so it doesn't suck dust in! I also had to remove one of the fans from the side as it was in the way of the duct!

Ran 3DMark06 with the case lid off and then case lid on and the CPU Fan never went above 4,000 RPM, it did hit 5,600 previously, and CPU went between 55°C - 60°C :shocked: Was running ANUS Probe II so not sure how accurate the fan speeds/temps are being reported.

Currently it's idling at 3,600, CPU temp 43°C and I never thought to record the temps without the duct in place :doh:

So it 'appears' to work for keeping the CPU cooler than without a duct, but as people will point out, not as good as a breeze block sized heatsink with a fan nailed to it bolted onto your CPU and mobo :disturbd:

Anyway, I've achieved what I wanted, made a CPU duct and luckily it's working to keep the CPU cool enough to stop the Fan going into turbo mode! How long it will stay like this is dependant on the room temperature and not pulling in warmer air that will increase the CPU temp. Think I'll load Oblivion and see what happens!

I'll have to raid the piggy bank to afford that Noctua though, sell a kidney, maybe an arm or leg and possibly a lung or even rob the shoolkids of their dinner money :(

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

the noctua maybe overkill there is the artic freezer 64 (these ar eless than half the price)on the cpu and a fan screwed to your gfx (if the HS will allow)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Pic please. :D
:rofl:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I ain't got nowt to take a picture wiv, got a pencil and sum paper, but they won't let me sharpun du pencil in case I urt meself, besides, it's ard tu use yer hands when dey put dat funny jacket on ya :nutter:

It's getting late, I need my tablets :)

Looked at the Arctic Freezer 64 Pro, read a review on Frosty Tech and they had some concerns about it regarding the retention clip, overall not bad but could do better!

Also read a few reports of that Noctua NH-U12F not being compatable with some AM2 sockets :Yikes: namely MSI, I have an ANUS Board (sic), snigger, so not sure of the compatability as they don't give out a board compatability chart, unlike Zalman do for their CNPS9500.

Still, they are BLOODY EXPENSIVE!!! Who's got a second hand NH-U12F or a Zalman CNPS9500-AM2 to sell me?

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

in all this you never mentioned you had cleaned off your HS and CPU and re-applyed new silver paste, i assume you have done that basic step every time you re-fit the ducting etc?...

some people have been known to re-lap (polish surfaces for max contact)both CPU and heatsink surfaces to be sure to maximise the contact and so increase heat transfer, did you also try that with super fine grain paper/pastes? and get a decrease in over all temps yet?.

also if your real tight on cash and have the tools, you can take an old copper plate off an old CPU cooler and tap and die it onto your biggest heatsink and that to will help that moveing of CPU heat a lot, it did for me way back in the day when i tryed it for fun.

quiet is my bug bare, and power supply fans are my werse offenders of noise, but it hard modding them to take 2+ slower fans and keep them quiet but its tricky getting the right balance, and you risk them going pop if you get it to low an airflow.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

The duct just slides over the fan on the CPU Heatsink, don't have to remove the whole HSF each time! I used to be an engineer so I know how to drill and tap a hole, but don't have any taps anymore, nor a spare HSF! Seeing as it's just an experiment I don't forsee it being a permanent solution, rather a 'proof of concept'.

The PSU doesn't make any noise, it's a PC Power & Cooling SILENCER and is, well, silent :)

Also grafted a 120mm fan onto the VGA card as that uses passive cooling!

Just waiting for the finances to level out before buying a 'proper' solution :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I didn't say photos, though that would be simplest. For such things I make use of a cheapo webcam that I've had for a few years.
An alternative you could use, which might help you to plan things out as well, is Sketchup:
http://sketchup.google.com/

Funny thing about that article is my temps are the same or better than his, & I don't have any ducting: CPU [XP 3200+, just like his] is currently 1-2°C cooler than his was with the ducting, & my system temp is 28-29°C. In the interests of full disclosure I should mention that I have my air conditioner keeping my room pleasantly cool. Also, whilst I'm using a different heatsink on the CPU, I have the same fan [YS Tech TMD fan] on it [except mine's black].

The above paragraph was written the other day, & saved in a text file until I got round to writing the rest of my reply, & since then I've upgraded my system. I'm now running an AM2 X2 6000 with the heatsink that came with it, & both cores hovering around the 38-40°C mark. Admittedly that's just normal temp, not full load. The highest I've seen it go is 58°C [had Orthos running for a while to see how hot it would get]. That's a bit warmer than I'd ideally like, & if/when I find myself maxing out my CPU more regularly I might get round to putting on the Freezer 64 Pro I have. Speaking of the Freezer, you were concerned about weight - according to the box it's 524g. That's a bit over the recommended limit, but not that much.

I must confess I was rather spoiled by the heatsink I had on my XP3200 [Zalman 5100Cu], as load temps rarely went more than 5-10°C higher than idle temps.

Wow, a slotted CPU, haven't seen 1 of those in a while! :)

Sure it wasn't this 1?

I know you said you have an AM2 CPU, but which 1? I'm running an X2 6000 with the stock heatsink [I don't know if lower model AM2s come with a different HSF or not], & as I mentioned before get about 38-40°C idle/not doing much, & 58°C full load. If yours is more than 1 or 2 models below mine then the airflow [or lack of] in your case might be the source of your problems, & not the CPU cooler.

I have 2 120mm fans, 1 back & 1 front - the front is a more powerful 1 as it has to compensate for the dust filter infront of it. My Ultra PSU does have an 80mm fan underneath it. How tidy is your case in terms of cable management? The more you can keep cables out of the way, the less they'll affect airflow & therefore temperature.

Another thing to consider is where the intake & exhast fans are mounted.
This:
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/alien42...ntfanmount.jpg
...is a good example of bad case design. Seriously, how are you supposed to get decent airflow through that? [not my current case, that's from an old 1] If your intake/exhast fan mounting points are anywhere near that bad then you would get a noticeable improvement in both temperature & reduction of noise by cutting out 1 nice big hole. If you have a holesaw suitable for cutting metal [or can borrow 1], then that would provide the neatest looking hole. For an 80mm fan you'll want a 76mm hole, I forget what size you'd need for a 120mm, but you can just measure your fan. other alternatives are using a Dremel, or if you're a masochist you could just drill way more holes, then try joining them up with a file/tin-snips/whatever. The way I did my last fan hole was to drill some holes & then join them with a nibbler [didn't get mine from there, can't remember where I got it from]. It's not too hard to get a nice clean edge with a nibbler either, though I'd advise wearing some sort of padded gloves or whatever unless you're used to doing a lot of work with your hands, otherwise you'll end up with blisters. :disturbd:

I get the strangest feeling you don't like Asus' software. ;) Have you tried SpeedFan? I remember seeing someone post elsewhere on this forum that SpeedFan doesn't read core temps. I can't comment on the Intel side of things [that's Zingle's department :D], but it reads the core temps on my X2 6000 okay [compared its readings to those I get from the prog Core Temp - they're not identical, but close enough].

Idling at 43°C? Even after adding the duct? If you have the same heatsink as me:
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/alien42...0_heatsink.png
then either your room's warmer than mine, you're not getting decent airflow through the case, or you're using the goo that came pre-applied to the heatsink instead of something like Arctic Silver.

