heat isolation

[subdismal]

I had this idea, like some others some of you may have read, spur of the moment.

I was actually thinking about isolating items inside the case that produce the most heat or that could be cooled solely for better performance.

I was thinking of isolating the power supply, however keeping it isolated and cooled and having an exit for all the wires could possibly pose a problem.

Other things would to be able to isolate the video card, memory (?), hard drive(s), and drive bay devices. I could've forgot something, but that's the general theory.

By isolating these devices, I mean encasing them in some sort of lexan or something, and have a single, small fan blowing directly into this case for the device(s).

This could be another stupid idea, and I'm willing to accept that. But, I like to post these stupid ideas here in the hopes that someone could possibly improve on my ideas and give some suggestions or insight.

 

[Cerb]

It's not a stupid idea, but with RAM and HDDs, you're going overkill.

Arctic Cooling VGA Silencer = partial video card isolation. Can't isolate incoming air, but spits hot air out the back.

Then you could duct the CPU out the rear exhaust, leaving the PSU and a front intake for the rest (you need other air flow, the PSU would be doing very minimal heat exhaustion, and the HDDs could remain cool).

 

[0roo0roo]

the g5 sorta uses isolated zones. but its got software controlled fans and stuff.

 

[Cerb]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
the g5 sorta uses isolated zones. but its got software controlled fans and stuff.

...so do OEM PCs. This is nothing new. Like the G5, however, it is usually not done with standard cases or motherboards.

 

[0roo0roo]

no not really. the g5 has 3 isolated heat zones with separate fan setups and temp monitors. the os will spin up the fans in anticipation of heavy activity. i don't know of any oem pc that matches that.

 

[Cerb]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
no not really. the g5 has 3 isolated heat zones with separate fan setups and temp monitors. the os will spin up the fans in anticipation of heavy activity. i don't know of any oem pc that matches that.

Hint: those Macs are designed as workstations, not home computers.

The G5 takes it beyond what any PC variant that I've seen does, but went too far, as well (probably for looks).

 

[fell8]

Small fans don't move much air and can be noisy. You'd be better off putting a 120mm intake fan in the side and run ducts to feed the major heat sources. Leave the p/s open to the case and have it exhaust. Better yet, cut a hole in the side of the p/s and put a 120 on that to exhaust. If an 80mm can be squeezed in front of the drive cage, it is quite sufficent, perhaps simple baffles could be utilized. Try to keep the the intake volume a little greater than the exhaust, with most of it going to the CPU fan, video cooling, chipset, memouy, etc. (in that order). The overall volume of air passing through should prove more than adequite for keeping temperatures down throughout the case.

If you're worried about it looking nice you could use lexan, otherwise you could use cardboard and duct tape.

 

[0roo0roo]

yea he'd probably be better off with using as few 120mm case fans as he can. better then a buncha isolated smaller louder fans mucking it all up...