Question Need Airflow Suggestions for NZXT H630

[lordfeepness]

I have an NZXT H630 case, which I've had for a couple of years, and I love. I used to use it as a gaming machine, but now I'm in the process of converting it to a server and adding 10 3.5" and 2.5" drives.

My question is about airflow, and my setup is a little weird. Right now, I have 2x200mm fans in the front providing intake, 2x200mm fans in the top providing exhaust, and a Corsair H60 120mm radiator in the back, set to intake (and cooling an i7-8700). I don't have anything in the bottom fan positions. All the fans are basic NZXT fans.

Before I installed the H60, I had a decent push/pull going on, and the case still ran hot. Now it runs hotter (CPU temp is 60-70c under full load), and I think the drives will make it hotter still.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can cool things down? Would it be better to set the H60 to exhaust? Add an intake or exhaust fan to the bottom? Maybe move the H60 to the top and run exhaust out the back again? Try different fans?

I'm no cooling expert, so any help would be really appreciated!

 

[theycallmechris]

Hi Lord. That is an interesting set-up you have for the fans to say the least.

You can certainly try flipping the cooler fan around for exhaust as fans can lose performance if they're trying to work against other fans, especially ones that push more air. But given you have 2 x 200mm on the front and 2 x 200mm on the top, that shouldn't be an issue as they should balance each other. One issue might arise from flipping the fan around though is that as the larger tops fans are working they may steal air from the smaller cooler fan, reducing the amount it has for cooling.

The cooler itself though seems small for the processor. A few articles and youtubers I've read and watched seemed to imply avoiding single fan rads as they tend to lack the thermal capacity to cool higher performance chips like the Intel I7 chips (especially the 8 and 9 series), which do tend to need a bit beefier cooler, usually 2 x 120mm rad at the minimum.

However 60-70c is still safe for the Intel chip though, so it's not exactly bad for them to run like that under full load as they can certainly handle it.

 

[lordfeepness]

Hi Lord. That is an interesting set-up you have for the fans to say the least.

You can certainly try flipping the cooler fan around for exhaust as fans can lose performance if they're trying to work against other fans, especially ones that push more air. But given you have 2 x 200mm on the front and 2 x 200mm on the top, that shouldn't be an issue as they should balance each other. One issue might arise from flipping the fan around though is that as the larger tops fans are working they may steal air from the smaller cooler fan, reducing the amount it has for cooling.

The cooler itself though seems small for the processor. A few articles and youtubers I've read and watched seemed to imply avoiding single fan rads as they tend to lack the thermal capacity to cool higher performance chips like the Intel I7 chips (especially the 8 and 9 series), which do tend to need a bit beefier cooler, usually 2 x 120mm rad at the minimum.

However 60-70c is still safe for the Intel chip though, so it's not exactly bad for them to run like that under full load as they can certainly handle it.

Thanks, Chris! These are some really good suggestions. I had the same concern about flipping the radiator fan, since it's so close to the top 200mm fans. Do you think that adding an intake fan on the bottom of the case would help mitigate that by adding some extra air pressure? The case is going to sit on a wire shelf, a few inches off the floor, so there's some good airflow underneath.

Interesting point about the cooling, too. I didn't think the i7-8700 (not the "k" version) would run very hot, since it has a 65W TDP, so I was really surprised by those temperatures. I don't think the CPU will be running at full load very often in my planned server configuration, but I'll hold on to the idea of putting it on a 2x120mm brick if it does get hot. Glad to know that 60-70c won't kill my processor, though!