Did you order it direct, or did you get it from a UK stockist? & if so, who?

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

The CPU is an X2 5600+, 2.8GHz with stock cooler and goo! Didn't go for the 6000+ due to the mem controller/ram frequency issue that runs the RAM at lower than spec with certain CPU speeds and dividers.

Case is a Songcheer wide case, 9" wide x 17" high x 17" long and looks a bit like your piccy of 'bad case' design I have already cut two 80mm holes in the side of the case and have 2 fans blowing out, although I had to remove 1 fan due to the duct. 2 x 80mm fans at rear, 1 blowing down the duct and 1 exhausting, 1 x 80mm inlet and 1 x 120mm hung under HDD bay blowing into case and 1 x 120mm fan strapped onto the heatsink of my GPU.
Speed fan is reporting core as 40°C idle.

Power supply ordered from Aria.co.uk, although they are out of stock again but www.overclockers.co.uk have them in stock for £130 inc vat!

Still not sure which way to jump for a CPU Cooler then I saw the Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme and thought 'Nice', then I saw the price and thought 'F**K OFF'!!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Get rid of the goo & get yourself some Arctic Silver. You don't have to worry about getting the latest 1 if it's more expensive [I haven't looked at AS prices in ages], as I'm still on my original tube of AS2, & it still works fine.
<edit>
looks to be around the £7-8 mark for some AS5, & it should last you ages.
</edit>

Ah, yes well, about that... It's possible that with some very memory-intensive app, & at stock settings, the 6000 might be at a disadvantage to the 5600, but that can be avoided by running it at 14x215 instead of 15x200.
Have a look at this thread:
linkage
I rendered the same scene with various different CPU & RAM settings.

tS7.11 rings benchmark, 1000 x 1000, save as bmp, no AA
XP3200 [2.2Ghz], 2GB RAM = 0:03:04.46 [3 mins 4.46 seconds]

X2 6000 [@ 3Ghz - 15x200], 4GB RAM = 0:01:47.06 [multi-threading option disabled]
X2 6000 [@ 3Ghz - 15x200], 4GB RAM = 0:00:59.10
X2 6000 [@ 3Ghz - 14x215], 4GB RAM = 0:00:59.34
X2 6000 [@ 3.2Ghz - 15x215], 4GB RAM = 0:00:55.89
X2 6000 [@ 3.3Ghz - 15x220], 4GB RAM = 0:00:53.90
The above results for the X2 were done on a fresh install of windows that I had to make on a spare partition as my existing install was partly borked & wouldn't go into Windows, but I was able to sort it from the fresh install, & then go back to the old 1 with all my old settings & stuff installed. On the old install, with X2 running at stock it was a couple of seconds slower, but I put that down to having a load of other stuff running. As you can see, the 14x215 option makes virtually no difference, & it can even handle the overclock to 3.2 with no probs even with the stock cooler, so I don't think the memory issue is that big a deal.

Hmm... it's a bit smaller than mine. Mine weighs in at about 8x19x22.5". I think having a greater air volume inside helps with temperature as well [more volume = more heat energy required to raise air to same temperature].

As someone else pointed out earlier in the thread, you ideally want to have your intake & exhaust fairly well balanced, which you haven't really got at the moment, as well as having the air flow from front to back.

As I understand it, your setup works out as follows:
Intake:
front 80mm [reduced flow due to case]
side 80mm [CPU fan connected to duct]

Exhaust:
2 x rear 80mm
side 80mm

At present you've got more fans trying to remove air from the case than you have trying to bring cool air in. The front fan being hindered by the case tilts the balance further in favour of the exhaust fans. This creates negative air pressure - great for vacuum cleaners, not so great for PCs.

Of course, if you want to turn your PC into a hoover, a few of these would do the job. :disturbd:

IIWY, I'd see if there's room to get a bigger fan in the front. You've probably got room for a 92mm, & if you're lucky you might have room for a 120mm. Cut out the necessary hole for it as well & that should improve the front intake situation considerably. Depending on the design of the back of the case, you may be able to fit either a pair of 92s or a 120mm fan back there, then you could cover up the side holes.

Not too bad, cheers for that. I may get 1 if I get another PSU. The only downside is no fan underneath & the cables aren't modular.

:LOL: I may be trying the Freezer sooner than I expected, as I just paid for a rather intersting add-on to my 3D prog, so my CPU may be getting a bit more useage in the near future. BTW, no I didn't pay that much, I was eligible for an extra discount, so only paid $119 [about £58].

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

But both the 5600 and the 6000 are at a disadvantage to pretty much all the c2d's :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Yes, yes, we know, but we prefer to support the little guy. :p:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

They have cunning plans lol

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Zing, if you want us to go C2D then donate us the board/cpu and we'll happily do it mate :)

Lol, another trip to my mate to cadge his artic silver off of him :) Would you suggest lapping the CPU block to get it smoother, or just use some brasso/duraglit to get it smooth?

I may have to revisit the case/fan situation again then. The problem is due to no chipset fan or a fan on the GPU so heat is radiated into the case more! The 80mm intake is held in a plastic cage that clips onto the inside of the case at the front, so it's not actually on the outside of the chassis but inside it. It should be between the front removable panel and the front of the chassis where there is more space to draw in cooler air. May have to start cutting some holes in the front chassis and use the 120mm fan thats hung under the HDD bay rather than the 80mm fan. Could also drill some air holes in the front plastic cover to help draw in more air. Something to play about with tomorrow then :disturbd:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I freely give my advice I aint freely giving my hardware ;)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Nah, I'm a more staunch AMD fan than that, if he wants me to switch teams he'll have to cough up a pair of Clovertowns. :D

If you mean just to get the goo off, acetone will do it, that's what I used. You can probably get some from your local chemist for less than £2. Then give it a wipe over with some Isopropyl Alcohol. You can do the same on your CPU, but take it out of the socket first - Acetone & plastic don't play nicely together, & it's the plastic that usually goes home crying to mummy. :) [just put a little bit on a bit of soft kitchen roll] Although not the best finish I've ever seen on the bottom of a heatsink, the finish on my stock heatsink was good enough. You can lap it if you really feel the need & are confident that you know what you're doing, but I wouldn't bother

I know it's an Asus, but what board is it you've got? I can't remember if you've said or not. [I just want to look it up on Asus' site, so I can see the layout of it] I haven't got a fan on my chipset heatsink at the moment, infact due to the fact that the AM2NF3-VSTA is rather... compact, the corner of the chipset heatsink is practically touching the cooler on my X800. I could probably fiddle with the chipset heatsink a bit to give a little more room, but it'd just be more hassle & I can't see the point at the moment [I bolted it to the board rather than trusting those silly push-pin things].

That's not a problem, you just remove the plastic cage & drill 4 holes in the case for the screws to go through. :) As for the inside vs. outside thing, I assumed it was inside, as they usually are. :)

Nope, you want [ideally] some free space on both sides of the fan. I don't mean in the sense that it's just hanging in free air, like your 120mm is at the moment, I mean nothing actually in the direct path of the air for at least 1/2 an inch either side. As long as there's... 15-25mm between the fan & whatever is the nearest inside object [hardrive cage?] that is plenty.

