Question How do you manage your temps in warm locations?

[JCarax]

I live in a relatively warm place. It's around 24-28 degrees celsius during spring and hits 30+ during summer. Sadly I don't have AC in my room.
I got a corsair H110i. One exhaust fan on top and another exahaust in the back. AIO radiator is mounted on the front pulling air in. For some reason the airflow in my case is pretty bad. When I remove the side panel I immediately reduce my temps by a few degrees. I have a 140mm spare fan . I'm not sure if I can put it into use since I can either install it on the top or maybe the front but I'm not sure if it is possible to do with the radiator on the front.

I also have a big square room fan I can put in place of the side fan that actually cools pretty nice, it is just the dust build up I hate.

How do you guys manage your temps?

 

[Paperdoc]

OP, you asked. "So one question, when I flip the fans to make them intake fans, I should mount them to the outside of the radiator right?"

Right, sort of. IF you can move the fans to the outside of the rad when relocating the rad, you won't actually flip them. They will remain turned as they are, and just slip from back to front of the rad.

From your photo it looks like there is nothing above the rad that will get in the way of simply sliding it up. You should be able to remove the mounting bolts, slide the fans out and back in (in the front), then re-locate the bolts in the new spots. That would not require removing the pump unit from the CPU and re-installing, hopefully.

As Colif said, you may NOT need to relocate the fans if it is difficult. The improvement from moving might be small.

 

[Colif]

i don't know if anyone actually tested to see if there is any cooling difference between fans on outside pushing air through rad, VS fans on inside pulling it through. Either way the air has to pass through radiator so its probably difficult to find a difference. You might find the fans are cooler outside but whether that means air is inside is a different story.

i have mine inside cause ... um, rgb looks better? Better than looking at a blank radiator anyway. It doesn't seem to hurt my temps.

 

[Phaaze88]

i don't know if anyone actually tested to see if there is any cooling difference between fans on outside pushing air through rad, VS fans on inside pulling it through.

It depends on a few things. I remember TPU's review of Phanteks' D30-120 that those are more effective at pulling, and part of it had to do with the large central hub. I think Noctua's NF-A12x25 has something similar going on.

Either way, people need to be willing to test things like that.

 

[Colif]

True, too many variables. fan design, radiator thickness as well.

There wouldn't be a definitive answer unless you tested a lot and found a pattern.

There are youtube channels that test fan design but I don't think they use it on a radiator, its more for how much air it can push... and only really static pressure and the newer fans (that are designed to worko in both scenarios) that we are looking at as historically case fans aren't suited to radiators. Now Corsair uses static pressure fans as case fans in some of its cases...

stops wandering off topic.

 

[JCarax]

Update :
So I unmounted and took apart the AIO, you wouldn't believe how dusty it was. And that's with me using compressed air on it from time to time. I flipped the fans, turned them into intakes, I moved the top exhaust further back. Sadly I couldn't move the radiator up because, well the braces I thought were there actually weren't lined up properly so I had to put it where it originally was. Also there is no way a 140mm would fit on top because there are no screw holes, so that's false advertising on MSI Mag bunker's part.

Anyway, main changes I made are : turned exhaust radiator fans into intake so cool air is coming inside the case and moved the top exhaust further back.
My idle water temps are down 3-4 degrees celsius with side panel attached and fans on quiet, so that's a big improvement on my part. Cpu temps are also down a few degrees as well.
Now I haven't stress tested the comp yet but I'd say temps on load will also be different. I also undervolted my gpu a little the other day so it may have effected the system temps a bit.

Anyway, thanks everyone for all the advices, I really put them to use. I'm going to upgrade my system(mobo cpu ram) next year and I'll also going to get a new case which allows more liberal use of fans. Thanks again.

edit : Actually it isn't 3-4 degrees, it is more like 5 degrees. So the main problem with my setup was that case wasn't getting in any cool air.

 

[Colif]

I been meaning to clean out my AIO. Maybe in a month, I do a 6 monthly clean. Temps fine now... its almost winter, I won't be able to tell.

I use one of these instead of compressed air. Cheaper in long run
https://www.opolar.com/collections/air-duster/products/2019-new-opolar-battery-operated-air-duster

i can't see liquid temps, but as CPU only on 25c it can't be that warm.

 

[JCarax]

I been meaning to clean out my AIO. Maybe in a month, I do a 6 monthly clean. Temps fine now... its almost winter, I won't be able to tell.

