Did Dell Screw Up?

[billdcat4]

So you two think I should reverse the top fan so it PULLS air from the heatsink.

Ill have to hear more ppl before I try it, but ok.

 

[billdcat4]

Yea, I think Ill do the mod and leave the fans where they are.

ill just put the black plastic in between the fan ducts so it channels the air from outside, thru the heatsink, and out the top fan.

good?

 

[utaka95]

After working on Dell's I think a lot of people on this forum give Dell engineers way too much credit. It was probably some goofy stopgap measure they used when they were switching between parts in the middle of a model run. I say mod that sucker!

 

[billdcat4]

After working on Dell's I think a lot of people on this forum give Dell engineers way too much credit. It was probably some goofy stopgap measure they used when they were switching between parts in the middle of a model run. I say mod that sucker!

like i said b4, someone at dell just f*cked up

 

[4Ryan6]

Put the piece of plastic back where it was before you removed it from the fan housing and take a picture of the housing setup from different angles and post that.

 

[billdcat4]

Put the piece of plastic back where it was before you removed it from the fan housing and take a picture of the housing setup from different angles and post that.

drawing is easier

 

[Stewartwi]

Put the piece of plastic back where it was before you removed it from the fan housing and take a picture of the housing setup from different angles and post that.

drawing is easier

Have you googled to see if you could find anyone else that had the same black plastic piece in their exhaust system?

 

[billdcat4]

ill try..... but I dont really know what to search for.

ill also try xps tech support online

 

[goldragon_70]

The green hood thing on the heatsink is something dell has been doing for years now, but the black plastic, I've never seen, Unless it was meant to block one fans flow from the others, it has no real reason to be there.

 

[billdcat4]

The green hood thing on the heatsink is something dell has been doing for years now, but the black plastic, I've never seen, Unless it was meant to block one fans flow from the others, it has no real reason to be there.

after the mod it should give quite good cooling, no?

 

[goldragon_70]

It's dell, they use the cheapest sanest solution, but yea, any moding to help air flow will greatly reduces your temps.

 

[nukemaster]

it looks like a simple mistake

just flip the fan and be done.

Other then that it will pull hot air back in(an air loop) and over heat

Review(not your system but looks like the same cooling)

Alright now. why did it happen?

well maybe dell used dual fans for dual core systems and a single fan for single core systems. If that was the case. dell would need a way to stop the fan from looping and missing the heat sink. So they slap in that plastic thing, now they can use one fan shroud for all XPS's

Now over on the floor someone places 2 fans(and one backwards) by mistake and out it goes.

It would not surprise me if all systems like your just come with one fan.

Now for temps. Dell uses there own motherboards so there are few programs to read the temps. You can try to turn on dell support in speedfan(but its made for laptops, never hurts to try). Tat and Coretemp have never read P4's as they did not have the thermal diode setup for it. You can be sure that the system is monitoring its own temps and adjusting any way.

Hope this helps some

 

[billdcat4]

Thanks for the Pic.

i dont think Ill reverse the fan though. then it will just be using hot case air to cool the Heatsink.

I do not have an real intake fan, just a big vent in the front.

I think the mod is the best solution.


btw, I just installed a GF7600GT w/VF700CU in my PC

it works!

 

[nukemaster]

Yes, but if you do that you will only have air flow in the back there. so little to no air will come in the front. if you suck enough air out the back air will have no choice but to come in the front.

If you do want to do the mod. make sure you suck in the bottom and blow out the top. Since hot air rises this will cause less re-heating. Or better yet make your own air guide or shroud to make the hot air rise faster.

 

[billdcat4]

Yes, but if you do that you will only have air flow in the back there. so little to no air will come in the front. if you suck enough air out the back air will have no choice but to come in the front.

If you do want to do the mod. make sure you suck in the bottom and blow out the top. Since hot air rises this will cause less re-heating. Or better yet make your own air guide or shroud to make the hot air rise faster.

I just played FEAR with my new GF7600GT and in the middle I bent down to feel the air coming out of the back of the pc, the exhaust of the HSF.

