[SOLVED] Airflow setup for Phanteks Luxe 2 + NH-D15?

[vukhanhtrung]

Most setups I found online uses some sort of water cooler for CPU, so I have no idea how having a NH-D15 as CPU cooler changes things.
I assumed something like this:

Intake:
2-3x 140mm front fan
1x 140mm bottom fan (my case is on the desk)

Exhaust fan:
1x 140x back fan

Normally I would put more exhaust fans on the top but with how NH-D15 push air to the back I have no idea how that would interact with the top fans.

Any help on how the case fan system should be here?

http://www.phanteks.com/Enthoo-Luxe-2.html
https://noctua.at/en/nh-d15

 

[Phaaze88]

Update: Ok, so I tried 4x 120mm in the front panel, and the results landed within margin of error of the base bottom to top chimney setup.
The mean temperature difference yielded numbers like 83.125(chimney base), 83.750, 83.875, 83.375, and the 80.750 from the fully loaded fan setup. The mean of the 4x 120mm resulted in 83.250, which is like the 3rd best result...
The difference between the hottest and coolest cores on my cpu are 6-7 degrees apart. It was pretty consistent with this.
So it's quite possible the more narrower track of the 120s is helping out here a little, because by themselves, these fans just don't move as much air their 140mm sibling.

Now I need to order a few more 120mms, because I don't have enough to fill both the front and side panels...
So with these particular fans I use, it looks like the 120mms make for better intakes due to the more narrower airflow, and the 140mms for exhaust, simply because they move more air and the direction of airflow doesn't matter for exhaust.

 

[vukhanhtrung]

@Phaaze88 About the the dust issue in the back port.

But most of the air fed to the cpu will be coming from below it, not from the rear exhaust port, because above the cpu cooler is the third, top-rear, exhaust fan pulling air from below.

Despite all that, I'm still very paranoid about the filter-less rear port

1st: I wanna try something like this when the fan arrive with a 140mm dust filter in the back. It's pretty hard to find a 140mm dust filter where I live so I might have to DIY one.

https://imgur.com/5xmnj3q

View: https://imgur.com/5xmnj3q


2nd option is I can just seal off the back with carton paper and go with this like Karadjgne suggested

https://imgur.com/MBwpHSb

View: https://imgur.com/MBwpHSb

Ok. Personally, I'd do a mixture, get a boost. If you stick the hdd cage bottom right, right in front of the lowest front intake (where you thought of putting a fan, that'll accomplish 2 things while only partially blocking bottom intake. It becomes a windbrake from the front fan. So you'll still get air in, but now it really won't affect the upwards flow, since it gets mostly blocked, and forced upwards, where the bottom fans just help that extra along. Bonus air. It'll also (between the bottom fan and side fan) dump a considerable amount of fresh air on/between the hdds, so even heavy usage won't affect temps there much. If you put the rack high/top, you stick them at the hottest part of the case.

 

[Phaaze88]

Hey, I've used worn pantyhose as a fan filter before... it works.

But I don't see that rear intake being much better than what I've already tried. We both essentially have the same cooler, so...
Intake and exhaust fans that are adjacent to one another tend to recycle air, in the case of the rear intake and top-rear exhaust, but you'd have to test and see. It might not be that bad.


I already tested bottom to top only, and bottom, top, and rear - the latter helps with the gpu cooling due to it's proximity. I don't think it's necessary to seal it off.

 

[vukhanhtrung]

For the completeness of the topic. My fans arrived and I use this setup:

https://imgur.com/MBwpHSb

View: https://imgur.com/MBwpHSb


Even with the CPU fan blows rear to front, the Top-Front fan mostly blows cool air(Like in Phaaze88 's experiment) while hot air comes out from the Top-Mid fan.
With smoke test, air goes from the rear port, through the NH-D15 to the front part and then upward.

Taking off the top dust filter gives an improvement of 1-2C.

Overall, chimney setup gives me 3-4 Degrees lower than typical setup, not sure about how much dust will come through the rear port in the long run.

 

[Karadjgne]

Hah, I have a diy stocking 140mm dust filter under one of my pc's. The original was a little clip on style that went inside the case, underneath the psu, sandwich style, pita to clean. So I took one of my wife's black stockings, and a 6x6 magnetic sign (think giant fridge magnet) from home depot (was like $3), cut it to frame the fan port and used M-77 spray glue. Looks like the cover on a speaker enclosure. Works like a champ, looks good and no more pulling the pc apart to clean it.