Any horror stories from not properly ventilating a MAME cabinet

[emb]

I'm debating whether or not to put a fan in my cab. I currently have air vents cut out of the top and bottom of my cabinet.

[Dazz]

I have normal CPU cooler and case fans on the PC in my cab.  Small air vents in the cabinet.  The cabinet sits in my garage where temps during the summer hit 115f degrees...  I've had no issues in 5 years.  Of course the PC has been upgraded a couple times in 5 years, but still no issues.

[saint]

I'd be interested in hearing other opinions, but in the 10+ years I've been in this hobby I've never heard of an overheating issue whether a cabinet was vented or no not. They're typically very open inside. That said, a good fan is cheap insurance. Dunno.

[boardjunkie]

I think its a good idea.....for both MAME machines and dedicated arcade games as well. Electronics that need to be forced air cooled don't like heat buildup. HDDs will last longer if kept cool, and monitors will have a better lifespan as well.

If it were me I'd keep the PC in its case (to keep its forced air cooling), run some flexable "dryer vent" style tube from the exhaust fan(s) to the upper cab vent. Adding a fan to blow out warm air from the monitor would be a good idea.

Adding fans to a Tempest was almost mandatory to keep the monitor's deflection amps from blowing up.....

[leapinlew]

If it were me I'd keep the PC in its case (to keep its forced air cooling), run some flexable "dryer vent" style tube from the exhaust fan(s) to the upper cab vent. Adding a fan to blow out warm air from the monitor would be a good idea...

Is that really necessary? A dryer vent exhaust?! That sounds like overkill to me. In all my years, I haven't had an issue with overheating in a full size cabinet. I just don't see the need for an exhaust fan. A few openings at the top allow the heat to escape. If you wanted to put a fan anywhere, I'd put one in low, but I don't use any on my full size cabinets.

If you wanted to add fans, I'm sure it wouldn't hurt. I just don't think it helps.

[ChadTower]

It sounds more like a dust collector than a viable cooling solution.

Put a thermometer in your cab.  If it goes to maybe 140 degrees in there then add a fan at the top rear.  If not, you don't need one.

[boardjunkie]

The vent tube is not overkill, but needed to properly displace warm air and bring in fresh air. If you just leave the pc in  there, it will recycle its own exhaust (there's no air movement inside a cab) and run warmer than it should. I've been involved in the amusement industry as a tech for over 20 years, and I know how much a monitor alone can heat up a cab. A PC dissipates far more heat than an arcade board and small switching supply.

So I guess its up to the builder what you want to do. But I would make the extra effort (its not that hard) to keep everything inside the cab as happy as possible if its expected to last and run reliably.

[ChadTower]

The difference is that nobody on this site expects their PC to run 15 hours a day for 5 years.  It's not run like commercial equipment.  The requirements are not the same.  People here turn their machines on when they want to use them and usually upgrade the PC after maybe 18 months.  There is no 20,000 hour requirement on the PC of a MAME machine.

[leapinlew]

The vent tube is not overkill, but needed to properly displace warm air and bring in fresh air. If you just leave the pc in  there, it will recycle its own exhaust (there's no air movement inside a cab) and run warmer than it should. I've been involved in the amusement industry as a tech for over 20 years, and I know how much a monitor alone can heat up a cab. A PC dissipates far more heat than an arcade board and small switching supply.

So I guess its up to the builder what you want to do. But I would make the extra effort (its not that hard) to keep everything inside the cab as happy as possible if its expected to last and run reliably.

To each his own. I have multiple cabs that run for weeks on end with no issues. Some of the cabs are almost entirely closed up, while others have a few exhaust openings up top and intake holes down lower. What should be mentioned is the caliber of computer used. I build my Mame machines with just enough. I don't use high end PC components that are overclocked and require additional cooling. My last machine only played classics and I was able to use a passively cooled Intel Atom.

I know saying a machine requires fans isn't correct, but I guess some machines would depending on the level of PC the builder decides to use.

[BobA]

Also consider the size of the cab.   Bartops need cooling alot more than a regular cab as they pack the equipment into a much smaller space.

[boardjunkie]

Well....my approach is I want it to work every time I hit the button. Once its done, I don't wanna have to screw with it. Troubleshooting mystery blue screen crashes or other erratic behavior ain't my idea of fun. Heat can, and will make these things happen. I just went thru this on someone's PC that had the intake vents all packed full of dirt. Onboard graphics chip failed, ram was bad and was causing crashes after the machine warmed up. Heat killed it.

