psu on its side. heat problems ??

[jcarte01]

Hi
Like many I'm planning to build a htpc, however I'm trying to fit it in a (395mm H x 175mm W) space. If i use an ATX motherboard (which gives me the most options) then i only have about 80mm to 90mm to fit a power supply. i was thinking of going with the Thermaltake purepower but its cutting the space kinda tight. however if i turn the psu on its side then the space is better used. I was wondering will putting the purepower on its side effect its heat dissapation abilities ?

thank jc

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[xeenrecoil]

heya jcarte01;

i was thinking of going with the Thermaltake purepower but its cutting the space kinda tight.

Does that mean it fits or not? If it fits but it is tight, yeah well it fits thats all you need to care about, dont worry about heat it wont be an issue as long as you have proper front and rear ventillation.
If it aint broke dont fix it.
Or if your Sony, if it aint broke fix it untill it is!


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[Crashman]

Most good ATX boards have a Micro ATX version, you can find Micro ATX cases nearly exactly that size, with full sized power supplies. Funny that you'd be using a tower, most Home Theater racks are designed for components that are short and wide.

You can put a power supply in nearly any orientation and its fan will do the job so long as the intake isn't blocked.

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[jcarte01]

I haven't bought the parts but going on the dimensions provided i have about 5mm between the top edge of the board and the power supply. the thickness of the case/box ,top and bottom, has to fit into that 5mm.

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[jcarte01]

Micro ATX is an option but i'm limited to a choice of 1 board ,the EPoX EP-8KMM5i, and 3 cpus ,sempron 15. 1.7 and 1.8 GHz. while i recon all these cpus are upto recording live tv, i would like to have digital sound in and out, spdif rca but preferably toslink. I'm building my own case to fit into the (395mm H x 175mm W) space which is one of 2 spaces either side of an existing "rack space". its a fanless psu, im wondering if putting it side ways will effect the flow through the heat pipes and therefore its heat disapation.

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[Crashman]

I hadn't thought of fanless power supplies with heatpipes. Most heatpipes have a wick inside so they'll work in other positions. My power supply fan is so quiet, I can't hear it from more than 2 meters distance, and can't hear it at any distance when the hard drives are spinning.

Of course my power supply DOES run hot...

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[jcarte01]

the purepower will cost me 145 euro ~ $170 hence all the back ground checking, thanks for your replies btw. the fan in my cheiftec tower is quite too, quiter than the fan on the athlon64. I'm trying to keep fans to a minimum. i was looking at the via esp 10000 itx board which is a fanless cpu only 7watts but with only 1 pci slot it was too limited.

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[Crashman]

You really want a fanless system? How badly?

If you picked up a Tualatin PIII and dropped the bus speed down to 100MHz, you could run it with a giant Pentium MMX fanless sink at 1.30v. Of course you'd need a voltage-adjustable adapter, so you'd might as well use an old BX board while you're at it.

Tom's did an article proposing a similar solution with newer AMD mobile processors. The problem again is getting the voltage down. There are workarounds, such as breaking pins off (!) and there might even be an adapter that lets you manually set the lower detected voltage.

VIA's 1000 processor is about as good as a K6-2 400! For that matter, you could get an old K6-2 board with the lower voltage settings, and use a K6-2+ or K6-III+ mobile processor at super low voltages with a passive fan.

Any way you look at it, you're dealing with complications OR junk hardware. There are passive external liquid coolers, but they're HUGE.

If you pay me enough money, I'll build you a case with passive cooling for the CPU. Since heat rises, it would work best with a horizontal case (larger horizontal surface so the rising heat from the bottom doesn't affect the top as much).

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[jcarte01]

not so much fanless but silent or as close to it within reason ie not going down the $1400 zalman silent case route .
100mhz p3: might manage audio , dvd playback unlikely, recording live tv forget about it. looks like I'm gonna have to take the hit re fans and beefup the sound proofing. thanks for the build offer but solving this is half the fun / challenge

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[Crashman]

Remember that the POWER SUPPLY fan is ALSO a CASE EXHAUST FAN, if you're trying to make the system quiet the most direct way would be to use a quiet fan power supply.

I have a case here that meets your criteria for size and it's AT. I have a motherboard here that has 5 slots and it's AT (using optional ATX power). I have a low power CPU here, it's a K6-2+ and can be cooled nearly silently at stock speed/voltage. I have a DVD Decoder Card here that takes all the stress from MPEG/MPEG2 playback off the CPU. And get this: All those parts work together!

Meanwhile back at the ranch...

Too bad nobody is making ordinary motherboards designed to offer low voltage/low heat using mobile or underclocked desktop processors. It would be very easy to do this. In fact, if someone would simply come out with a board that supported 1.0v via pin assignments, I'd be able to modify that board for manual adjustments.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[jcarte01]

re psu fan. yea i was thinking of doing that, kill 2 birds with one stone. something cheap and cheerfull like
http://www.bit-tech.net/review/135/
for E24. i was thinking of ducting the cpu fan from the rear of the case. my next main concern is the material to use for sound proofing. i was thinking of carpet underlay, its about 5mm think felt backed rubber but there is the whole thing about static dischange.

yea i think theres a market for very quite /silent motherboards and cpus. the htpc dosent really the latest and greatest.

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[Crashman]

It would be very cheap for a company to adapt a standard Micro ATX board to allow for lower voltages in BIOS. So it's not like they'd have to design a whole new board, they could make very few changes to an existing board and sell it as a specialty product.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[jcarte01]

could always try <A HREF="http:// http://bit-tech.net/images/article/135/4f19.jpg" target="_new">water cooling</A>

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[xeenrecoil]

jcarte01;

There are specialty companies that make the sound proofing for your computer case, anti-static and all that stuff, look into it, you can probably find it at most of the enthusiast e-sales sites.

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[Crashman]

Actually, something like <A HREF="http://www.sysopt.com/reviews/Zalman_Reserator_1/index.html" target="_new">THIS</A> would be perfect if you had a place to set the tower. In my home theater, I could simply hide it behind the rack.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[jcarte01]

hmmmm worth looking into, may be difficult to get here in Ireland though.

Homer: There’s 3 ways to do things, the right way, the wrong way, and the max power way.
Bart: isn’t that the wrong way.
Homer: yea but faster.

 

[_WW_]

As to the original question, I've had a Vantec Ion 400w in my tower, installed on its side, for over a year now with no heat problems. It also has different settings for the fan to help quiet it down.

....WW (5.0)