Fan orientation advice - 2 radiators, 4 fans, concern

[william.aultman.ii]

I have concern about my fan orientation, and air pressure. I splurged a while ago when money was clear and got a prebuilt snowblind in the Element case with the fancy screen on the left face of the case. Yes, I know I should have built, but here we are now lol.

So I have a Kraken x62 with 2 Corsair ML140s set up as intake on the front of the case with fans against case intake and radiator exhausting into the case (hence part of my concern), a single ML140 on the only fan mount on the top of the case, blowing out (there is no filter up there to have this fan blowing into case, and I thought pulling the rising hot air out would be best).

Then I have a Hybrid SC for my 1080Ti blowing out of the back of the case, with the radiator against the case and a Corsair ML120 fan blowing through it and out of the case.

So 2 in, 2 out, but radiators and lack of experience/knowledge.

I havent overclocked the GPU or undervolted it, and I have my i7-8700k with Intel turbo boost on and another option in the bios, giving it as low as 800mhz and up to 4.4ghz and 4.8ghz as needed.

I havent overheated, at all, but I have gotten temps upwards of 60C on the CPU when monitoring with CAM software. GPU similar temps when running Furmark on highest possible settings with max Antialiasing.

It performs great, long Oculus sessions with multiple back to back users for hours on end, and it just gets a little warm across all temps, nothing drastic, with zero performance issues.

My concern is my OCD and need for optimization (yes, even though I started with a prebuilt).

So my question is ridiculous in my mind... but I just need to dig and my searches havent given me any similar scenarios to base on.

Do I add filter on top fan mount outside the case for dust, switch it to intake, and turn 2 front fans to exhaust to pull air through radiator and then out, while also keep exhaust orientation for GPU radiator? Or would this create too much negative pressure and pull dust in through non filtered holes such as the empty second graphics card mount, or other crevices?

Or should I just turn top fan to intake, add filter for dust, keep front 2 fans as intake through CPU radiator, and keep GPU radiator fan as exhaust? 3 in, 1 out, for positive pressure and cool air across mobo from top fan?

Should I empty the case, and have my machinist buddy drill an exact copy of top fan mount next to the current one and then add a second top fan?? This would then allow both top to blow in (filtered) and turn front radiator to exhaust and keep rear radiator as exhaust? Craziness, but I'll do it.

Have I yet to think about the best optimal orientation outside of the above examples?

I simply will not change my case until I need to upgrade mobo and cpu. Even then I really dont want to.

I absolutely love tinkering and whatnot, but my free time has been severely limited with new work hours and I havent spent any time playing with orientations. It wouldn't take long to test, but I also dont have a temp gun, it would be booting and running diagnostics with software... over and over.

Long winded, yes, and I dont think I can hit this with a TLDR. Please help a brother out!

 

[william.aultman.ii]

Bruh I am long winded. So sorry lol

 

[SkyBill40]

I'd probably leave things as they are in terms of what you've got for orientation. Exhausting out of the top is more helpful than an additional intake would likely be given all you've got in there. As it's an exhaust, you don't need to filter the air going out and doing so would likely add unnecessary restriction unless you live with pets or in a particularly dusty environment.

As for testing your front radiator for the best of a push or pull setup, the only way to find out what works best and offers the best temps would be to try it out be swapping the configuration. Your current temps aren't anything outside of the normal for a highly clocked 8700k seeing they're known to run hot regardless of the cooling used. You should be able to do some easy monitoring using HW Monitor if you don't have it already. It's not super precise, but it's pretty accurate and better than nothing.

 

[william.aultman.ii]

I was hoping I was just overthinking things. I appreciate it!