Monitors that run too warm will bake capacitors causing them to dry out and either make the image quality suffer, or cause the monitor to fail.

So....you do as you wish. I'll go the extra mile to insure that its gonna be reliable.

And on the subject of commercial games, they weren't expected to last more than a couple years, so they didn't bother with the finer details.

A great example of what heat can do to arcade games was the Cedar Point amusement park arcade in Ohio. When they still had all the vintage games in there (large arcade), you could count on a good portion of them either not working, or not working right. The room was not air conditioned, and it got real hot in there. Alot of the monitors looked like crap from dried out caps, and up to half the games were tagged out of order. Elevated temps inside the cabs was a major player in the failure of all this equipment. I don't think they ever had anyone working on the games who knew what they were doing. I even offered to tech for them many years ago 'cause I hated to see the games in such sad shape. They offered me some lowball salary, I passed, and that was the end of it.

[leapinlew]

Like I said, there is nothing wrong with adding fans, but I equate it to using titanium joystick shafts. Sure it doesn't hurt... but it's not actually doing anything either. 

[boardjunkie]

Fans "don't do anything"? That goes against every rule of thermodynamics......

[leapinlew]

Fans "don't do anything"? That goes against every rule of thermodynamics......

Fans don't do anything in a vacuum .... put that in your rule of thermodynamics pipe.

Exactly, in many circumstances a fan doesn't hurt, but it also doesn't help. AKA "don't do anything"

[boardjunkie]

Since when is an arcade cab with upper and lower vents a vacuum?

Really....its this simple. You pull warm air out of the top, cool air comes in the bottom to replace it. Constant air circulation....

[Donkbaca]

Well I made sure that when cutting out the sides of my cab I was exact to get an airtight seal..... I was wondering this same thing, since I am putting an xbox 360 in my cabinet, but I ultimately decided against it.  Here is my thinking:

1) Fans are LOUD, no getting around it, and they get really dirty.  I don't want to deal with the additional noise and cleaning.
2) cabs are really leaky, I figure with the amount of space in there, plus the holes in the back, plus the leakage around the coin door/ joints, there will be plenty of air flow.
3) The PC and Xbox both have heat sensors and will shut down before any damage is done.  If it overheats and shuts off, I'll add fans later.
4) If it all melts down I really don't care.  I got a refurbed 360 for 100 bucks, the PC was a P4 that was free and I have another one on hand in case that one takes a dump.  Storage is so cheap, I have the hard drive cloned.  If the xbox takes a dump, I'll get another one for cheap, and if the pc explodes, I'll just swap it out with the new one and then add fans.

[Hoopz]

Well I made sure that when cutting out the sides of my cab I was exact to get an airtight seal..... I was wondering this same thing, since I am putting an xbox 360 in my cabinet, but I ultimately decided against it.  Here is my thinking:

1) Fans are LOUD, no getting around it, and they get really dirty.  I don't want to deal with the additional noise and cleaning.
2) cabs are really leaky, I figure with the amount of space in there, plus the holes in the back, plus the leakage around the coin door/ joints, there will be plenty of air flow.
3) The PC and Xbox both have heat sensors and will shut down before any damage is done.  If it overheats and shuts off, I'll add fans later.
4) If it all melts down I really don't care.  I got a refurbed 360 for 100 bucks, the PC was a P4 that was free and I have another one on hand in case that one takes a dump.  Storage is so cheap, I have the hard drive cloned.  If the xbox takes a dump, I'll get another one for cheap, and if the pc explodes, I'll just swap it out with the new one and then add fans.

Add to it that the sides of the cab are going to allow for heat transfer too.  Unless someone put insulation in there, some of the heat is going to go out thru the sides and top of the cab itself and not just through any little crevices.  Considering how many cubic feet are in a "typical" cabinet for air to move and heat to escape, I don't see the point in adding fans.

[bkenobi]

Yes, heat will be conducted through the wood sides, but that's not really going to make that much difference IMO.  You have natural convection with hot air to warm wood on the inside, then natural convection from warm wood to warm air on the outside.  You are going to get very little heat transfer even with the large surface area due to small delta temperatures and no forced air flow either inside or outside.  I am ignoring radiation affects as that's a 4th order factor of temperature difference and is thus minimal.

Since the sides of the cabinet are wood, you will get very poor heat transfer especially with 3/4".  If you made the sides out of metal, you would do better, but the limiting factor would still be the small deltaT between the inside and outside coupled with the minimal air movement.

