Do 80mm to 120mm fan adapters show results?

imported_raulinigo

Diamond Member
Oct 20, 2004
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I was thinking about getting an 80mm to 120mm fan adapter for like $5 on ebay so that I could put a 120mm fan on my cpu heatsink hoping it would be more silent and move more air. I googled it and found a review that these things really dont provide better cooling over an 80mm fan. Even if it kept my temps the same, I would at least have a quieter computer... right?

Anyone have personal experience with this?
 

Kaspian

Golden Member
Aug 30, 2004
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Originally posted by: raulinigo
I was thinking about getting an 80mm to 120mm fan adapter for like $5 on ebay so that I could put a 120mm fan on my cpu heatsink hoping it would be more silent and move more air. I googled it and found a review that these things really dont provide better cooling over an 80mm fan. Even if it kept my temps the same, I would at least have a quieter computer... right?

Anyone have personal experience with this?

If you get a 120mm fan get one rated at 20db or less. Or get a fan controler for it.
 

Kaspian

Golden Member
Aug 30, 2004
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Originally posted by: mindwreck
your gonna suffer pressure problems and thats going to make more noise.


It all depends on the fan. I have 3 120mm fans in my case and the only thing that you can hear is the stock fan on my vga card (which is my next hs/fan to replace).
 

Cerb

Elite Member
Aug 26, 2000
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It's pointless. The adapter will mess up air flow, hurting he fan's performance, and you really don't get much in the way of reduced noise. A bigger fan will push the same amount of air with less noise, but there's more to it when you need it over such a small space.

Axial fans push air out in a cone, that basically leaves a dead spot in the middle. Many heatsinks have taken advantage of this (it's all about the temperature gradient), or had designs that lessened the impact of not cooling the very center (the latter being more common).

The trouble is that the fan is trying to push out, but being forced to go back inward, causing resistance, and increases the static pressure, which is never that low on a HSF, anyway (part of why fans with good static pressure ratings, like Panaflos, do very well on HSFs). I'm not too knowledgable there, so there may be even more to it.

Getting a Japanaflo L, Nexus, Papst, low-speed NMB or Delta, etc., and maybe a [non-PWM] controller, are going to be much better options than a 120mm->80mm adapter.
 

Mrvile

Lifer
Oct 16, 2004
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You probably won't see any results, primarily because your CPU heatsink isn't changing. The bigger the heatsink, the better. If you just strap on a bigger fan it'll get louder, it won't help airflow, and it might hurt the heatsink itself.