It was very hot, something I havent seen before, so I quickly opened the case and felt the HSF. It was hotter than I have ever felt it. After a while with the case open it cooled down to merely warm.

I think that I will make both of the fans exhaust.

BTW, my new GPU idles at 50C and loads in the low 60s. This is compared to my old ATI card which idled at 60 and got up to 78C at load 8O .

in response to a suggestion that single core systems were meant to have 1 fan and dualies 2, when i bought my PC in August of 2004, the Pentium D had not come out yet. my prescott was pretty good (but not as good as an Athlon 64)

 

[nukemaster]

well you know what i mean. dell may have run the hotter cpus with 2(or just messed up and left that plastic there). After all you could get a XPS from like 3.0 to 3.8(as i recall) so maybe the 3's ran one and the 3.8(super hot) ran 2.

your hot cpu was due to the heat looping. so head leaves/then goes back in and gets hotter its a loop....

Bahhhh either way, just run to as exhaust and it will suck air in the front over the hard drives and video card and out the back.

 

[billdcat4]

well you know what i mean. dell may have run the hotter cpus with 2(or just messed up and left that plastic there). After all you could get a XPS from like 3.0 to 3.8(as i recall) so maybe the 3's ran one and the 3.8(super hot) ran 2.

your hot cpu was due to the heat looping. so head leaves/then goes back in and gets hotter its a loop....

Bahhhh either way, just run to as exhaust and it will suck air in the front over the hard drives and video card and out the back.

will do, but arent those gpu temp differences impressive?

 

[billdcat4]

well you know what i mean. dell may have run the hotter cpus with 2(or just messed up and left that plastic there). After all you could get a XPS from like 3.0 to 3.8(as i recall) so maybe the 3's ran one and the 3.8(super hot) ran 2.

your hot cpu was due to the heat looping. so head leaves/then goes back in and gets hotter its a loop....

Bahhhh either way, just run to as exhaust and it will suck air in the front over the hard drives and video card and out the back.

will do, but arent those gpu temp differences impressive?

now ive got dual exhaust baby!

 

[nukemaster]

well you know what i mean. dell may have run the hotter cpus with 2(or just messed up and left that plastic there). After all you could get a XPS from like 3.0 to 3.8(as i recall) so maybe the 3's ran one and the 3.8(super hot) ran 2.

your hot cpu was due to the heat looping. so head leaves/then goes back in and gets hotter its a loop....

Bahhhh either way, just run to as exhaust and it will suck air in the front over the hard drives and video card and out the back.

will do, but arent those gpu temp differences impressive?

Nvidia card tend to run cooler. and a 7600GT is newer and cooler then what ati had in 2004. what was your old card? i've got an over clocked(and pipeline unlocked) 850pro over 100c. now THATS hot. I later zalman's that one too.

 

[4Ryan6]

The best overall solution is to hard mount the 2 case fans to the case with fan mounting screws set both fans exhausting the case air and add a good after market CPU cooler.

If theres no predrilled mounting screw holes think outside the box thats what drills and magnets are for, the drill to drill the holes, and magnets to catch the metal shavings.

Dells cheap cooling solution is just that cheap!!!

Loose that shroud crap and cool the thing, now thats what I would do, and thats my advice, whether you heed it is completely up to you.

The original design was to intake air with the bottom fan and exhaust it out the top fan creating a circulating airflow effect, Dell used that setup because its cheap, not because its super efficient! because its cheap for them to mass produce period.

The piece of plastic was probably a shipping stiffner that a Dell employee forgot to remove, probably around 4:30 on a Friday afternoon if they get off at 5:00, it makes no sense even for Dell to block their own cooling airflow, but it may be a testimony that your CPU doesn't need much cooling at all in the first place, but better cooling is always a better option, for any CPU.

Keep in mind this is just simple cooling!!!!

Not rocket science, don't make it a forum event, just do it!

