It looks like these fans really need at least 2cm space between them and the case panel so they move air. I initially planned to put them onto the side panel, but at the front they should do a lot more.
When they are mounted on a side panel the air flow would get restricted to one corner, instead of the whole area of the fan - I didn'T want to cut the panels open.
Also with smoke tests now the intake air alos seems to swirl in as a narrow stream at one corner of the fan.
The idea was to get the two 1400mm fans to intake air through the integrated dust filters and create positive pressure. The case is fairly perforated, but I think it allows air to flow freely everywhere.
I already got a dead mainboard in an old case caused by hot air beneath the PSU.
When I try smoke by the side panel vents next to the CPU almost no air gets sucked in, so it seems to work. Also opening the case almost doesn't change temperature.
I stuffed foam next to the front fans and this directs airflow and reduces a resonace there to inaudible levels too.
The front fans are also custom mounted and I got lucky there is enough room.
I can hear and I don't mind:
at load the GPU is whining a bit, I'm waiting for an aftermarket cooler for it (Scythe Setsugen2)
air rushing (mostly when the CPU fan spins up)
a bit of HDD bearing (like hissing)
PSU noise at full load
What's annyoing is a quiet but noticable vibration resonace of high frequency which seems to be caused by the CPU fan through the mainboard and case.
Luckily it only builds up sometimes.
I did temperature tests with Furmark and Prime95 both in their extreme burning modes. Ambient temp was about 20-22°C and CPU/GPU maxed at 52/79°C.
specs:
Phenom X6 1055T - NB VID and core VID undervolted by 0.05V and overclocked FSB to 240MHz
Ati HD5750 His iCooler IV - overclocked to 840/1250MHz and BIOS mod for lower available fan speeds
Enermax Modu87+ PSU
Gigabyte GA-MA770-UD3 Rev 2.1
Noctua NH-C12P SE14 CPU cooler - idling at 490RPM
two Noctua NF-P14 FLX fans with ultra low noise adapters (~790RPM)
Revoltec Sixty 3 case
I can't post pics because of the post count though.