As for putting holes in the front plastic panel - what I suggest is 1 big hole, & use 1 of those round black plastic ducts that you've seen on a couple of sites linked earlier in this thread. That will cover up any rough edges you left on the hole you cut & make it look more professional, & you can cut the back end of it to length so it goes to within about 1mm of the metal panel of the case where the fan is mounted. Why 1mm gap? because you're unlikely to get an absolutely perfect seal between the back end of the duct & the metal chassis of your case, & an important part of both good airflow & reduction of dust in your case is making sure the air only goes to & from where you want it to. To that end, you invest in a cheapo foam mousemat [cheapo £1 jobbie will do just fine], & cut out an O-ring to go between the chassis of your case & the duct. It dampens vibration & stops air/dust going in/out of the gap between the duct & chassis. You can even go 1 step further & cut out a square piece just a bit bigger than your fan, with the hole in the middle just that little bit smaller than the diameter of the end of the duct. If you make holes in the corners for the fan screws [I've actually used nuts & bolts in the past], then hey-presto instant fan vibration dampener, & air/dust gasket all in 1. :) Of course, if you're going that route, you'll want another 1 on the inside of the chassis between the metal & the fan, & then a small piece on each corner. It's a lot easier to put the washers [to stop the foam slipping over the nut] & nuts on on the side of the fan that isn't touching the case with bolts that are long enough to go all the way through the fan & chassis than to use shorter bolts & try to do up the nuts against the side of the fan nearest the chassis. Trust me, I learnt that 1 the hard way. ;)

If I haven't done a good enough job of explaining it &/or you're having trouble picturing what I mean, let me know & I'll try to knock out a pic in trueSpace.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Cinebench is abit more of a universally supported benchmark, and its somthing my old core 2 duo, thrashed amd's finest barcelona at :) not surprising though that 2x 3.6GHz beat 4x 1.6GHz

I have forgotten the point of this thread, was the cooler just abit loud or was the system unstable ?

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Perhaps, but I didn't do that testing for this thread, I did it for the thread I linked to on the Caligari forum [I just haven't gotten round to posting it there yet], & also to satisfy my own curiosity. As I don't use Cinema4D, testing with Cinebench would be pointless.

I'm fairly sure they're in the 2-3Ghz range now. In fact I know they've had Barcelona up to 3Ghz, but I don't know if that's the 2 or 4 core version. Also, the reason I posted that info was in response to his comment about memory performance on the 5600 vs. the 6000, for which the data was adequate to illustrate my point. How a C2D would or wouldn't perform is completely irrelevent for comparing 2 AMD chips from the same family to each other.

No, it was asus loud - badum-tush! :disturbd: :Sprint:

Seriously though, I don't think he's had a problem with stability [except when using CPU-Z ;)], I believe it was temperatures & noise that he wanted to reduce.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

@Alien: Mobo is an ASUS Crosshair Went for that as the 590 chipset supports SLI at 16x for both cards, the 570 chipset only does 8x for both cards if using SLI! I'll just clean off the gunk from cooler/cpu and remount the HSF! Gonna try mounting the 120mm fan in the front of the case, drill some mounting holes for it and some extra air holes in the chassis front too!

You're explanations are fine BTW, unless you just WANT to do those pics in TrueSpace :)

@keith: Was just an excersise in ducting to see if CPU temp would drop as the fan was noisy, I think it worked as the CPU fan doesn't spin so loudly now, it uses PWM to adjust speed on the CPU fan, with a duct it seems to allow more cooler air to get sucked in and blown onto the heatsink! Then after that it turned into an airflow discussion and fans, fan orientation and fan mounting! I'm turning int a real 'fanboy' now, lol!!!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Alien : I did see that pic this morning on l'inq, and well its very questionable since its a digital camera pic of an unkown amd cpu thats running at 3GHz, im pretty sure it would be quad core to get a score of 5.9+ (core 2 duo needs 3.6GHz+ to reach that) however we have no way of linking the machine in the pic to that score.
They could of used extreme cooling to get it to hit 3GHz, or they could of used a lower speed quad to get windows to record the score, and then put in a dual core chip to get that screen grab.

A crucial thing missing from that pic is the little bit saying "This system is : rated (or unrated) then giving the score.
If you change hardware it will change this to unrated, but will show the previous score until you rerun it.

I'd be very pleased if amd has got there quad core to 3GHz on air cooling as this would give intel the hurry up (they're currently backing off development) However there 'blizzard' of name drops suggested that they would launch at 2GHz for the bulk of machines (some 77%) with 6% being 2.3GHz and above, and 17% being 'energy efficent'
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets...oc.aspx?i=3050

I do wonder if amd have been building some barca's @90nm as they really seem to be having trouble with 65nm to the point of they are already talking about 45nm being next year and yet they have yet to ship mass volumes of 65nm chips, only really the energy efficent chips so far and some of the low- mid end desktop chips

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Lucky git! No wonder you can't afford a more expensive heatsink! :p: That's what I hope to get eventually. [Okay, so if I had the money I'd actually have an L1N64... [img]Download Failed (1)[/img]]

Good idea, remember, the AS needs to be as thin & smooth/evenly spread out as you can get it.

Cool, that should hopeully improve your airflow significantly.

Well, I do need the practice. Maybe after I've had a play with the new version... :)

Cynical, much? :) It's just a shame they only mentioned the codenames Barcelona [the core] & Phenom which is a partial model name, there'll be Phenom X2 [Kuma] & Phenom X4 [Agena]. Of course, there'll also be the Agena FX, but that's socket F [quad FX platform].

Did you notice this bit from page 10:
So apparantly it was a quad core. :)

I somehow doubt it, the 2.4 Ghz Agena's supposed to use 89W, & my X2 [Windsor, 90nm] is rated as 125w, so I'd think they'd have to be using a smaller process.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Well today was, to put it mildly, a f***ing nightmare!!!

Started off with removing the heatsink, except it wouldn't come off for some reason. Both clips were unhooked but the effing thing world not come away from the CPU. Pulled and pulled and eventually 'pop' the heatsink came off, phew!! except there was no CPU in the socket when I looked down!! :confused: After a mild heart attack I sneaked a look at the heatsink and to my relief/surprise the CPU was firmly stuck to the bottom of it by the pre-applied goo :Yikes: Prised the CPU off and checked the pins, by sheer luck they were all straight and none missing, first time I've pulled a CPU out of its socket when it's clamped in :disturbd:

Nipped round to my mates with the CPU and heatsink as he's got some funky cleaning fluid called PROPANONE (Fancy name for acetone I think), a few dabs on a kitchen towel and a rub on the heatsink drew the goo off in no time, kitchen towel was as a black as night first rub, then after a few more rubs with a new piece of kitchen towel it was clean so no more goo left to clean off. Same for the CPU! Came home and assaulted the case!

Drilled out the case front by chain dilling lots of small holes so I had about a 11cm square hole, filed the back/front edges to get rid of burrs then drilled mounting holes for the fan and found the plastic speaker/fan cage was 5mm too wide on one side as the 120mm fan could not sit square to the case, so a hacksaw job on the plastic cage later, the fan and plastic cage were in place!

