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Water Cooled P180 High Case temperature

Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 8:20 pm
by alex7575
If anyone out there could help me out.

Setup

848P-A Deluxe
P4 3.0 (Prescott)
1 gig mem (generic)
X800XL (Arctic Silencer)
1 x Raptor HD (lower cage)
2 x ATA drives (lower cage)
Thermaltake Big Water

So on a hot summer afternoon (~84F, not even that hot). The readings from MBM are an average temps (idle) of:
45C - Case
38C - CPU

Image


I have all fans on low. I've removed the top fan, and I'm using it on my radiator (BigWater's fan was way noisier). I placed my radiator where the fan on the back's supposed to be, and put the back fan on the front, behind where the Harddrive cage is supposed to be. Also removed the HD cage from the main compartment.

Image

Do you guys think that those temperatures are normal?

Many thanks to all and any replies!


P.S.:<whisper> it's so quiet!!!</whisper> :D

Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 9:34 pm
by lenny
The case temp seems rather high. Try another app. for monitoring such as Speedfan or any utility that came with your board. The fact that 12V rail is at 0V suggests that MBM5 may not fully support your board.

I'm surprised no one asked you any questions about your WC setup. There's been a number of people expressing interest in WC with a P180.

Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 9:47 pm
by alex7575
lenny wrote:The case temp seems rather high. Try another app. for monitoring such as Speedfan or any utility that came with your board. The fact that 12V rail is at 0V suggests that MBM5 may not fully support your board.

I'm surprised no one asked you any questions about your WC setup. There's been a number of people expressing interest in WC with a P180.
Wow,

I've been using MBM for a while now and I never noticed that!!! :oops:

Will try Speedfan and post results.

Do you guys think it's better to post thumbnails, so people can click on them and see the image, or is it better to just have the whole pics embeded within the post? Reason being is that I'm one of those lazy folks (look at the cabling job in my P180) and I don't like clicking links to see a picture.

Thanks,

Alex

Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 9:55 pm
by alex7575
Readings from Speedfan and MBM seem to be the same.

Image

Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 10:00 pm
by alex7575
Lenny,

What temperatures do you get from your setup?

Also, I'll be glad to answer any questions about my WC setup.

Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 10:33 pm
by MikeC
I'm a noob about WC, but not about temps -- those look fine to me. I bet your system is perfectly stable too. So where the problem?

Posted: Tue Jul 05, 2005 11:46 pm
by Elixer
The reason your case temps may be so high is it looks like your radiator fan is blowing inward. This means all the heat from your processor is going inside your case. If you reverse this fan you will probably see a reduction in your system temp but an increase in your cpu temp.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 1:50 am
by 2grVe
alex7575,

I would agree with mikeC, run a stress test for a day (Prime95, Benchmarks etc.) and if everything runs ok I would leave it at that (assuming you checked your fan direction).

There is a post in the watercooling section "Watercooling P180", we were discussing how a WC kit is best installed. Would be very grateful if you could find a few minutes to post some of your experiences with making the WC fit and maybe some pictures.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 5:25 am
by Daikhovalin
Make sure your front fan is pulling air in and the rear fan on the radiator is blowing it out. As someone else noted, it looks like your rad fan is pulling air in, in effect, blowing hot air into your case and cancelling out any airflow generated by the front case fan (assuming that you have it blowing in as well). It might help if you were to shroud the rad fan (if you have room to that is). Try cleaning up the area around the northbridge heatsink as well because all those cables could be impeding airflow to it. It's actually fairly normal in my experience for the case temps to go up a little with watercooling because the NB heatsink usually depends on air moved by the CPU heatsink fan to help cool it. I hope this helps.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 6:36 am
by alex7575
MikeC wrote:I'm a noob about WC, but not about temps -- those look fine to me. I bet your system is perfectly stable too. So where the problem?

My system is as stable as it could get. I'm not an OC freak, everything in my system runs stock.

My only concern is that my old ($39.99) case never had the case temperature go beyond 40C. Although it felt like a had a car engine humming next to me.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 6:38 am
by alex7575
Elixer wrote:The reason your case temps may be so high is it looks like your radiator fan is blowing inward. This means all the heat from your processor is going inside your case. If you reverse this fan you will probably see a reduction in your system temp but an increase in your cpu temp.

Wow, how could you tell that? Just by the pic?

