question about cooling

[Zombie21]

I currently have a Game Max Falcon PC case which has some pretty poor fans and an awful magnetic dust filter on the top (the causes immense noise when in place with my so called "Silent" edition fans). I wanted to know once i get my new AIO CPU cooler, what fans would be best to put in place I know that Static Pressure fans are best put next too a radiator but I'm still not completely sure what to do.

Since i can only fit up to a 240mm radiator I'm opting for an ARCTIC Liquid Freezer 240 to cool an OC'd 7700k but since the radiator comes with a total of 4 120mm fans I think two fans need to be external.

 

[Sedivy]

I'm not sure what a magnetic dust filter would be causing noise, but if you have a silent edition fans, especially positioned on top, it's strange that they're very noisy. Are they pwm or dc? Are they set to follow a certain temperature eg. motherboard or system temps, and adjust rpm accordingly? Cause if you're running them at top speed, no matter what fan you get, you'll get tons of noise if it's like that all the time.
As for your aio, it is going up top I'm assuming and two fans will be external yes, unless you can fit entirety of radiator and two fans worth of thickness and not run into your motherboard (unlikely but I'm not sure about dimensions on your case and if it's a full tower it might be possible). Go with the fans it comes with. It would be silly to pay pretty penny for an aio and then pay more to replace its fans. With 4 fans, it's likely you'll be able to adjust to a fairly low rpm and still get very decent cooling, thus making it pretty quiet even with extra fans.

 

[Zombie21]

I'm not sure what a magnetic dust filter would be causing noise, but if you have a silent edition fans, especially positioned on top, it's strange that they're very noisy. Are they pwm or dc? Are they set to follow a certain temperature eg. motherboard or system temps, and adjust rpm accordingly? Cause if you're running them at top speed, no matter what fan you get, you'll get tons of noise if it's like that all the time.
As for your aio, it is going up top I'm assuming and two fans will be external yes, unless you can fit entirety of radiator and two fans worth of thickness and not run into your motherboard (unlikely but I'm not sure about dimensions on your case and if it's a full tower it might be possible). Go with the fans it comes with. It would be silly to pay pretty penny for an aio and then pay more to replace its fans. With 4 fans, it's likely you'll be able to adjust to a fairly low rpm and still get very decent cooling, thus making it pretty quiet even with extra fans.

To be specific they are the Corsair AF120 'Quiet Edition' Fans. I'll be honest I'm not completely sure weather they are PWM or DC, In BIOS I have them connected to a fan controller which came with the case.

With the AIO I might mount the radiator on the front as looking at different tests mounting on the front seem to make a dramatic difference.

 

[Sedivy]

Ok, is the fan controller connection to the motherboard a 3 or 4 pin? I'm assuming 3 pin as that's still more common nowadays if they came with the case, but that still means you should be able to access that fan controller with a utility like SpeedFan or something that whoever made that case or fans or motherboard in it makes, which allows you to control the voltage to the fans, and therefore speed, depending on the temperature, and not just crank them to the max all the time.
Front mounting will make a bigger difference on the cpu temperature but will also make your gpu hotter as you're pumping in hot air (and in my experience gpu temperature gets typically hotter than the cpu), and your case in general, thus making your motherboard hotter as well (motherboard temp can be just as limiting as cpu temp if you're overheating). Ultimately it's fine either way, I misunderstood cause i thought you wanted top mount in order to get rid of the noisy top fans next to the filter (fans and filter you'd take both off when mounting the radiator). Again you're fine in either configuration and it's just a matter of personal preference.

 

[Zombie21]

Ok, is the fan controller connection to the motherboard a 3 or 4 pin? I'm assuming 3 pin as that's still more common nowadays if they came with the case, but that still means you should be able to access that fan controller with a utility like SpeedFan or something that whoever made that case or fans or motherboard in it makes, which allows you to control the voltage to the fans, and therefore speed, depending on the temperature, and not just crank them to the max all the time.
Front mounting will make a bigger difference on the cpu temperature but will also make your gpu hotter as you're pumping in hot air (and in my experience gpu temperature gets typically hotter than the cpu), and your case in general, thus making your motherboard hotter as well (motherboard temp can be just as limiting as cpu temp if you're overheating). Ultimately it's fine either way, I misunderstood cause i thought you wanted top mount in order to get rid of the noisy top fans next to the filter (fans and filter you'd take both off when mounting the radiator). Again you're fine in either configuration and it's just a matter of personal preference.

the two fans on the front of the case use the old Molex connection which plugs into the PSU none of the 4 fans out of the 5 i currently have are connected directly to the Motherboard.

The two corsair fans are connected via a 3 pin (if memory serves correctly) I always like to have at least one exhausts fan at the rear of the case along with a further two exhausts on the top with two intakes at the front.

 

[Sedivy]

And that's the issue. Any fan you buy, even with ones with only 1200 RPM as max will be loud if they're plugged directly into the PSU as they'll just spin at highest voltage all the time even when computer is idle. That's a waste. Mine are at 500-600 RPM on idle and silent at that speed. Only on the most demanding of games will fans go higher than 1100-1200 and even that because I'm pretty adamant about low temps. I have plenty of overhead and could go lower.