Then I knocked the phone base station off the wall and broke 2 small brackets that held the base station onto the mounting bracket, now the bloody phone tilts forward and I can't put the phone on it to charge it at night :mad:

Also got cramp in my feet from kneeling in a cramped bedroom and also in my right forefinger by gripping the hand drill so hard while trying to drill the case because the drill I used was about as sharp as butter! First time I've hand cramp in my finger too, seemed funny bending your finger straight only to see it slowly curl up and cramp again :erm: Eventually it stayed straight enough for me to continue putting all my bits back in the case.

Managed to put the PC back together and boot it, CPU was still alive! The 120mm fan is now blowing straight into the bottom of the case with nothing in its way. Mounted 2 x 80mm exhaust fans at the rear, 2 x 80mm Silent fans on the side blowing in, used some tissue paper as a dust filter :) So thats 3 fans bringing air in and 2 drawing it out, as opposed to 3 drawing air out and only 1 blowing in. The 120mm fan under the HDD doesn't count as it was just blowing in the air the 80mm intake was drawing in.

So we'll see if this has done anything significant to the temps in the case. Too knackered to do any testing now, it's late and I'm b*ll*cksed!!!

Next time someone suggest a 'simple case hack' don't be surprised if I tell you to F*** *FF :D

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

That's 1 of the reasons why the 1st thing I do with a heatsink that comes with pre-applied goo is it to clean it off. Having said that, I have read somewhere that the pre-applied goo on the Freezer 64 Pro is supposed to be better than Arctic Silver. I don't know if that's true or not, but I've not had any probs with AS, & I'm still rather dubious about using pre-aplied goo.

:LOL: I can beat that story, & I have a pic. I built a PC for someone, & sent it by Special Delivery. When they received it, things weren't exactly as they should be...
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/alien42..._to/socket.jpg

Yup, that's the stuff.

Cool. :)

Be careful it doesn't take out a restraining order. :p:

Well that stage sounded like it didn't go too badly. :tu:

Ask your mate if he's got any Chemical Metal [works on more than just metal]. Put some of that in the holes, then you can re-drill & put new wall plugs in. I've also heard that No More Nails stuff is meant to be good, but I've not tried it. Or if it doesn't need to be in exactly the same place, you could drill new holes near to the old ones & hope that the base station will hide the old holes. :D

Yeah, sounds unpleasant. To save you the bother of finding out the hard way, might I also suggest you don't ever try drilling into concrete with a hand drill & a masonry bit. :disturbd: [BTDT :dunce:]

No permanent damage then? ;)

If you happen to have a female friend or relative who wears tights or stockings, & has an old pair they might like to donate, I've heard that stuff does ok as a dust filter, & would probably strike a better balance between keeping dust out & letting air through than the tissue paper. Another alternative would be net curtain material.

Isn't that 120mm fan the 1 you've now got mounted in the front?

Simple in concept, perhaps, more laborious in application though, as you've discovered. :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Why did you feel the need for the 2 extra fans on the side blowing in? imho these will impede correct air flow. The air should be pulled in front bottom then allowed to be pulled out over the motherboard and out of the back nearer the top .I think you have to much air coming in now and not enough exhaust

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

@Alien: Glad you didn't take offence at the last bit of my post :tu:

I gather that pic is the CPU AND SOCKET glued to the heatsink :disturbd: Hope I don't get a parcel of you anytime soon :D Was it Parcel Force that delivered it? Puts the FORCE part into perspective then if it was!!

The 120mm fan indeed is the one that was hung under the HDD, it's now bolted to the chassis where I made the big hole :) I also drilled holes in the case front, it already had an ideal pattern of indents in it which made drillng so much easier, I now have an 11 x 11 grid of holes in a 12cm square. Stuck some tissue paper inside to stop dust again.

The phone, I just taped the base station to the bracket using PTFE (Put The F***er Everywhere) tape, it'll do for now :cool:

Hmm.. A pair of tights! I can use a spare pair I have, err... they're for when I go fishing gov, honest! :shocked:

The fan noise is not as bad as before too, so somethings happened! Either too much turbulence before or the side ones aren't spinning, can't see for the tissue paper :)

@Zing: They are only low RPM Silent ones in the side, didn't think they'd do much to upset the flow seeing as the rear fans are spinning much faster, that's if they are spinning as I mentioned above :) I can easily unplug them if they're not needed, or can flip them round to blow out, or have 1 blow in 1 blow out etc!! Maybe use one of those smoke bombs my local plunber uses for testing the air draw of chimneys, stick in the front of the case and if I don't get much smoke coming out the rear of the case somethings up ;)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

yes do that and if the air is disturbed by the side fans or is not being drawn out correctly alter your cooling :)

imo pic is ideal airflow

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Wasn't offended, more concerned that I might have put you off modding computers, or p****d you off by making it sound easier than it had turned out to be. For future reference, I tend to lean more towards understatement than exageration. :blush:

Close, but not quite - look again. The lugs of the socket that the heatsink was latched onto turned out to be stronger than the bond/grip/whatever between the socket & the metal pin bits that were soldered into the motherboard. [plus I used Arctic Silver, not the original chewing gum that Cooler Master put on it] That's 1 of the reasons why you couldn't pay me enough to use an ECS [aka Elitegroup] motherboard. It's not like the heatsink was heavy either, just a cheap aluminium Cooler Master jobby [good enough for an XP2000 that wasn't going to be overclocked, plus they wouldn't cough up for a decent 1]. Also, if I ever build a system for someone I don't know really well again, & they ignore my recommendations for hardware [I recommended an Abit board, they insisted on the cheap ECS 1 because they couldn't afford the Abit], I'll just tell them to find someone else to build their computer for them.

LOL, no, Royal Mail "Special" Delivery.

In all honesty, I think that tissue paper might be hindering airflow too much. Dust's only a problem if like me you can't be bothered to have to clear the dust out of it every month. :)

Cool. :tu:

:LOL: Unless "fishing" is a euphamism I haven't heard before, I'm not sure that excuse works. :p: As I said previously, I haven't tried them before, so don't know how they rate in terms of a balance between airflow & dust filtering.

Probably the reduced turbulance on the front intake fan.

Out of the various options you've listed the 1 in/1 out is the 1 I'd forget about straight away, if they're close together you'll just have the intake 1 taking back in the warm air the exhaust 1 has just removed. That's why people don't make the rear fan below the PSU an intake instead of an exhaust.

The only thing that would bother me about that idea is what sort of residue the smoke might leave behind.

^^ what he said. :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Well thats a standard approach to doing cooling, not sure i would call it ideal though. But its about the best you're going to get with ATX, BTX on the other hand was a much better idea its such a shame that its not really taking off as its much quieter and much more efficent way of doing air cooling.

Back to the amd chip thing somthing just doesnt smell right. Generally pre-release engineering samples and alike run slightly slower than what the manufacturer then ships as tweaks are made to the design which squeezes abit more performance out of them.
I dont really see the point of what they have done aside from a 'look at us we can make a 3GHz chip too'.

You would have to assume that there is somthing significantly wrong with it else they would be 'leaking' performance figures from the chip at just how much it thrashes an intel chip, or at least some kind of benchmark other than showing its off the scale on windows performance index.