 

[billdcat4]

well you know what i mean. dell may have run the hotter cpus with 2(or just messed up and left that plastic there). After all you could get a XPS from like 3.0 to 3.8(as i recall) so maybe the 3's ran one and the 3.8(super hot) ran 2.

your hot cpu was due to the heat looping. so head leaves/then goes back in and gets hotter its a loop....

Bahhhh either way, just run to as exhaust and it will suck air in the front over the hard drives and video card and out the back.

will do, but arent those gpu temp differences impressive?

Nvidia card tend to run cooler. and a 7600GT is newer and cooler then what ati had in 2004. what was your old card? i've got an over clocked(and pipeline unlocked) 850pro over 100c. now THATS hot. I later zalman's that one too.

My ATI card was a Radeon X800. When I bought it from Dell, it was called teh X800SE, and that is what it is referred to on the driver cd. But in Catalyst and all of those programs that give you your PC's specs, it was called the X800GT. Not really sure what it is. The only ID on the card itself is where it says O430D. I do know that the card is specced at 350mem and 400 core or the other way around. Its also got 8pixel pipes. i think; ill have to look it up sometime...

The best overall solution is to hard mount the 2 case fans to the case with fan mounting screws set both fans exhausting the case air and add a good after market CPU cooler.

If theres no predrilled mounting screw holes think outside the box thats what drills and magnets are for, the drill to drill the holes, and magnets to catch the metal shavings.

Dells cheap cooling solution is just that cheap!!!

Loose that shroud crap and cool the thing, now thats what I would do, and thats my advice, whether you heed it is completely up to you.

The original design was to intake air with the bottom fan and exhaust it out the top fan creating a circulating airflow effect, Dell used that setup because its cheap, not because its super efficient! because its cheap for them to mass produce period.

The piece of plastic was probably a shipping stiffner that a Dell employee forgot to remove, probably around 4:30 on a Friday afternoon if they get off at 5:00, it makes no sense even for Dell to block their own cooling airflow, but it may be a testimony that your CPU doesn't need much cooling at all in the first place, but better cooling is always a better option, for any CPU.

Keep in mind this is just simple cooling!!!!

Not rocket science, don't make it a forum event, just do it!

im not going to OC my CPU, so what do I need more cooling for? If the way it is doesnt get it warm, even on full loads, then what do I need more for? Its not like its life is going to get shortened significantly by having it hit 50C 8O sometimes.....

I dont want to kill my PC by drilling holes in the mobo/case. Its fine the way it is...

 

[4Ryan6]

im not going to OC my CPU, so what do I need more cooling for? If the way it is doesnt get it warm, even on full loads, then what do I need more for? Its not like its life is going to get shortened significantly by having it hit 50C sometimes.....

I dont want to kill my PC by drilling holes in the mobo/case. Its fine the way it is...

Great lets move on to the next real problem! :roll:

 

[billdcat4]

After I play BF2, or FEAR, or any game at that matter my HSF gets so hot that it can burn my hand. The air blowing out of the dual-exhaust fans is only slightly warm.

From what I know about feeling for temps, the threshold of burning is 90C or so. Thats pretty damn hot!

 

[nukemaster]

if the heatsink is warm(hot) it means its working

It's been that hot for years and its still kicking. and now you have 2 fans that are working. i would not worry about it. I bet the fans are quiet. Dell tends to trade some heat to keep the sound down. lower air speed = hotter heatsink

I never could touch the stock heatsinks on the old athlon xp's and that was only @ 60c(max even 50c is hot to touch)

 

[asloane]

I have the same plastic strip covering one of the air ducts - except for a tiny gap < 1mm (it's not totally snug).

I have the internal components of a Dell Dimension XPS Gen 3 with me but the housing box is in another country (airplane weight restrictions :-/ ).

So I don't have the complete PC h/w configuration in front of me.

I recently got a non-Dell box with a Silvershield 400W ATX PSU. That's 60W less than the Dell PSU.

I am wondering if I can safely rehouse the Gen 3 components inside the non-Dell box with this non-DELL PSU or will there be non-compatibility and power issues? Well I am sure that's for another thread.

I can post pictures of the green fan and plastic strip if anyone wants?