Question Top mounted aio intake or exhaust?

[Speedy_H05]

Hey guys I’m getting the Corsair 4000x rgb and was wondering when I mount my ml240rgb v2 aio if I should have it as a intake or a exhaust

 

[Speedy_H05]

Or should I front mount it keep in mind I’m getting a 3080 which is gonna be a hot card

 

[MeanMachine41]

Hey guys I’m getting the Corsair 4000x rgb and was wondering when I mount my ml240rgb v2 aio if I should have it as a intake or a exhaust

Hi Speedy

Very much depends on the AIRflow thru your case. If you have a none reference GPU then case temps will be higher and need extra exhaust fans. Case temps are never lower than ambient temps so I have my top mounted rad fans pulling air into the case. I have tried it both ways and found an 8-10C difference however my ambient room temp is air conditioned.

Test by trying it one way and record your CPU temps under load, then switch around the fans and check the differance.
Do this prior to any Overclocking.

 

[Speedy_H05]

Ok thanks the thing is if I put the aio as intake that mans I’ll only have 1 exhaust and 5 intake that’s why I was thinking of putting it as exhale that way I have 3 intake and 3 exhaust

 

[MeanMachine41]

Ok thanks the thing is if I put the aio as intake that mans I’ll only have 1 exhaust and 5 intake that’s why I was thinking of putting it as exhale that way I have 3 intake and 3 exhaust

I'm not familiar with the Corsair 4000x rgb case however from what i can gather the fans are 120mm and if possible I would have rear fan changed to 140mm ML fan which are quieter under load. I also changed my rad fans to ML with an improvement around 6C and much less noise.

 

[Speedy_H05]

I honestly don’t feel like doing all that I’m just swapping cases and I wanna know if I should have it exhaust on top because I still want my gpu to get good airflow

 

[Phaaze88]

If you don't test it yourself, you'll never really know. Your fans, chassis design, cpu and gpu coolers, etc, will all affect what works best.

If you can't be bothered: do front intake, rear and top exhaust.
Is it the best for your hardware? Probably, probably not; who can say. But you can't go wrong with it.

 

[Speedy_H05]

Yea but I feel like when you front mount it only airflow goes to the radiator and not my other components but with it top mounted exhaust the only different will be like 1 to 3 degrees and it’s cooling my cpu and getting rid of all he got air while my cpu is still getting amazing airflow

 

[Phaaze88]

You don't actually know that, since you haven't tried it...

 

[Speedy_H05]

Yea but it’s common sense the air from the front pushes in where the radiator is where is the air gonna go if the radiator is in the way

 

[Phaaze88]

The air passes through the radiator. It does not get trapped there, but... you could make it to where air struggles to pass through the radiator, if you really want to:
Just replace the rad fans with some crappy 10USD ones - done. Or just use fans not designed for moving air through most hybrid cooler's radiators, like those Corsair QLs for example.