When removing a heatsink its much better to try and slide it off than pull it off. As the thermal goop can as you have shown can stick on pretty well.
When you apply your own thermal grease and then move the heatsink around abit on the chip to squeeze out all the air bubbles you will find then that the sink becomes 'sucked' onto the chip and is difficult to pull off.


Edit - what i meant to say all along.
There has long been a debate over whether you should run your computer with slightly positive (more air in than out) or slightly negative pressure (more out than in)

A downside of negative pressure is that air is pulled in from other sources (poor shutlines on case etc) and you find dust creeps in everywhere. this does not happen if you have slightly positive pressure and as long as your inlet is well filtered you dont get a dust build up inside the case.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

All good points/observations gentlemen :tu:

I could light a load of joss sticks and stuff them in front of the case, at least I'd see the smoke being sucked in and exhausted if air flow is correct, and it would smell a lot nicer and probably would not leave any residue :D

I also have a mate who used to work in a factory making air and oil filters so I can ask him to get some filter material for me. In fact he went down there the other week to get some filter material for the 25cm fan on the side of his Kandalf case, yes I did say 25cm! It's bloody huge, but it blows into the case and so he's put the filter on the inside to stop the dust getting sucked in!

He's also got an external water cooler he no longer uses, a Thermaltake Aquarius III, but not sure if it will fit an AM2 socket but should I even consider it?

I also forget to mention the duct is no longer being used, thought it better to see if regreasing the CPU and getting better air flow would do more good! I'll see after a few hours of the system being on and a blast (literally) in GTA: San Andreas and some other games!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Considering BTX was created by Intel, & they cancelled further development of BTX retail products last September, & that they along with AMD & other component manufacturers are trying to focus on lower power consumption [& consequently heat output], I wouldn't get your hopes up about a BTX revival.

If I had to guess, based on various things I've read, I'd say odds are they're having trouble with yields of cores that can hit 3Ghz. As you say, the 3Ghz may well be a "look we can do it too" act, with the idea being to keep people interested in the AMD brand, or perhaps even to win back some of the interest that Core2 has taken away from them.

I've never had trouble removing a heatsink that I've put on with Arctic Silver. :shrug:

My case actually does have a certain amount of negative pressure, which is why I have done my best to seal up any openings that aren't supposed to have air flowing through. It's not a perfect seal or anything, but I reckon it's definately made a difference, as my case doesn't get as dusty as my old 1 did before I sealed up the extra gaps.

You'd need to light quite a few, as the smoke is quite thin, & disperses easily.

I must admit I was surprised when I 1st read that, that's the same size as the cone in my sub-woofer!

You can actually buy PC fan filters, which aren't too expensive. I may be recovering the 1 that came with my case soon, as I managed to poke a hole in it the last time I cleaned it. :( After a quick test with some net curtain I had left over from some bug screens I made to keep bugs out of my shed [stretched over a wooden frame, which was then screwed to the wall around the air vents], I might give that a go. The holes in it are smaller than the plastic mesh stuff on the existing filter, but it still allows air to flow through it ok.

I'm not sure about AM2 compatability. Thermaltake's site [as well as several others] mention "K8", but the problem with that is that K8 includes sockets 754, 939, 940, AM2 [which I believe is physically a 940, but incompatible with s940 Opterons], & 1207 as well. As to whether you should consider it... :shrug: It's up to you. I haven't read any reviews of it, as external liquid cooling doesn't interest me. It's 1 thing when you've got the whole system inside your case, but when it's external... I can just imagine accidentally knocking it off, & the problems/damage that would ensue. Considering the recent fate of your telephone's base station, you sound like you have the grace/co-ordination of... well... me! :p: In which case an external liquid cooling setup wouldn't be high on my list of recommendations.

I'll certainly be interested to hear the results.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

All this when a decent CPU HSF would have done the job

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

But then I wouldn't have had the benefit of duct making, case modding and general advice/fun banter with people on this forum would I?

Some fun at parties you'd be :D

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

yeah but I get the job done dont pee around ;)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

If I could afford that Noctua or Thermalright Zing I may not have gone to all this trouble, no disrespect to the people who've given advice :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

even an artic freezer 64 would have done lol

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

OK, I'll try the AF 64 Pro!

LOL, scan are out of stock :)

Ebuyer to the rescue! £11.33 inc VAT! Read some of the customer reviews and while positive one noticeable comment from a few people was the metal retention clips put so much pressure on the CPU and socket that one person had it shear through the plastic lugs on the CPU socket :Yikes: Have you heard of this Zing? Also, they say the pre applied paste is overkill, so buy some AS5 and regrease it?

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I know you asked the zingly one, but I just had a look at mine again. If by overkill they mean that it's too thick, I'd have to agree. Not by a lot [we're not talking Voodoo3 GPU thermal adhesive thickness here], but certainly noticeably thicker than the amount of AS I'd put on.

As for the clip being too tight, if you're that concerned, you could just apply pressure gradually to the clip lever. As you've already done the stock AMD 1 you have an idea of how it should feel, so if it feels like it needs you to use significantly more then just abort the attempt & go back to the AMD 1.

BTW, you mentioned that your system was quieter, but you haven't told us how your temps are doing.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, up pops an Alien :D

So you're happy with your AF64 then? As for my temps, it seems without the duct the temps have gone up, more so now I've regreased the CPU, think I hit 60°C and the fan was hitting 6000RPM, previous with stock cooler was 5600RPM and temps about 55-60°C and with duct CPU about 40-43°C and 4000RPM on the fan! Not sure the AS II my mate has is still useable, it's well over 4 years old prolly more! Not done anything different from greasing previous CPU's, have done about 25-30 or so for me and friends and not had a CPU pop yet! Maybe his ASII is past it's use by date?

I'll order the AF cooler and see what happens then! Should I buy some OCZ 5+ paste as Ebuyer sells that, might as well get both from same place and regrease the AF64, or just use the gunk that comes on it?

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

[img]Download Failed (1)[/img] :disturbd:

I haven't actually tried it yet, I just said I had a look to see how thick the pre-applied goo is.

[img]Download Failed (1)[/img] That doesn't sound right. I can't think why your temps would have gone up. :confused:

Waitasec... 6000rpm? Are we still talking about the stock AMD cooler, same as I posted a pic of previously? I set Orthos running to warm up my CPU, to see how fast the fan would go. It's been going for over 20mins now, cores are fluctuating around the 53-58°C mark, & the highest the fan's gone is about 3600rpm. :confused:

Unlikely, considering I've had mine at least as long, if not longer.

Do you want me to try mine 1st? I wasn't planning on putting it in yet, but if you're in a rush to get lower temps I suppose I could.

