CM 690 II Advanced - Cooling Options

[src1425]

A slightly different take on an earlier question, regarding optimal cooling for the CM 690 II Advanced. As you can see, it has numerous fan options, and since I'm going to replace my cooler, I may as well add a fan or two while I'm at it.

Stock fans are 140mm intake in the front, a 140mm exhaust at the top, and a 120mm exhaust at the rear.

Option 1: add another 140mm exhaust fan on the top and a 120mm intake fan on the bottom

Option 2: remove the front 140mm fan, add another 140mm exhaust fan on the top and two 120mm intake fans on the bottom (the bottom half of the HDD cage can be removed).

Option 3: add another 140mm exhaust fan at the top and a 120mm intake fan on the top HDD cage


Or, Option 4, something else?

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

 

[BoomerD]

IMO, it's preferable to have more air being pushed INTO the case than being drawn out of the case.
That creates a positive pressure situation, and the excess air leaks OUT of all the various cracks, crevices, seams, etc...You end up with less dust into the case.

If you have more air being drawn OUT of the case than is being pushed in, you end up with a negative pressure air flow and air ends up leaking IN through all the various cracks, crevices, seams, etc...and that can cause unfiltered (dusty) air to get into the case...
For most of us, it probably doesn't matter a lot...unless, like me, you live in a dusty area, then it might.

Do you have the option to add a fan to the side panel/door?

Are you having heat build-up problems?

 

[src1425]

I do have the option of a side fan, but I believe the height of my heatsink would rule that out. Wouldn't a side fan disrupt the airflow from front/bottom to top/rear? Dust isn't too much of a concern for me, as my daughter has pretty severe allergies so we keep an air purifier running 24/7.

My i5 2500K readings are higher than I'd like, and I have 2 GPUs, so I wanted to try to improve airflow, as well as replace the CPU heatsink. Figured I might as well do both while the board is out of the case.

 

[Manticorps]

I have a CM 690, closest to my layout was option 1, no side fans and I added a 120mm to the 5.25" drive bay blowing in. I tried several layouts and that is what worked best for me.

 

[faxon]

i have this case. i filled every fan slot on it with the largest/highest airflow/$/noise level i could get. needed it as well since i run the box DCing with 2 5870s 24/7, and they kept going up over 100c if i didnt lock the fans to 60% and use gentile typhoons on every fan slot i could. Still, with a less insane heat producing build the case works really well if you add a single fan on the bottom slot (cool air into the gpu intake) and on the top as exhaust from the cpu/motherboard area right over the cpu

 

[nyker96]

no doubt, option 1 is the best for heat exhaust.

 

[jjmIII]

I picked option 3.

Keeps the hdds cool, and I feel the bottom fans pull the most dust.

 

[Petey!]

Option 1, and you should still be able to add a fan on the side door in the lower slot. This is what i would do. I know I could when I had my 690 and i had a CM Hyper 212+. It was just the upper fan spot I couldn't put a fan on.

 

[Interitus]

I have a K62 and it's got a similar airflow pattern sans the side door fan option. I don't know what type of hardware you're running, but you may want to check out the top fans as intakes as an option. This made significant changes in overall temps in my case. I'm running an OC'd i7 920 on an EVGA X58 (not classy), and mosfet temp was an issue for me. Flipping the top fans to intakes instead of exhausts netted me a 5C drop on the CPU and a very large drop in mosfet temps.

As Boomer mentioned, dust becomes less of an issue and all other temps stayed the same (HDD's, GPU, etc..). If you're really worried about dust in that situation, you could grab some cheap filters for the top intakes as well.

 

[Makaveli]

I voted for Option 1.

Using a side intake fan instead of a bottom fan in case.

 

[Rhezuss]

I use you Option 1 and my temps dropped 3-4 degrees.
And by temps I mean GPU, CPU, Mobo and overall temps...

Amazing case!