Air flow (H440) with a h100i in place.

[Qitarah]

I put together my new build yesterday (4790k, r9 290, h100i and a nzxt h440).

Having a few issues with heat build up.

Firstly i'll start by saying I need to reapply thermal paste, I did a crap job and will be doing that in the next few days.

Here are some current temps

Ambient room temperature is at 30.5c today (hot here and small room :X)

H100i is keeping the CPU at 38-40C at idle and 50-55c during light loaded games.

My VRM temps on my asus vii hero are slightly worrying, during load they are at 61c and it is super hot to touch the heatsink on the VRMS.

Now here is the problem:

all these temps are with the Side panel of the case removed. If i have the side of the case on, then these temperatures just keep creeping up and up. the top of the case was actually getting really hot, nearly too hot to touch.

Is this an issue of airflow or is the high ambient temperatures the main cause?

I currently have it in a pretty standard configuration:

front three 120mm fans on the case are set as intakes, rear 140mm as exhaust (seems to hardly move any air mind you). I mounted the h100i as push in the top mount of the case.


Any advise or input would be great.

 

[ttaskmaster]

IIRC from another thread, the H440 is kinda crap on airflow/intake... I may be wrong, though.
Ambient temp won't help, although my own rig was averaging 30ºC at idle in 28ºC ambient last night. My CPU fully loaded did not breach 50ºC.

Which brand of fans are all these?
Are they connected to the mobo?

The 290 probably kicks out a fair lot of heat, so I'd personally look at getting as many fans exhausting out the top/back as possible. Exhausting hot is more important than intaking cool(ish).
Perhaps chuck the H100i fans atop the rad to pull and add some decent high Static Pressure fans beneath to push (if you have room)?
Anything you can do to improve the intake will also help - Higher airflow fans, or high SP ones, if you have a mesh/grille/other obstruction in place. If you do have such things, perhaps reducing/eliminating them will help. Depends how far you fancy modding your case.

I'd personally have a heart attack over those temperatures, but I'm insanely picky. Certainly the case should not get anywhere near too hot to touch!

 

[Qitarah]

As mentioned I do need to reapply thermal paste which will knock off some C's, just waiting on the delivery but yer certainly the heat being exhausted at the top of the case is bloody hot after an hour of gaming.

All the fans are the stock NZXT's h440's, which apparently are quite decent. I'm sure 3 noctuas in the front would do a better job though. The rear exhaust is also the standard one.


When I reapply the paste I'll try with pull instead of push on the h100i. Failing that I'm not really too sure what else I can try.

Ow and the h440 comes with a built in fan hub, which just runs the fans on 12v molex so they are running at full tilt the whole time.

 

[ttaskmaster]

certainly the heat being exhausted at the top of the case is bloody hot after an hour of gaming.

That's the part that concerns me the most.

I'm sure 3 noctuas in the front would do a better job though.

Ah, you know me well!!

When I reapply the paste I'll try with pull instead of push on the h100i. Failing that I'm not really too sure what else I can try.

Additional, lower rpm fans pushing in from the other side of the rad?
depends on space.
Also, some cases have space for extra fans inside and/or you could mod the panels to accomodate even more.

Ow and the h440 comes with a built in fan hub, which just runs the fans on 12v molex so they are running at full tilt the whole time.

Depending on a variety of factors, sometimes running fans too fast does not cool the air enough. I get the same thing on my bike when it's hot - If I ride faster than a certain speed, the friction of the airflow actually heats my clothing up and makes me even hotter!

I have noticed that under certain performance loads, my own case runs cooler if I drop the fan speeds down sometimes. I do have a dedicated fan controller for this exact reason, though.

 

[Qitarah]

Isnt room for push&pull, one of the reasons I didn't get the h105 instead.

With the front panel off it keeps it a lot cooler. Far better circulation.

Couple that with probably 5-10c from actually have a decent paste job on it i think it should be fine. Guess on those hotter days i'll have 2 take the front panel off.

Still not ideal, will have a mess around with different fans (noctuas) and changing a few things I rekon!

 

[Jay85]

I configured mine by having a 140 pulling from the rear. a 240 rad up front which is offset to sit at the bottom 2 mounts and a intake fan which sits at the top 120 slot so gives me a clear flow from front to back. I also changed my top 240 rad fans from exhaust to intake and I found that helped with my temperatures a lot. I'm not sitting at a comfortable 68C on my cpu and both my GPU's which are also in the loop at 48C max. Both GPU's and my CPU are overclocked too.

 

[Qitarah]

been thinking about doing as you said, obviously with out the top rad. Just smash a couple of fans up there for uber exhausting hot air.

with the some what restricted air flow from the front, the 290 dumping a bunch of air into the case I kinda feel the h100i just isnt getting enough fresh air through it.

Im gonna try:

Mounting the h100i from the front of the case, i'll go push/pull if it works out. Think there is room left over for the 3rd 120 at the top.
put 2 fans at the top of the case for exhaust.
Change the back to an intake to see if that makes any difference.

 

[Qitarah]

Well just wanna write up here with my finding in case anyone in the future has similar issues.

I tried changing rear fan to an intake, didn't work.

I re pasted my CPU which knocked off a few C.

The biggest and most noticeable change was:

I changed the middle front fan to a corsair Airflow high performance which I control on the motherboard. I let it ramp up quite high under load. This stopped me having to take the front cover off of the h440. A lot more airflow. I'll be replacing all the fans on the h440. Excluding the rear 140mm.

Also the h100i fans do a good job but have realllllllllllly annoying wurring sounds at certain RPMS. So those will be replaced as well.