IMO (without running any calculations), you will get most of your cooling from heat rising out the top leakage paths and being replaced by relatively cool air through lower leak paths.  From what I've seen, many cabs just put a hole on the top with louvers (presumably to keep stuff from falling in) and leave the cab relatively poorly sealed (coin door, CP, rear door, designed vents in the back/front, etc).

[boardjunkie]

Those 360s are incredibly sensitive to heat buildup. Thats what causes the "red rings" failure. I'd be careful with that. I hear all the horror stories from a guy here in town who repairs that kind of stuff. Many thousands of $$ worth of BGA reflow equipment are required to properly repair it. And if the board warps, it will likely never operate right again.

http://ecadigitallibrary.com/pdf/56thECTC/s17p6cq.pdf

Read all about it....

[saint]

IMO (without running any calculations), you will get most of your cooling from heat rising out the top leakage paths and being replaced by relatively cool air through lower leak paths.  From what I've seen, many cabs just put a hole on the top with louvers (presumably to keep stuff from falling in) and leave the cab relatively poorly sealed (coin door, CP, rear door, designed vents in the back/front, etc).

Houses used to be cooled this way back (albeit with actual design intended) before air conditioning, right? Chad had a good idea, I'd be interested to see someone without cooling put a fan in their cabinet before running it, then running it a while, and reporting back on temperature rises.

I'd be pretty leery of a 360 like boardjunkie said. I do not think I'd be terribly concerned about a PC.

[Mrephunk]

With my cab build right now I am designing it to use a 360, my plan is to remove it completely form its housing and mount the MB on PCB feet, moving the dvd drive and hopefully alleviating heat problems

[bkenobi]

Houses used to be cooled this way back (albeit with actual design intended) before air conditioning, right?

They still are.  Attics are designed to remain vented to help with moisture issues.  There are soffit vents at the low points on the roof that need to remain open to keep fresh air entering.  There are different ways to vent the high point of the roof, but jack vents are one of the more common.  You won't likely feel any air movement if you enter the attic (unless a strong wind kicks up), but you can be assured that this ventilation is effective and REQUIRED!  I just bought a house last year that the vents had been all but covered in one section of the house.  That section had massive damage to the sheeting and rot/mold issues in some locations.  The roof had been redone ~2 years prior, so this ventilation truly makes a HUGE difference.

As far as cabinets, again, this is an effective way to remove heat.  BUT, if you have thermally sensitive electronics, you need to have a lower ambient temperature or much higher flow rates to sufficiently cool the components.

[bkenobi]

With my cab build right now I am designing it to use a 360, my plan is to remove it completely form its housing and mount the MB on PCB feet, moving the dvd drive and hopefully alleviating heat problems

That may be a BAD idea!  The case of the Xbox is designed with air flow/cooling in mind.  If you decase the system and don't add sufficient cooling to the components, you could end up with a dead system.  If you put a fan facing the board with a high enough flow rate, you should be fine though.

[Donkbaca]

Nah, the 360 shuts down when it gets hot.  The overheating errors you get are from a design flaw in early 360's due to a combination of poor solder/ poor heat transfer compound on the heat sinks, and odd pressure points on the mobo. It has more to do with a design flaw than actual heat.  The 360 has a temp sensor and is designed to shut down before damage is done.  The red rings thing is caused by the repeated heating and cooling of the board over time and poor heat transfer, causing the solder joints on the chips to get messed up.  It doesn't happen from a one time overheat.If the 360 shuts down due to heat, I'll put a fan in.

Anyhow as I said, you can get a MS refurbed one with a controller, 20gb hard drive and all for 99 bucks.  I can sell the controller, HD, and power brick for around 60 bucks or so, so If it takes a dump I am out like 40 bucks or so.  Not worried about it.  And its not like this thing is going to be on for hours at a time, days on end.  It will probably see 4 hours of play a week, on average, in an air conditioned office...

[Donkbaca]

Decasing it is fine.  Just make sure the rear fan and the fan manifold are still connected so that it draws air from the gpu and cpu heat sinks.  No need to have a fan blow on them, in fact if you are forcing warm air on them this could be a bad thing. People screw up fans all the time, I have seen so many "this is my intake fan and this is my exhaust fan" mods.  Its dumb, the system does not breathe like we do, it does not use the air, the whole point of fans is get rid of heat, you want fans blowing heat away from the system.  Decasing it will allow more heat to escape, since it won't be stuck in the case, just make sure there is a fan/fans blowing air AWAY from the heatsinks and you will be golden.

