Hey all, want your opinion on a case and cooling I bought.

[fdisk2003]

This one (aspire x-dreamer 1) was on sale at newegg.com for 50 bucks and included free shipping. It is a premodded solution w/case window, blowhole, and a temperature probe. They had the X-dreamer 2 with more bugs and whistles (lol) like LED lights etc but it was $20 more when you count in shipping. I really liked the x-dreamer because it was a premodded solution and looked pretty slick in the pics. Not to mention the temperature probe. It will be nice to tell the temps at a glance at the box instead of loading up speedfan or checking in the BIOS. Also nice for independant verification purposes since the temp is currently "calculated" by the system and is not an actual temp.
http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproduct.asp?description=11-144-001&DEPA=1
Review: http://www.modthebox.com/review162_1.shtml

Then I bought a Vantec Aeroflow for CPU cooler. I was gonna go with the zalman. But I read this article that compared 42 air coolers both on the die and the motherboard. The SP-94 outperformed all of course, but suprisingly there were several coolers that were all in the same performance cooling range as the Zalman! The Vantec is cheaper ($23 vs $34), and the Vantech fan is replaceable (unlike the Zalman). I asked on the Zalman boards and they did say they were coming out with a Kit so you can replace the fan..because it's an incredible waste to pay extra for a 100% copper heat sink only to toss it because a $5 fan died.

Finally because my new aspire x-dreamer has so many places to put fans I just went nuts and bought 7 fans over at xoxide.com. I found some neon ones on sale for 1.99.
http://www.xoxide.com/triledpu80fa.html

What do you guys think? Everything in its entirety cost me about $113 shipped. I should be getting everything pretty soon here. Can't wait to put my system in this and show it off.

Just wondering what you all think, decent stuff or what? It's my first P4. I would have loved to have modded it myself but I don't have the tools nor the expertise, so I wouldn't have gotten as good of results and to buy tools it would have been very expensive. Maybe after I get this system together I'll mod some older systems I have myself.

Edit: Oh yeah can you forsee any problems with the fans? They said they had passthrough 4-pin connectors..I've never hooked that many fans up before. I have a Kigwin 450W PSU.

 

[FPSguy]

Case: Nice. I have always liked the X-Dreamers. Great deal for $50 shipped.

Heatsink/Fan: A decent choice. Rated well for it's cooling ability. Equally good as the Zalman, and cheaper. Not as quiet though.

Power Supply: Reputed to be loud. Depending on how much stuff you have in your system, you might be pushing it with only 18A on the 12V rail.

Fans: Depending on how many drives you install, the power supply may not have enough connectors. If so you will need some Y splitters. It could get messy inside the case. 7 fans plus 3 or 4 on the power supply is a lot of fans. This could be a loud computer.

Overall: Sounds like a nice system. I would check the amps on the components and be sure the power supply can handle it all, though.

 

[fdisk2003]

alright got it. it has a beautiful black finish but..

1. frame and paneling were bent.
2. not enough room for my psu because of where the blowhole is placed. their psu is 5.5" long and my kingman is 6.125" long. so im kinda stuck on this, i have to find a high power but very compact psu now. for a case thats supposed to have a lot of features they sure blew it here with the blowhole placement. also im probably screwed now and wont be able to run as many fans until i can find a psu that fits the bill.
3. no manual.
4. no online help! had to look at x-dreamer reviews to get some ideas.
5. redundant fastners on front faceplate made it hard to remove the faceplate. .
6. frame is cheapo, bends easily. psu is cheapo also, but im glad it came with it. because if it didnt, my kingman wouldn't have fit and i couldnt use the case for a week.

 

[FPSguy]

Bummer about the bent frame and paneling. I'd return it.

The PSU really is close to the fan, isn't it?

Why not just put a grille on the top blowhole and not use a fan there? Then you could use your better power supply and still install all fans but one.

 

[fdisk2003]

well it did come with a grill (alien head logo, black - looks cool)..but isn't the blowhole important because heat rises? or is that normally for looks? I'm not OCing yet, but I would like to once things stabilize. if a blowhole is critical I'd rather leave it..but if it's not..hmm.

on a side note, finally something positive happened. my load temp while gaming went from 45c to an AMAZING 39c after putting this new case with better airflow/blowhole/window fan, and switching to the vantech. Yeah!!

the side window fan came pointing inward on the case but I switched it to suck air out and away from the vidcard/northbridge/cpu area.

 

[FPSguy]

It's not at all necessary to run 7 fans, and a top fan is not necessary either (I am not using a fan on my top blowhole). Believe me, you won't miss the top fan. Your power supply is pulling up hot air and pumping it out the back. It doesn't need any help unless you are doing some mad overclocking.

Also, the side fan was blowing air in for a reason. General rule: front and side blow in, top and back blow out. The side fan blows cool air toward the processor. If you switch the direction, it competes with the processor heatsink fan which is trying to blow cool air toward the processor. Also, a side fan that blows out alters the airflow from the front fan and sucks out cool air that the front fan brought in. I'd switch the side fan back to the original direction.

Another thing: You have all the right parts to be overclocking. You should hit 3GHz easy, and probably a good bit higher than that. I see no reason not to start right away. Remember to fix your AGP and PCI buses, and run your RAM on a 5:4 ratio. Do that and I bet you will hit 3GHz on your first try. If not, a tad more voltage to your 2.4C should get you there.

 

[0roo0roo]

just make sure air in and air out are pretty balanced. get a fan speed controllre if you have a boatload of fans, that way you can run them all at low rpms and have a quiet case with quite reasonable airflow, thats what i do. it gives you the option of running them fast when your on a disc burning spree/gaming when its hot summer etc.


oy, looked at the picutre, its a turbolink psu. i have one in my other case. its loud, i had to wire its fans to my speed controller so i could slow it a bit. more fans = more ability to run at low rpm. blowhole is a good place for exhaust fan obviously, while you can get away with not having one if you have other fans running 100%, its a nice spot to put another fan and have the option of running em all slow or fast.

 

[rseiler]

What article has the 42 coolers comparison?

 

[SWScorch]

just so you know, if that case is the one I think it is, I have two scars on my left hand from the damn drive bay covers. There are so many sharp edges in there it's not funny. I nearly sliced my thumb to the bone trying to install a CD drive.