Just a thought, are you using the optional cooling fan that comes with the Crosshair, & if so, is there any chance you might have mixed up which sockets it & the CPU fan plug into? I don't know what speed that fan's rated for, but that might explain the higher speed.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Regarding the water cooler, have amd changed the retention method for the heatsink between the different A64 sockets ? IE would a 754/939 air cooler work with AM2 ? I have some recolection that they did tweak things abit which meant all good 939 coolers were just with AM2. At worst case all you would need is a new waterblock, however if its anything like my thermaltake waterblock you strip off the standard air cooler mountings and put in there own including back plate, so i suspect it would work fine :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

@Alien: No need to fit your cooler, I'll order one and if it works, it works, if it doesn't it hasn't broke the bank! The CPU fan is the stock AMD one. It's controlled by the mobo via PWM (4 pin CPU fan connector) and according to PC Probe it was spinning at 6000RPM, temp up around 60°C! Not sure whats gone wrong unless the clip has come loose on the heatsink. The additional fan in the Crosshair box is not connected, it's only used when passive cooling like a watercooler is used, not when air cooling is used so the stock cooler is plugged into the CPU fan connector.

At least the system is stable! It's not resetting, freezing or BSOD'ing, YET!!

@keith: I rung my mate about his watercooler but he's selling it to one of the guys he works with as he reminded me I said I didn't want it :doh: As for the AM2 compatability, not sure! The board I put this water cooler in was a socket 940 and we had to remove the black bracket around the CPU and then put 4 bolts through the back of the mobo and backplate and then put a 'H' bracket over the bolts and slide it onto the water block then screw it down. It may work on an AM2, but won't know now he's selling it!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I'm not sure. I do know that the Freezer 64 Pro will do s754 & s939, & it doesn't come with any extra brackets or whatever, so maybe the mounting mechanisms for them are all the same. :shrug:

I've just been looking at the ACF64P again, after reading a review of it. It is a rather big heatsink, & it looks like the fan will be above the first 1 or 2 RAM slots. Hopefully there'll be enough clearance so that I can leave the RAM in there, but once it's installed, if I wanted to remove the RAM I'd have to remove the heatsink [or at least unclip the fan, which is pretty simple] first. [when I eventually do it, I mean] Although your board is about 1.6" wider than mine, the RAM looks roughly the same distance from the CPU socket as mine, so you may want to bear in mind the above if you get the ACF64P.

More important than that though is that heatsink between the CPU socket & rear I/O ports. I was worried that it might be too close to allow the ACF64P to be fitted, but having spent a few mins looking at the pic of the Crosshair & the cooler I think you might just get away with it. :)

Well that's always a good thing. :D

s940? So it was an Opteron board then? From recent reading, & as mentioned previously, I think it would have fitted, as it did say all K8, & AM2 is K8, as are s940 Opterons.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I had no issues with the AF64 the fan does sit quite high so hopefully will be out of the way. I would be concerned for a AM2 cpu getting upto 60 degrees there may be some kind of fault here perhaps with the mobo I had a Gigabyte mobo that just cooked D805 cpus that were perfectly fine in other boards even with freezer pros on they were just hot ,I had to rma the mobo. Lets hope the AF64 brings your temps down.If temps continue to rise to these levels I feel you may need to try it in a different board

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

With standard RAM, perhaps, let's just hope he doesn't have Corsair Dominator or some other RAM with extra tall heat spreaders/sinks.

I was going to dispute this point, but then I thought to check the power useage for his 5600. My 6000 uses 125w, whereas his 5600 is only supposed to use 89w. If his temps are the same or higher than mine with the tissue paper removed from the front fan [that might be hindering air flow], & with the stock AMD cooler, then something's definitely not right. Having said that, apparently AS can take a few days to "cure" or "settle" or whatever. :shrug:

@Web-Junkie: It might be a good idea to post your system temp as well when posting CPU temp, might give us a more complete picture of the situation.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Even in machines with no other cooling and with stock coolers x2 cpus ive used on AM2 have not even nearly reached such temps. My daughters 4200 with a stock cooler is no where near this under normal load and the case has no other cooling at all.I know this is a lesser cpu but the last amd cpu in accept as ok at a normal temp of 60 degrees in a thoroughbred

was this temp under orthos or normal load? I cant seem to find it there is a lot of babble in this thread and I think I may have missed it

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Depends whether her 4200 is the 89w version or the 65w version. If the latter, that would explain the diffference in that instance.

AFAIK full load, but not sure if it was Orthos or something else.

Oh, & Web_Junkie, apparently the paste on the ACF64P is their older MX-1 compound [it's their newer MX-2 which is supposedly better than AS5], which is apparently not as good as AS5 [don't know how it compares to AS2], so if you decide to buy some AS5 as well, then definitely go with that instead of the pre-applied MX-1.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

its not EE

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I wouldnt be too fussed about which thermal paste you use, as yes they can make a difference but its actually quite small.

The more silver a paste has in it the more solid it is and thus lower thermal resistance, however the more silver thats in it the harder is it to apply a thin smooth void free layer. The way i tend to apply paste is different to most.
I will put the normal blob in the middle but then i'd use an old plastic card to spread out the paste nice and smooth on the heatspreader, then i'll put the two together and move the heatsink relative to the cpu slightly, this works out all the air bubbles and its why it becomes difficult to pull the heatsink off because i've made a good seal between the two.

It sounds to me that somthing has gone wrong with contact patch, by spinning the fan fast the mobo is trying to compensate for the high thermal resistance. I'd suspect there is a patch of the heatspreader which has no thermal goo on it.

Most pre-applied stuff these days is just that pre-applied paste which is actually really good compared to the 'thermal pads' of a few years ago which were more like sticky tape than a thermal compound and required alot of burning in. If you got the pad really hot it would form a better thermal seal, i used to do this by idleing the machine in the bios with the fan disabled letting the temps build up before shutting it off. I used to see a drop in fully loaded temps of between 5-10C by doing this.


As for the chips themselves 125w is quite high! my quad core is only 105w (note this is a maximum, worst of the worst shipped value, most are alot lower than this)
The 65w X2's are the 65nm chips which are few and far between!

And as for the amd demo, seem's there has been quite a response to our comments!

As for zing :) aah the old t'bred, to small of a cpu die to consistantly remove the heat it produced, hence why they followed intel with the heatspreader route

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Ordered the AF64 Pro and some OCZ Ultra 5+! Might as well get the ball rolling :)

Won't be using the puter much today so no point worrying about the high temps, AF will be here tomorrow hopefully so it won't matter, unless it's a faulty board as Zing says, will find out soon enough!

Defo gonna apply new paste like keith said, I use an old SKY card to spread the paste on.

And Alien, system temp is bout 40°C according to PC Probe, will take the tissue paper off and see if makes a difference when I fit my AF64, also waiting for some filter stuff from my mate, rung him up but he's not in :mad: was hoping to get that tomorow too!

So tomorrow is when it all goes bang :dunce:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Aside from the moving it after you've put it on bit, I think that's the way a lot of people do it.

If that were the case I'd expect the temps to be higher. Then again, assuming there's not some sort of problem with fan speed reporting on his system [either software or hardware] his fan [same as I have] is running twice the speed of mine.

The 1 I really hated was that pink stuff you'd get on the bottom of Cooler Master heatsinks. IIRC the stock heatsink that came with my XP1900 had the same stuff on it. Simplest way to get that stuff off was to remove any plastic parts [including fan] from the heatsink & then put it in the freezer for a couple of hours until the pink stuff went brittle, which made it easy to scrape off with a finger nail.