[ChadTower]

Chad had a good idea, I'd be interested to see someone without cooling put a fan in their cabinet before running it, then running it a while, and reporting back on temperature rises.

If I had a MAME cab I'd do it just to satisfy the debate.  A remote meat thermometer should do the trick easily.  If you have more than one (I do for meat smoking/BBQ) you could even take temps at different spots inside the cabinet.

[leapinlew]

If I had a MAME cab I'd do it just to satisfy the debate. 

I think we both know it won't satisfy anything. 

[alfonzotan]

I put a $3 120mm fan in the cab's back panel right behind my CPU (a Core2Duo), and cut a small vent at the top of the cab, with a $2 vent cover from Lowe's.  Probably overkill, but it was cheap insurance, and the fan noise is next-to inaudible, especially with two speakers pointed directly at the player's head.

[ChadTower]

If I had a MAME cab I'd do it just to satisfy the debate. 

I think we both know it won't satisfy anything. 

That's what she... no, wait... doh.

[FrizzleFried]

A single fan at top pulling air out or a single fan at bottom blowing air in is more than sufficient cooling for a MAME cab (unless you're overclocking).

I like to blow air in the bottom (of course with a dust screen attached) creating positive air pressure in the cab... though there is nothing wrong with going with an exhaust fan at top creating negative air pressure.  The heat will be removed regardless.

[markronz]

I like to blow air in the bottom (of course with a dust screen attached)

ooh dust screen.   I never thought of that!   That would be nice.  What do you use as a dust screen?  All I currently have in mine is an exposed fan and thats it.

[markronz]

Oh and I'm of the same mind as others.   I don't really have the time to test a cab with and without a fan or two, but fans are cheap, and I figure why not, it can only help!

[gabe]

Here's some more non-scientific anecdotal drivel to add to this conversation:

I have a bare motherboard attached to the wall of my cab. It runs 24/7. I have the monitor, marquee, and speakers on a separate switch which I turn off when it's not in use. The cabinet is passively vented. The only cooling comes from the stock OEM CPU/GPU heat sink/fan. The machine has been perfectly reliable up to this point, and I don't anticipate that changing. If it dies a premature death, I'll be sure to report back here.

[Donkbaca]

If I feel the need to add a fan, I am going to use speaker cloth for my dust screen

[boardjunkie]

Fan filters are fine, but you gotta check them often to see if they need cleaning. If it gets clogged, that could be bad news....

[TOK]

The vent tube is not overkill, but needed to properly displace warm air and bring in fresh air. If you just leave the pc in  there, it will recycle its own exhaust (there's no air movement inside a cab) and run warmer than it should. I've been involved in the amusement industry as a tech for over 20 years, and I know how much a monitor alone can heat up a cab. A PC dissipates far more heat than an arcade board and small switching supply.

So I guess its up to the builder what you want to do. But I would make the extra effort (its not that hard) to keep everything inside the cab as happy as possible if its expected to last and run reliably.

I've been running the same PC in my original MAME cab since 2005, a Pentium 4 I built from used parts already laying around.
Never ran fans, never had an issue. Sometimes its on for an hour, sometimes it runs all day. Cooling fans would just be one more thing to go wrong.

Not running anything but standard fans (CPU, power supply) in their original spots on my other machines, either. No problems.

[Donkbaca]

So I guess the answer is no, there are no horror stories.

[leapinlew]

So I guess the answer is no, there are no horror stories.

I got a story. It's about a guy who worried about his cabinet getting too hot. So he connected a couple fans and ran dryer vent tubing inside his cabinet. After all was said and done, he lost several hours that he could've spent PLAYING ARCADE GAMES! 

[eds1275]

For what it's worth every single audio install I have seen and or worked on pulls cool air in from the bottom [with a fan] and lets it out through the top. And I am talking amplifiers, tube equipment etc - the hot stuff. I have never seen one installed with fans pulling air out from the top. Though it would work, maybe it wouldn't be as effective. I don't know the science behind it.



A pc though? I think adding some fans and or vents is more for piece of mind than really a requirement.

[boardjunkie]

[/quote]

I got a story. It's about a guy who worried about his cabinet getting too hot. So he connected a couple fans and ran dryer vent tubing inside his cabinet. After all was said and done, he lost several hours that he could've spent PLAYING ARCADE GAMES! 
[/quote]

Dude I've played arcade games for more than 30 years and repaired 'em for 20. Its not my top priority in life. Why do you care so much that I want my stuff to last? I'll do it the way I want to, so quitchabitchin.....

You can build a fire in your nifty MAME cab for all I care.....