Does your motherboard not have support for more fans? Other than the cpu fan plugin, how many are there directly on the mobo? Check the manual for your motherboard if you need.

 

[Zombie21]

And that's the issue. Any fan you buy, even with ones with only 1200 RPM as max will be loud if they're plugged directly into the PSU as they'll just spin at highest voltage all the time even when computer is idle. That's a waste. Mine are at 500-600 RPM on idle and silent at that speed. Only on the most demanding of games will fans go higher than 1100-1200 and even that because I'm pretty adamant about low temps. I have plenty of overhead and could go lower.

Does your motherboard not have support for more fans? Other than the cpu fan plugin, how many are there directly on the mobo? Check the manual for your motherboard if you need.

I've got an Asus TUF Z270 mark 1 motherboard which supports up to 6 i believe

 

[Sedivy]

Ah that's a sweet looking board and yes you've got space for plenty. Forget plugging directly into psu, just plug them onto the motherboard, and your motherboard comes with a utility which will enable you to control them all (thermal radar 2+). Hell it allows you to monitor remotely from your phone lol.

 

[Sedivy]

Geez..
1 x CPU Fan connector(s) (1 x 4 -pin)
1 x CPU OPT Fan connector(s) (1 x 4 -pin)
5 x Chassis Fan connector(s) (5 x 4 -pin)
1 x Assistant Fan connector(s) (1 x 4 -pin)
You've got space for 8 fans and all support pwm....wow.

 

[Zombie21]

Ah that's a sweet looking board and yes you've got space for plenty. Forget plugging directly into psu, just plug them onto the motherboard, and your motherboard comes with a utility which will enable you to control them all (thermal radar 2+). Hell it allows you to monitor remotely from your phone lol.

I know that there is an app that lets me control the fans and check the Post Code however the issue is that The app doesn't actually work 90% of the time which is why i didn't connect it directly. However I think If i set the Fans to PWM then it should work okay.

 

[Sedivy]

No, forget the phone app, that's just the window dressing. The actual program would run on your computer and would allow you to set temperature/RPM curves for each individual fans so you can make sure no single fans work overtime.

As for DC vs PWM, it's a setting that's specific to a fan/hardware. If your fan doesn't support PWM, and you set it to pwm or vice versa, it'll just run at highest RPM. If it's a dc fan (3 pin, current regulated fan), then set the setting in the utility to DC and motherboard will regulate it for you by regulating voltage. PWM fans work a little differently (disconnecting power intermittently), and so if they are pwm, for same reasons, select PWM and adjust the curves. If you don't clearly see each of your fans respond based on temperature in the case when you start up a game etc. then you didn't do it right.

 

[Sedivy]

Checking corsair page for your AF120s, not sure if you got the PWM ones, but if it specifically doesn't say that on the box, then assume it's DC. The one that came with your case, also likely DC, though I'd check with manufacturer of the case.
edit: I see the quiet edition ones. It's the same fan, just capped rpm and yes it's a DC.
http://www.corsair.com/en-us/air-series-af120-quiet-edition-high-airflow-120mm-fan-twin-pack
In the settings, the only fan that will for sure be pwm right now in your case is your cpu cooler (assuming it's currently an air cooler) so make sure you leave its curve as pwm and set the rest on DC, adjust the rpms/temp all the while monitoring your cpu/system temps and you should be fine.

 

[Zombie21]

Checking corsair page for your AF120s, not sure if you got the PWM ones, but if it specifically doesn't say that on the box, then assume it's DC. The one that came with your case, also likely DC, though I'd check with manufacturer of the case.
edit: I see the quiet edition ones. It's the same fan, just capped rpm and yes it's a DC.
http://www.corsair.com/en-us/air-series-af120-quiet-edition-high-airflow-120mm-fan-twin-pack
In the settings, the only fan that will for sure be pwm right now in your case is your cpu cooler (assuming it's currently an air cooler) so make sure you leave its curve as pwm and set the rest on DC, adjust the rpms/temp all the while monitoring your cpu/system temps and you should be fine.

Currently I have a H55 however its fairly inefficient in cooling the Overclocked 7700k hense why i was debating getting the H100i V2 but wanted some outside opinions on what the best AIO cooler would be as most Air coolers are too big to fit in my rig.

 

[Sedivy]

Both arctic's 240 and corsair's 110i got really good reviews cooling wise. I don't think you can go wrong with either of them as long as they fit. But how are you space limited? Your case supports 240mm size radiators both front at top positions, at least on paper.

 

[Zombie21]

Both arctic's 240 and corsair's 110i got really good reviews cooling wise. I don't think you can go wrong with either of them as long as they fit. But how are you space limited? Your case supports 240mm size radiators both front at top positions, at least on paper.

The case I've got isn't too good with space but it states that i is able to support up to a 240mm rad so i'm hoping it's okay. I'll get some measurements and see if it'll fit since my motherboard also takes up a large amount of space