Yeah, but those C2DQs are 65nm, aren't they? As for the 125w of mine, there's an AMD util that's supposed to monitor power useage. Hopefully it'll give more than voltage, which I already know [1.43v - Web_junkie: yours shouldn't be higher than 1.35v (+/- 0.05v)].

Actually, there are 65w in 90nm as well:
http://www.amdcompare.com/us-en/desktop/default.aspx
Set options as follows:
CPU: Athlon 64 X2 dual core
Manufacturing Tech: 90nm SOI
Wattage: 65w
& you'll see there's models listed from 3800 to 5200

After a bit of searching, there are 4200, 4600, 5200 models available at 90nm & 65w.

65nm: plenty of 4000+, 4400+, 4800+, 5000+

Where? :confused:

It was the T-bird [specifically the 1.44Ghz model] that was legendary for its heat output, not so much the T-breds.

Hmm... I had a thought about that. AMD provide some utils here that might be useful. I was thinking mainly of the power monitor. It would be interesting to see if they tally with SpeedFan & PC Probe. If it's using too much power that could potentially cause an increase in temps [would mean Zing was right about the mobo :)].

That's what I do as well.

40°C? [img]Download Failed (1)[/img] That's bloody warm for the inside of a case. Either the reading's wrong or... I dunno. From what you've described you ought to have plenty of airflow to keep system temps lower than that. What about the Crosshair's extra plug-in temp sensors, maybe you could use them to find out what area is putting out the extra heat. That might provide the clue as to how to drop your temps. 60°C [under load] may be uncommon for a CPU, but so is 40°C for a system temp unless you lived somewhere really hot & didn't have air conditioning.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Well I'm in a small room and have a 17" CRT that kicks out a lot of heat, this room DOES get warm quickly if I have the door closed and the curtains drawn at night, even with the window open. When the AF64 arrives I'll hang one of those sensors near the middle of the case and one near/touching the CPU and see what the readings are! I don't think It's wise to try and trap the sensor between heatsink and cpu though! Vcore is showing 1.33v, so that's right!

Already installed the Dual Core Optimizer and enabled Cool n Quiet, although the Processor driver is showing 1.3.2.0 and there is a 1.3.2.16, so installed that but it's still showing the same version in device manager after a reboot?

One thing I have done is use the EPP of the RAM to set it to performance in BIOS, this changes the timings to 4-4-4-12 and increases the DDR voltage from 1.8v to 2.38v and DIMM VTT from 0.9v to 1.18v according to PC Probe and Everest. although I can't explain why it's showing CPU Hypertransport at 1.39v when it should be 1.20v, not overclocked the CPU unless it's tied in with the SLI memory? Those are the only 3 voltages showing RED in PC Probe.

Installed the Power Monitor, why does everything need a sodding reboot :mad:, but just shows the power as 1 red bar on the graph for each core! I turn all power saving options off in XP, always have and Vcore is showing 1.3v so that ties with PC Probe and Everest. Installed Dashboard too, jeeeesus another sodding reboot :mad::mad::mad:, but I think it's broke, CPU is showing 40°C no matter what I do and the fan speed is always showing MIN!!

Ripped the tissue off the inside of the case front and system is now idling at 42°C for CPU and 39°C for system. When I've fitted the AF64 I'll try using front fan and 1 exhaust and then front fan and 2 exhaust and see which works best, no side fans! Then I'll see if 1 side fan exhausting or 2 exhausting affects temps as well.

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

AF64 arrived this morning!

First problem was the clamping lever was on the wrong side, it looked like it would interfere with the fins on the mobo heatpipe and be awkward to get at when in place. Unscrewed the retention assembly and re-assembled it 180° now the lever is the correct side, fan is still pointing to the front of the case!

Second problem is the base of the heatsink is dog rough and concave! Scraped all the gunk off and used the edge of a SKY card to see if it was flat, in one direction it's concave and 90° to it it's nearly flat, but the finish is very rough! So either I leave it at that and hope it's OK or try to lap it flat and get a better finish, should I lap it? More damn work :rolleyes:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

AMD's 65nm process really is going like intel's 90nm process in being to hot and to slow.

The 1.4GHz Thunderbird was until the intel prescott's the highest thermal output chip ever this is true, but it was a 180nm cpu and had the die size to match the enormous heat output.

However when amd made the jump to 130nm with the thoroughbred (Tbred) the physical die size of the chip shrunk significantly, the thermal output did drop but not by as much. So the thermal output per mm went up to a point amd really had trouble with the chips and had to delay them and ship them with coolers that had copper inserts. They didnt last long before the Tbred-B came out where they changed the way the chip was layered up which solved the high heat density problem.

Then the barton took over with its bigger cache which made a much bigger die (intel had been using larger l2 cache all along and heatspreaders as well so didnt have the problem).

I'm surprised the AF64's surface was so rough, perhaps they are cutting corners these days :(


Edit - Having checked wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athlon) There was the palomino in between the thunderbird and the thoroughbred, the palomino was the first 'Athlon XP' and raised the clockspeed compared to the tbird (b/c) and was made at 180nm.
The move to 130nm with Tbred (A) was abit of a flop as the whole point of a process change is to decrease core temps / increase working frequency and Tbred (A) failed to do both, it took TBred (B) to make any gains and I quote

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Aye, surface is very rough, you can see the milling marks on the block! In fact it looks like it's a piece from a surface roughness scratch guage :)

Brother is up town and is going to see if he can get some wet or dry paper, between 400-2000 grit according to lapping guides I've read, we'll see what abortion I can make of this, better put your tin hats on this could get messy!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Everything is in and working!

Lapped the copper bottom with some 400/800/1000/1500/2000 grit wet or dry, not a mirror finish but first time I've done it so not complaining, at least it was flat and nowhere near as rough as it was! One problem I had with the lapping was the copper bottom kept vibrating on the glass/sand paper if I pressed on too hard? Tried immersing fully in water while lapping and by just wetting the sand paper and gently rubbing back and forth, still vibrated if I pressed too hard! But, managed to get a decent finish in the end by not pressing too hard

Fitting the AF64 was tricky, the retention clip is so damn stiff even with one side clipped onto the lugs you really have to press down on the other clip to get it to mate plus it was extremely hard to flip the clamping lever and you could feel the force it was exerting when it clamped home. The lever was actually pulled sideways a bit the strain was so great! Used the OCZ Ultra 5+ paste, spread it over the CPU but the block of the AF64 does not cover the whole of the CPU, rather it fits flush on 2 adjacent edges of the CPU and the other two edges have a 1 - 1.5mm gap exposing the CPU and paste!

Put a sensor cable touching the exposed bit of the CPU core and one hanging near the middle of the case! Idle temps according to PC Probe:

CPU: 36°C
CPU Fan: 2300rpm
Mobo: 31°C
Sensor 1 - CPU: 36°C
Sensor 2 - case temp: 28°C

Everest was near identical readings 1°C difference on CPU sensor, 37°C.

