Saturday, July 9, 2011

My new tower

Sometimes my desktop computer (the one I use for my business, but also for gaming) was overheating, and would randomly restart without any warning.  I should preface this by saying that I loved my old case, a Lian Li Black anodized aluminum case.  It had nice lines and was very sleek looking.  But the orientation of the power supply was vertical (photos pending) and was directly adjacent from the CPU fan.  A recent video card upgrade was the last straw.  It provided the extra heat + demand for power that pushed everything over the edge.
A quick temp reading with my laser thermometer showed a temp of 59 degree Celsius on the video card (GPU) and nearly the same reading on the power supply and CPU/mainboard.  While this is not too hot (relatively speaking), it contributes to the larger problem of heat being trapped in the case with not enough exhaust to pull out the hot air.
So my challenge was to find a way to increase airflow inside the computer to prevent it from overheating.  Since I already had the front fan bay (80mm-medium) and the top exhaust fan (80mm also) being used, the only unused fan ports were small 20mm fan ports on the rear of the case.  This would not provide much additional cooling, and a fan this small would have to spin very fast (and loud) in order to provide any measurable benefit.
In the end I decided to replace my case.  I have purchased an Antec six hundred case. I will be posting again as I assemble the computer again after I get it.  I bought mine from newegg.com and there was even a sale on it!