The fan IS blowing inward. So now the question is, does it matter at all what the case temperature is, as long as my CPU and GPU temps are normal?

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 7:01 am
by MikeC
alex7575 --

Go ahead and flip that fan! Logic says, why the heck are you blowing the heat back into the case? It makes sens to blow/suck it out. All your temps might drop a bit with that.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 7:30 am
by Tiamat
alex7575 wrote:
Elixer wrote:The reason your case temps may be so high is it looks like your radiator fan is blowing inward. This means all the heat from your processor is going inside your case. If you reverse this fan you will probably see a reduction in your system temp but an increase in your cpu temp.

Wow, how could you tell that? Just by the pic?

The fan IS blowing inward. So now the question is, does it matter at all what the case temperature is, as long as my CPU and GPU temps are normal?
These guys are real sharp. If a little whisper of noise annoys the heck outta them, you can be sure that they will catch every other detail too! :D

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 8:28 am
by alex7575
MikeC wrote:alex7575 --

Go ahead and flip that fan! Logic says, why the heck are you blowing the heat back into the case? It makes sens to blow/suck it out. All your temps might drop a bit with that.
Mike,

I didn't realize you were "the" Mike.

I just want to say that you guys did a heck of a job putting this case together. It's almost like I dreamt it up and you guys made it real.

Now a little update:

Tried with the fan blowing outwards, didn't like the results. Case temp went down a bit but not much, and what I gained in Case temp, I lost in CPU temp, just like Elixer had predicted.

Fan's blowing inwards again, BUT I added the fan I scrapped from my Radiator and put it on TOP (outside) of the case, and.....

Case temp: 35C
CPU: 32C

:shock:

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 8:36 am
by MikeC
Presumably the top fan is blowing out right now? Is there no way to mount it on the inside?

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 8:53 am
by alex7575
MikeC wrote:Presumably the top fan is blowing out right now? Is there no way to mount it on the inside?
Top fan indeed blowing outward. Running CPU Burn-in + RTHDRIBL for 20 mins and case temp went up to 41C, 4C lower than before, when computer was IDLE!!! :D

What's the lowest profile quietest 120mm fan in the market? I think there's only about 15~20mm room on the inside.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 9:04 am
by MikeC
alex7575 wrote:What's the lowest profile quietest 120mm fan in the market? I think there's only about 15~20mm room on the inside.
Ah because of the tubing.... 25mm is the lowest.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 9:10 am
by alex7575
MikeC wrote: Ah because of the tubing.... 25mm is the lowest.
Do you think having the fan on the inside of the case would reduce the noise dramatically?

I need to replace the Thermaltake fan, sounds like a Cesna trying to take off, compared to the rest of the system of course. :D

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 9:13 am
by teknerd
Wow, how could you tell that? Just by the pic?
You can tell because of the mount for the fan hub. Fans almost always blow towards the mount for the fan (the 4 bars that run from the outside rim to the center hub).

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 9:14 am
by Elixer
alex7575 wrote: Wow, how could you tell that? Just by the pic?

The fan IS blowing inward. So now the question is, does it matter at all what the case temperature is, as long as my CPU and GPU temps are normal?
Yeah, I could tell just by looking at the picture, on all computer fans I've ever seen the hub of the fan is on the side which the air comes out of. I would say case temperature isn't important as long as your CPU and GPU temps are fine and your system is 100% stable.

Posted: Wed Jul 06, 2005 1:45 pm
by polonator
I think there are a few things you can do to improve the performance of your W/C loop. I don't personally use a closed W/C loop, but the following are some things I picked up at ocforums.com. Head over to take a look at their stickies.

1) As Daikhovalin said, try putting a shroud on your rad. The extra standoff between the fan, whether it is in a push or pull, should increase performance. You can make a simple one by "gutting" out another fan and using the fan frame as a shroud. Tupperware containers and cardboard stock also make good shroud material.

2) I know it's a new case, but you could also dremel out the back grill entirely to decrease resistance.

3) It looks like you might have a pretty severe bend from your waterblock to your radiator. Less resistance means more flow and that should lead to better temps. Perhaps you can try flipping your radiator such that the barbs are on the side instead?

4) You could mount the radiator externally by "piggy backing" it to the back of the case. Again, you could put a gutted out fan as a standoff between the radiator and case with the fan pulling air out of the case. This might involve a bit of drilling though to get the tubes in and out of the case.