Ran Othos in 'Blend - stress CPU and RAM' mode for 10 minutes and noted PC Probe readings:

CPU: 53°C
CPU Fan: 2300rpm
Mobo: 33°C
Sensor 1 - CPU: 47°C
Sensor 2 - case temp: 30°C

CPU still looks high! Turned off the only overclocking feature enabled in the BIOS, SLI Memory, and re-ran Othos for 10 mins and no change on temps! Either this CPU runs hot or I suck at fitting heatsinks, I think I know which one people will opt for!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

53 on orthos is fine imo much better temps

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Really? oh good, thought i'd done something wrong!

System temp seems fine with the 120mm fan blowing in through the front and 2 x 80mm fans exhausting at rear, disconnected the 2 side fans! Just spent an hour on GTA: San Andreas and Sensor 2 is showing 30°c for system temp and 45°C for CPU so it's better than the duct I made (with stock cooler mind!) as I was getting about 43°C idle with that!

Cheers Zing, Alien and Keith and other contributors for all the help and advice, can we really put this thread to bed now? :disturbd:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Must be really small for a 17" CRT to heat it up quickly! :Yikes:

LOL, true. Before on-chip sensors became common, I recall reading a number of accounts of either milling a groove in the base of the heatsink, or more commonly drilling a hole in the side of the base of the heatsink that runs parallel to the bottom & as close as possible to it, then put thermal probe & a dollop of thermal paste in the hole.

Cool. :tu:

My processor driver shows the same version [only had the default MS 1 installed before].

I was going to play around with my RAM settings to get the timings I paid for, but my graphics card &/or monitors have done that thing again where they remain blank between re-booting & Windows login screen, which means if I want to get into the BIOS again I've got to power off & take the graphics card out & put it back in again. :rolleyes: [can't be bothered at the moment]

LOL, anything that works in a driver-ish sort of way usually does with Windows.

My understanding of that is that it would [in theory] go up from red to yellow to green the longer you leave your system on & the more it's idle.

Well, hopefully that should mean your mobo isn't trying to fry your chip. :)

I couldn't get Dashboard to load. I just get an error message.
Hmm... having googled, apparently it's because I have Cool'n'Quiet disabled in the BIOS. I remember leaving it disabled, & that I had a reason... I just can't remember what the reason was! :blush:

That's as it should be, fan pointing to front of case, airflow going towards rear exhaust fan[s].

Mine isn't concave, but I have to say after looking at it again it's definitely the roughest heatsink base I've ever seen. :( I'm not looking forward to lapping it either. It's probably going to have to wait a while anyway, as I think I had to chuck my decent/fine sandpaper out a while ago [it suffered an unpleasant fate :sick:]. I'll have to see what I've got left, otherwise it's going to have to wait until after next weekend, as I've only got just enough money for food until then.

None of the review pictures looked anywhere near as bad, I wonder why. :rolleyes:

Yeah, my 1900 was a Palamino.

I had to look that up, as I didn't know what you meant, but yeah, having had a closer look I have to agree. :(

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/alien42/smilies/tinhat.gif sorted.

IIRC, you're supposed to move it in small circles, not just back & forth. And yeah, it is supposed to be done fairly gently.

:Yikes:

I remember seeing that mentioned in a review. The important part is that it more than covers the area where the core is [in the middle]. On the plus side, as you've discovered, it makes sticking an exernal thermal probe on a bit easier. I used to have 1 of the probes for my DigiDoc 5 pressed up against the side of the core of my XP3200, & getting it to stay there, up against the not-very-tall side of the core wasn't easy [even with the supplied bit of sticky tape].

The onboard mobo sensor is probably somewhere warm, which would explain the difference in mobo & case temps.

[img]Download Failed (1)[/img] It's certainly an improvement over the temps you were getting.

Much better.

Awww, I was enjoying this thread. <pout>

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

As Vic or Bob would say:

You wouldn't let it lie!! :rofl:

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I've never really been into Vic & Bob, but I get the gist of the reference. :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Shooting Stars was brill, "What are the scores, George doors"

Ah Hum, anyway, box still running fine, CPU idling at 39°C as it's a bit warm today, ambient temp 30°C

My room is VERY small, about 8 feet square! No wonder it heats up so quickly.

As for the lapping, the guide I read just said move the block in on direction until it's removed most of the roughness then turn it 90° and use the next grit down and so on and so forth until you have a smooth mirror finish. Never got a mirror finish, but did have a smoother flatter block which seems OK, and I can't spell GAUGE either it appears :rolleyes:

The only problem I can see with the AF64 so far is the fan is nearly touching the back of the DVD drive cables and the HDD bay underneath. Thought about using a bit of card to deflect some air from the 120mm fan into the AF64's fan, but that idea is in embryo, not in a mad rush to try that!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

sounds like you got a tiny case mate sometimes size does matter lol

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

LOL, the case is about 16.5" long, 16.5" high and 9" wide! Looks a bit compact inside but there is plenty clear air space under the HDD bay and where the mobo sits, so that 120mm fan has a clear air path into the case.

Just rung my mate and asked him to bring his digital camera up so I can take a few piccies so you can see what the case is like and the duct I made! Should be a laugh!

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

Nice. :tu:

:erm: When you say 8 feet square, do you mean 8x8, or 4x2 [or 3.5x2.28-ish, etc]?

Hmm... I think I'll have to wait for the pics before forming an opinion on that 1.

Yeah, his sounds more like a mini-ATX than a mid-ATX.

Dude, last time you measured it it was 17" long & 17" high. Hmm... small warm room, shrinking case... you sure the Mrs hasn't tricked you into using the airing cupboard? :p:

Cool, look forward to seeing this PC I've been trying to imagine. :)

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

I await these images with interest, :D

Re: Making a CPU duct to draw outside air onto CPU!
 

OK here's the piccies:

Cobbled together duct. Red arrow pointing in is the intake from the 80mm fan at rear of case, duct slid over it and taped down. The other arrow shows the 70mm duct that slid over the CPU fan drawing the air onto the heatsink from the air the 80mm fan was blowing in! Don't laught it did work, better than I thought :D
http://img404.imageshack.us/img404/2...0008ke4.th.jpg

Now for the Songcheer extra wide case. Measures 9" wide x 16.5" long x 16.5 " high!! It's a short fat b'stard init!! What do you me it's like me then :shocked:
http://img123.imageshack.us/img123/8...0004od4.th.jpg

Front of case showing drilled air holes, note the 3 extra holes, oops! got carried away, shouldn't have watched Driller Killer earlier :angel:
http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/8...0002ak6.th.jpg

Inside showing air filter, just used some masking tape at right angles to hold it in place. Note the snapped off lug bottom left :( EE I'm a clumsy tw@!!
http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/9...0003ps4.th.jpg

Here's the hacked out hole for the 120mm fan, B'stard of a job that was :mad::
http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/3...0005bd2.th.jpg

Inside of case showing 120mm fan on the right, Arctic Cooler choking on the cables but the hot air is blowing towards the rear case fans! You can also just see the 120mm fan I strapped to the Graphics Card! There is plenty of air space in the case, particularly at the bottom and across the GFX card and slots! You can see the case temp sensor dangling in the middle too!
http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/6...0006sq2.th.jpg

Broken phone bracket, red circled areas are the lugs that I broke :( Should be like the ones directly below them!
http://img123.imageshack.us/img123/1...0013py1.th.jpg

So, that's basically what I've been rabbiting about for the last 7 pages :)