I have a fractal R4 and currently only using the two stock fans that come with it. At 12v the case sounds like a wind tunnel and there is some motor noise. To solve the issue im looking to add two more 140mm fans and run all of them either 7v or 5v.

Question is what fans should i get? The noctua NF-P14 FLX seems popular and is good on motor noise but does it create that woosh effect when in a case? The specs on the noctua site claim they moves more air than the stock fans at each voltage which is why i ask.

Also in terms of temps would it be better to have:
-two fans in front of the case, one on top and one on back
-one fan in front, two on top and one on back


Part specs:
3770k + thermalright hr-02 macho
asus 670gtx
Asus V Gene
256GB samsung 830
2TB Western Digital Red

You probably won't need two exhausts unless you're overclocking a lot, even if exhausts are the most effective way to achieve increased cooling. Try using the two included fans for the front intake, at 5 or 7V through the front controller. At least at 5V I can't hear mine and they do their job in that position. I have similar components as far as heat goes and just one 140mm fan at 700 RPM is enough even for lengthy gaming sessions. I'm using one set of the black silicone spacers that also came with the case to get a small distance between the exaust fan and the vent, which slightly lowers the amount of air going through. The NF-P14 FLX should blow a quite similar amount(possibly just slightly more) of air as the TY-140 I use at the exhaust around the same speed. I don't know for sure if the NF-P14 FLX starts at 5V but I think it ought to, becoming a possible candidate to connect to the fan control also. Or try its included adapter that says 750 RPM perhaps. Should be enough outside heavier overclocking.

My favorite 140mm is Noiseblocker NB-BlackSilentPro PK-1 140mm x 25mm Ultra Quiet Fan - 700 RPM - 9 dBA, in my case is enough to cool a xeon e3 1230 on an AXP 140, but the fan is very quiet imo, i also own 2x PK3 (1600rpm version) and they move a lot of air, but to me PK1 is very good as it comes stock in terms of noise n cfm.

what temps do you get for idle and full load?
with the stock 2 fans in their default positions at 12V my computer is idling around 30C and with prime95 gets to mid to high 50's. with intel burn test its mid to high 60's. room temp is 20C and everything is at stock speeds. temps seem higher than they should are they not? HWMoniter shows a few degrees warmer than real temp on average but at idle both show the temps constantly changing every second between 26C to 30C by a degree or two. is this normal?

do you have your TY-140 hooked up to the fan controller? what speeds does the fan run at when set to 5v or 7v. i was thinking of getting a second one for a case fan but wasnt sure if the pwm would get in the way.



noiseblocker isnt available in my area. i was considering them before but importing wasnt worth the cost.

Those temperatures are perfectly fine, really. Would confer no advantage to get them lower. Lowering the noise while keeping similar tempeatures would be a worthy goal for sure. Since idle temperatures by themselves don't really need to be so low, I only care for load situation temps.


I have it connected to the motherboards CPU header, so that in any case where the CPU would run extra hot it could raise the rear exhaust for the good of the whole system. The CPU header might be the best at lowering PWM fans a bit more when not needed to run fast too. Being designed for PWM and fairly heavy the fan might not start a 5V either I thought, so I haven't tried it differently. I've verified that the actual CPU fan is doing a good enough job through gaming or Prime95 with the hottest reading core staying below 70C.

Many of the newer Asus motherboards, including the V Gene, have two PWM controlled CPU headers. This makes it easy to setup a CPU plus exhaust PWM fan chain. Asus provide Fan Xpert as a free download, the most useful version of which is Fan Xpert 2 and again the V Gene supports it. So, it might be worth considering controlling the case airflow with PWM fans and just using the R4 case fans to provide sufficient supporting airflow to give a quieter idle and mitigate temperatures under load. For example the existing 140mm exhaust fan could be moved to the top rear exhaust position, and both it and the intake fan could be set to 5V/7V using the case fan controller. As the CPU cooler is the Macho with the Thermalright TY-140 fan a PWM chain could be created by justing buying another TY-140 and plugging it into the CPU_OPT header on the motherboard. The second TY-140 could be put into the rear exhaust position. The CPU/exhaust PWM chain would give lower airflow and noise under idle or low load conditions, but under gaming load the TY-140s would ramp up to create sufficient extra airflow to deal with the extra heat generated by the processor and graphics card. The fans on the PWM chain can be controlled by the Asus BIOS controls, and Fan Xpert 2 is there to offer additional flexibility including user-definable fan profiles.

Well, there's your problem right there.

Seriously, though, there's no reason to run fans at fixed speeds. Most motherboards support fan-control software like Speedfan or EZ-Fan, and fan controllers are cheap if you have one that doesn't. If you want to reduce the whoosh, just lower fan speeds.
This depends on a myriad of factors, including personal preference. I prefer to have positive-pressure (ie, more intake than exhaust) and no top fans (they produce more subjective noise). I'd recommend a single exhaust blowing in the same direction as your CPU cooler.

EDIT: alright i'm going to do what mkk did. picking up another ty-140 for the rear and use pwm. both fractal fans to the front of the case at 5v and im going to try a corsair 140mm fan for the top since i can get one for cheap. if the corsair can start at 5v i'll attach it to the built in fan controller.

ty-140's are hard to find canada at normal pricing. i kinda wish i picked up 2 of them when they were $4.



thats the thing my temps seem higher than other people running the same-ish hardware overclocked with slower fan speeds. thats why i have the fans on 12v for now.

i also want to know if it's normal for the temps to be constantly jumping up and down by a 3-4 degrees when idle.

Sorry if this is off topic (and an old thread) but I noticed you have an asus gtx670 on the v gene with the hr-02, exactly what I was planning but I was unsure on the distance between the Hr02 and the gpu. Does your card have the backplate and does this touch the cooler?

yes my card has a backplate and it does not touch the cooler. theres 3-5 mm of space left.

if you use the thermalright fan with the hr-02 make sure you have it in the correct position since it's 152x140mm. the fan will hit the graphics card if not rotated correctly.

Thanks, v helpful (although I'm getting the formula now :P)