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PC Basic Case Air Circulation.
fastredpacman:
The only reason I was concerned was because of the 5 hard drives in the case. And the room inside the cab will get pretty hot. So along with the cab inside the case I was planning on putting extra fans. What do you guys think?
Crazy Cooter:
5 drives? RAID 0+1 with a storage drive?
Anyhow, if this is all going in a cabinet, why use a case at all? Use the cpu fan and put a vent fan on the cabinet. Monitor your temps and add cabinet fans if the they get out of hand.
Xiaou2:
Ive had 3 hard drives fail so far - before I finally realized the main reason... Heat!
Most older or smaller pc cases have drive bays that stack the hd's within a few millimeters appart. The problem is that the heat from the bottom drive will make the top drive twice as hot. Of course - the more drives you have the hotter your system will get.
Heat causes the metal to expand - and with hd's - that is a big problem. It eventaully causes the heads to become missaligned and damaged due to friction.
I HIGHLY Sugggest that you get a large server style case. The new cases have 2 removable drive bays (3 drives in each possible)... and fans that sit right in front of them : )
One of the spots is for the floppy - but I got a 5.14" adapter so that the floppy sits in a cd bay (with extra usb ports too : ). This allows me to space the drives appart by one inch... which allows the fans to blow more effectively across the drive surfaces.
Ive got an older processor - that dosnt get that hot... but for anything over a gig... I recomend cutting a hole in the sidepanel and popping a fan in there.
Ive found... that by trying to draw air out of the case by the cpu hardly reduced the tempature. But by pushing air right twords the cpu - it cooled it considerably. This is true for the hd fans, and anything else for that matter. Yes... it will suck more dust into the system... but hey, you can remove that every few months as needed.
I run 4 drives in my system:
1) os
2) os backup
3) main data drive
4) Main data backup drive
I do not use automatic raid. I backup my data manually using norton ghost - about every month. And if I need to back up something sooner... I just place a duplicate on the backup drive manually untill I can do a full drive copy. Reason?
If a virus hits... it will not destoy all my drives. (well, less likly... but better if u unplug drives untill needed) If my OS gets quirkey or unbootable... I can just switch to the backup knowing it will work... and re-ghost.
This setup has been a lifesaver a few times already (many os swaps, one unfixable sector problem)
One other thing worth mentioning... is power. If you run 5 drives at once, as well as cd roms, many fans, and more... you should invest in an expensive powerfull power supply. Else... your supply will start to have trouble keeping up... will have trouble booting your drives correctly, and may cause cpu and or drive damages over time.
If things get ultra hot (summer), and you do not have AC, then either do not run your pc... or take off the sidepanel and place a huge boxfan in front of it. (this is what I do)
NoOne=NBA=:
I've got an Enermax case that uses the setup shown in the original post, with two exceptions.
It has a side fan in the windowed area for intake, and has TWO exhaust fan holes below the power supply.
I've got all the fan holes populated, except the one immediately below the power supply, and haven't had any problems at all.
I'm running an Athlon 2000+ that is NOT overclocked, so I'm not really taxing the cooling system at all.
My general take on fans though is "the more fans the better".
I've never heard of a computer having problems from running too COOL.
As long as it doesn't make too much noise, I'd fill them all, and add a side one for good measure.
patrickl:
--- Quote from: Xiaou2 on September 27, 2004, 08:12:09 pm ---
Ive had 3 hard drives fail so far - before I finally realized the main reason... Heat!
Most older or smaller pc cases have drive bays that stack the hd's within a few millimeters appart. The problem is that the heat from the bottom drive will make the top drive twice as hot. Of course - the more drives you have the hotter your system will get.
--- End quote ---
I learnt the same lesson the same hard way. I don't know why (desktop) case builders seem to forget to cool the disks, but it's probably the most annoying part to die on you. And indeed, the more disks the bigger the problem.
--- Quote --- Ive found... that by trying to draw air out of the case by the cpu hardly reduced the tempature. But by pushing air right twords the cpu - it cooled it considerably.
--- End quote ---
Oops, I said I had an exhaust hole over my CPU, but it's actually an air intake ... :-[
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