I use one of these instead of compressed air. Cheaper in long run
https://www.opolar.com/collections/air-duster/products/2019-new-opolar-battery-operated-air-duster

Let me put it this way. There was a thick layer of dust almost as thick as a rug in between the fans and the radiator and I initially used a brush to clean it off. You may have seen archaeologists dig up artifacts and use brushes to clean them right? That's what I did. And then I used compressed air and I have one that is basically for cleaning cars, it is not very gentle but very effective so I used that. And then I used wet wipes to do the final touches. I'm pretty sure cleaning it had a big effect as well but I can safely say that the fans are doing a better job sucking the air rather than blowing it out.

 

[Colif]

I have seen what radiators can look like if not cleaned. All the air is being sucked through them, so is all the dust.
If you don't clean them every few months it can get bad

I have had 2 AIO in this pc,. started with a 240mm but it died in December, now have a 360.
my front filter seems to stop most of it, but it still needs a blast. Now not ideal time to do it.

 

[Paperdoc]

So OP found substantial dust accumulated BETWEEN the fans and the rad fins. I'm sure he is right to say that was a BIG part of the problem of poor cooling. But that is such an odd place for a pile of dust! Normally I would expect that the dust filter (a sponge sheet?) on the outside of the front intake fans (and rad) would capture most of the dust, and the user is responsible for cleaning that periodically. That is why that filter ALWAYS should be there.

But WAIT! In OP's set-up the rad fans were on the INSIDE of the rad and blowing interior case air OUT through that. In fact, it appears that
ALL fans in the case were exhaust fans! So there were NO air intake points with dust filters! All intake was by leakage wherever, OR by the wide-open side panel OP used with a large room fan to improve cooling. So that makes much more sense! ALL of the air being blown by the rad fans was UNfiltered and contained dust which, understandably, built up on the inlet side of the finely-space rad fins.

Just goes to prove that dust in the air is an issue that needs attention.

 

[JCarax]

So OP found substantial dust accumulated BETWEEN the fans and the rad fins. I'm sure he is right to say that was a BIG part of the problem of poor cooling. But that is such an odd place for a pile of dust! Normally I would expect that the dust filter (a sponge sheet?) on the outside of the front intake fans (and rad) would capture most of the dust, and the user is responsible for cleaning that periodically. That is why that filter ALWAYS should be there.

But WAIT! In OP's set-up the rad fans were on the INSIDE of the rad and blowing interior case air OUT through that. In fact, it appears that
ALL fans in the case were exhaust fans! So there were NO air intake points with dust filters! All intake was by leakage wherever, OR by the wide-open side panel OP used with a large room fan to improve cooling. So that makes much more sense! ALL of the air being blown by the rad fans was UNfiltered and contained dust which, understandably, built up on the inlet side of the finely-space rad fins.

Just goes to prove that dust in the air is an issue that needs attention.

Yes you've summed it up nicely. With the radiator fans working as intake, my water and cpu temps went down significantly. Now I also bought an air purifier(xiaomi smart air purifier 4 lite), which claims to filter out dust as well. It's been a week or less since I got it, so I'll have to see if it'll improve the conditions in my room in the future.

An additional note here, I've noticed that there is warm air coming out of the back exahust of the PSU(there is one at the bottom as well). I've never felt it before, is it because the front radiator fan is intake now that it is pushing out the air in the bottom chamber(where the PSU is located) as well? If you guys look at the pics, the bottom radiator fan is somewhat inside that bottom chamber where the PSU is located in.

 

[Paperdoc]

Yes. ALL PSU's have their own fan inside for cooling, and ALL direct that air OUT of the back of the case, so they are supposed to be exhaust fans. However, BEFORE your recent changes the bottom front fan was half way into the lower chamber for the PSU and it was robbing air from that chamber OUT of the FRONT through the rad. Now you have that fan reversed to the proper intake position, so that bottom chamber actually has and extra air supply. Thus the PSU fan CAN exhaust more air out the back.

 

[Colif]

So really the PSU was heating up your CPU, on top of all the dust you cleaned out of the AIO. Now the fan direction is reversed there is nothing drawing it into the Radiator. Added bonus to reversing fans. No wonder temps dropped 5c.

The fan in PSU generally used to draw air from below the case and exhaust out the rear. In most it faces down, though with PSU having rgb fans now, some people face them up. Since fan facing downwards, where air goes from there depends I guess on how much wiggle room there is in between PSU and top of shroud. If there is a gap it might escape forwards and ignore the obvious grills on back of case. That and you had a fan sucking air in that direction.

I can feel some heat on back of PSU but I wouldn't say its a steady stream compared to air from rear exhaust. There is more of a gap between my fans and your shroud though. I can see through the bottom of my case so less air pressure from my 3 fans really

i have enough space I leave the GPU stand in the gap between front of card and AIO

I had to remove part of my case to get the AIO in, prior to that there was no way for air to enter the shroud from infront