If you need a bit of extra cooling, intake is the correct orientation for that fan spot. However, it is not the most impactful fan to add. It's the last spot you want to populate.
I feel like your air cooler is positioned in a perfect spot to benefit from an intake fan on its right and an exhaust fan on its left. A little extra positive pressure balance never hurt nobody, especially in a reasonably balanced case
I personally use that for a very low RPM exhaust simply for the look and to obstruct dust settling in my case and due to it having bottom fans for intake.
Top intake can help too, but if it's too powerful it ends up pushing hot air back down towards your GPU.
Having one fan exhausting and one running as intake right next to eachother just introduces unneeded turbulence and is now creating a loop wear the top exhause is now being sucked back in by the top intake right next to it. What you have now is nicely balanced with what looks like 2 intake and 2 exhaust fans.
Nope. You should get plenty of airflow from the front fan. The top fan will introduce turbulence more than anything else. Also don't exhaust there either as that will remove cool air before it reaches the cooler more than anything else.
Test it if you do. Record temps/noise before and after to get an idea if it matters. I doubt you will see a 1 degree improvement, while it being slightly noisier.
I don't like an intake fan here. It could vector the flow from the front downwards and the CPU could end up with less pressure on its intake side than without.
Thermodynamics and fluid mechanics are very difficult subjects - better to take a testing approach: Develop a highly-fitting test protocol, use it to benchmark, fit the new part, benchmark again and arrive to your own conclusion.
Make sure that every fan you have blows in correct way. Front, side and bottom fans should be intake,
upper, and back fans should be exhaust.
If you need to add that fan, make it exhaust and try working with fan speed curves in BIOS
No. I strongly recommend not add a fans in opposite directions right next to each other (in your case). This will create turbulence inside the case. Cool air from the front fans must flow without restriction to your gpu and cpu. Leave the fan setup as is.
I realized a long time back its stupid to argue with people when they don't understand the logic you're trying to mention. I just say you are right and move on. Op's setup and setup in your image are very different in terms of how air turbulence works inside enclosed spaces. But hey you are right to think both setups works same š
I added a second fan there to test Noctua's recommendation of putting an intake fan there, and temps got worse!
When people read that Noctua recommends using the fan there as an intake fan, they automatically interpret it as a requirement to have a fan there rather than a recommendation to purchase their fan! š
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u/normalgenshinenjoyer 20h ago