cooling advice

Soldato
Joined
1 Feb 2006
Posts
8,188
hi guys,

first visit to this section of the forum..

i have an athlon xp3000 machine with 3hard disks, gfx card, sound card, 2 dvd drives and floppy all mounted within my case so there isnt really much free space...

the machine is getting really hot these days.. there is one large fan mounted just beside where the RAM sticks are.. i presume this is the CPU fan.. think there maybe is another on the gfx card.

anyhow, if left running for a while this beast makes the most awful and annoying noise.. the fan revs up and the only solution to get anywhere near silence is to remove the side window of the case..

i think that with the multiple hard disks etc inside the tower that i should have some extra form of cooling..

anyone recommend how i could do this? i cant listen to this racket for much longer to be honest!

Looking at my diagnostic tool now (side window open - fan relatively quiet) the temperatures are as follows:

cpu: 36
hard disks: 50

cooling van 3650rpm

Any comments would be good

Cheers
 
Man of Honour
Joined
14 Nov 2005
Posts
10,661
Location
Up North
Your cpu seems to be doing ok. I would worry about the HD though.

It all depends on how much you want to spend :

£0 - Take the fan off the heatsink (the metal bit under the fan next to the memory sticks), yes thats the cpu heat sink fan (HSF), give it a good 'blow' as it will more than likely be full of dust. A small artists paintbrush will also help remove any gunk build up there too. Replace and clean the fan aswell.

Clean all your other case fans too, there should be a minimum of one, usually on the 'back' of the pc where you plug everything in. For improved airflow (less turbulance) you could also tie-wrap your internal wiring and attempt to hide them away so it will not disrupt airflow.

£10-£15 - I take it your case is fairly old so they will probably only take 80mm fans if 120 then thats great. Buy a couple of good fans and have one 'intaking' fresh air (usually from the front) and one exhausting warm air from the pc to the rear. This will significantly lower your case temps and hopefully your CPU and HD temp.

£20 + - Invest in a new CPU cooler, the higher spec models come with a 120mm fan which are near silent compared to 80mm, you could even get away with using a heatsink without a fan if its large enough such as the 'ninja'. If your motherboard has a chipset fan (a small fan attached to the motherboard) then you could also replace this with a heatsink at little cost which will drastically reduce noise.
 
Soldato
OP
Joined
1 Feb 2006
Posts
8,188
many thanks, very informative..

looking inside my case i just have a CPU fan/heatsink and that is it.. there are no fans at the back of the case (i see two slots for them though)

edit: i can see a very small fan enclosed inside a gold casing.. this might be chipset fan.. its hidden in behind a lot of sata leads tho!

sounds like i need to get something sorted!
 
Last edited:
Soldato
OP
Joined
1 Feb 2006
Posts
8,188
just gave fan and heatsink a very quick clean there...

temperatures now:

cpu: 30
hard disks: 40

cooling van 3000rpm (quiet!)

THink I might add one other fan to remove air out to the back.. do i definitely need one of the front to pull fresh air in?

Cheers
 
Soldato
OP
Joined
1 Feb 2006
Posts
8,188
got all my heat problems sorted.. got a new thermaltake soprano case with 3 built in fans.. temps now all low 30s! and its quiet too!

Thanks for the advice above

Jonny
 
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