[SOLVED] What options do I have for better airflow?

[cazanlucianadelin]

Hello,

Last autumn I built my first PC and... I've made mistakes 😀
I got the Gigabyte Aorus AC300W case which has the front covered with only a few holes to use for airflow.
My second mistake was getting the Gigabyte Aorus 360 water cooler.

The issue is that I cannot place the cooler on top due to top interface cables so I had to mount it on front as exhaust and I'm keeping the glass panel off as with it mounted and even if I set front coolers to intake my GPU temps get around 80s in latest games (RTX 3080)

I wish to purchase a new case that would help with my airflow problem and I've been browsing the options I have and I cannot decide were to go from here, thus posting here for some suggestions, so far I'm thinking about these options:

1. A Mid Tower case with open front panel, keep the liquid cooler on front as intake (I think that wouldn't be recommended as I'd just increase my temps inside the case) and use top/rear as exhaust
2. A Mid Tower case as above but with bottom fans and use the above configuration, bottoms fans would help with cooling the temp inside the case I think
3. A Mid Tower case as #1 but with side fan space where I could mount the liquid cooler radiator & fans
4. A Full Tower case where I could mount the liquid cooler radiator & fans on top as exhaust

If you see any other options which I may not know or haven't thought about please let me know.
Thank you for your time and help!

 

[Phaaze88]

Get a chassis that supports that 360mm at the top, like Fractal Design Meshify 2. That model might not be available to you, but I was mentioning it as an example.
With that big a unit, you are sort of stuck with top mounting it.
Front mounting a 360mm doesn't last as long, because after an undetermined amount of time, you will start to hear water dripping/running.
The source of that is air pooling at the inlet side of the radiator - that noise only gets worse as time goes on, and you'll be forced to either mount it at the top, or throw it away, even though there's nothing wrong with the cooler itself, which is a bit of a waste.

1. A Mid Tower case with open front panel, keep the liquid cooler on front as intake (I think that wouldn't be recommended as I'd just increase my temps inside the case) and use top/rear as exhaust.

Any way you spin it, something's going to heat up something else. Some air - even warm - is still better than no air.
A)Cpu exhaust flowing into gpu cooler.
B)Gpu exhaust flowing into cpu cooler.
I would say to aim for the 'lesser evil' of the 2, but the 360mm AIO more or less forces a top mount anyway...

2. A Mid Tower case as above but with bottom fans and use the above configuration, bottoms fans would help with cooling the temp inside the case I think
Bottom chassis fans really don't do all that much, for a number of reasons. The most effective ones have the floor of the chassis reasonably elevated, or you DIY elevate the chassis by standing it on planks or something.
The gpu's fans can already act as a more efficient intake - front, bottom, and rear.
Plus, dust settles more towards the bottom, so you will have to clean that filter more often, so don't forget.
O11 Dynamic, or a look-alike, and elevate it.

3. A Mid Tower case as #1 but with side fan space where I could mount the liquid cooler radiator & fans.
O11 Dynamic, again, but it's no different from front mount with the drip-drip later on. Well, you can still mount the radiator to the top of this one, fortunately.

4. A Full Tower case where I could mount the liquid cooler radiator & fans on top as exhaust.
O11 Dynamic...
Might be quite a few options available to you for this, but without knowing what's available to you or where you're shopping at, that could be a lot of hit and miss.
As an alternative, use PCpartpicker's system builder, select your Gigabyte cooler for the cpu cooler first, then go to 'Choose a Case', and most of the incompatible options will be removed for you.

 

[cazanlucianadelin]

Hello Phaaze88,

Thank you so much for the detailed response, I saw a video from NG about the position of the AIO and I know it's not mounted as it should and I was leaning towards the 4th option with top mount too. As well I was looking at both the Fractal Design Meshify 2 and the O11 Dynamic, I was also taking a look at Lancool II Mesh. I believe all 3 are available to me or at least I could get them from abroad (from amazon or something).

I was also thinking about getting a normal mid-tower with open front and whenever the AIO dies I would switch it to a 240 and place it on top but I'm not sure how it will impact the cooling of my CPU.
I have the i7 10700k and I OC to 4.6Ghz and I heard it's a hot temp CPU thus I was inclined to get the bigger AIO for better cooling.

All 3 are looking good and are available in my country, all 3 appear to be compatible with the LC360 on pcpartpicker as well.

Both the Meshify 2 and the Lancool ii Mesh seem good but not exactly fitting my liking (as if I'd have the luxury to go with my liking in this case)
So I'm guessing I'd have to go with the O11 Dynamic, it has a really nice interior design and I like the idea of the PSU being "hidden" in the back.
I'll keep looking for some other viable options too but I think I'll stick with this one.

Thank you again and have a nice day!

 

[geofelt]

At no cost to you, remount the radiator to take in fresh air.
See how you do.

 

[Phaaze88]

I have the i7 10700k and I OC to 4.6Ghz

That isn't an OC at all, but a downclock. Remove that.
The chart in the following link is what the 10700K normally does depending on how many cores/threads are active:
https://www.techpowerup.com/review/intel-core-i7-10700k/20.html


"... I would switch it to a 240..."
If your chassis can already fit large single tower air, dual tower air, or a 280mm AIO, then 240mm have nothing going for them.

 

[cazanlucianadelin]

I'll try to use front as intake with the side glass closed and use top & rear as exhaust but I'm pretty sure it won't have sufficient intake as the holes really are small.
As for the OC I only enabled the self-OC as I didn't bother with manually doing so, is that not good? I believe the stock is 3.8Ghz so I thought it would perform better

once again thank you for your insights

 

[Phaaze88]

I believe the stock is 3.8Ghz so I thought it would perform better

It does not hang around base clock(3.8ghz) unless you go into bios and disable Turbo Boost, otherwise, the cores boost much higher than that when there's work to do.
The 4.6ghz OC is worse than letting it boost normally.

 

[cazanlucianadelin]

Ohh, I see what you mean now and it makes complete sense.
Thank you for pointing it out, I'm ashamed not to have looked more into it.