Is a 3mm gap between my bottom intake fans (Noctua A12x25) and GPU (Gigabyte RX 9070 XT) okay?
Posted by Suspicious_Talk_2859@reddit | buildapc | View on Reddit | 7 comments
I’m finalizing the fan layout in my build and I’ve run into a really tight clearance situation. I’m hoping to get some feedback from anyone who has run a similar setup.
As you can see in the attached pictures, I have Noctua NF-A12x25 fans mounted as bottom intakes, blowing air directly up into my Gigabyte RX 9070 XT. Because the Gigabyte card is quite thick, the physical gap remaining between the top of the Noctua fan frames and the bottom of the GPU shroud is exactly 3 mm.
I was wondering whether this is a bad thing in any sense, and if, should I consider getting slimmer version of those fans like Noctua NF-A12x15 to get 1.3 cm clearance. Case is mesh so airflow is not obstructed, I have ASUS AP201 mesh case.
Here are some pictures of the insides as well as the mesh:
Would love to have some feedback from any enthusiasts both positive and negative!
Turbulent_Insect_431@reddit
no that's fine, as you said in the edit you're not getting turbelence (5mm would stop that)
I do MFF builds and you always end up with stuff close, nature of the cases.
Suspicious_Talk_2859@reddit (OP)
Thank you, that's reassuring to hear from someone who does MFF builds since this case is far smaller than my old tower.
Regarding airflow, this is something I was also considering since when I crank up the intake fans, GPU mostly blocks any air that goes up to the cpu, so it ends up having negative case pressure (sucking air through the mesh) at the upper part of the case. I can see dust sticking up to the outside of the case, so was wondering to either try to add a fan at the front like you said, but then there's this cable madness that I can't flip and adjust, or set the back of the case fan as an intake (+buy a magnetic mesh frame), and leave the exhaust at the top.
Here is what I mean, first picture is current set up, second picture is what I imagine would be better solution to my problem: https://imgur.com/a/zqCLJEp
Turbulent_Insect_431@reddit
I like the potential idea, at the end of the day, allow PC to get heat saturated, run a gpu + cpu benchmark, record temp, next day do the other way, record temps with hwinfo64, whatever works best, had it recently on the montech ten all intake was best in the scuffed config I had built for a friend, it can be weird.
pythonic_dude@reddit
Do a proper test with 100% gpu load and fixed gpu fan rpm, with bottom fans, and then with them removed, and see for yourself.
Suspicious_Talk_2859@reddit (OP)
Good point! Although it will be hell to get those fans removed since the GPU will have to get removed, but solid point regarding checking how it performs with/without fans.
It's just sad that the "analysis" by comparing both ways won't give useful insights since the question resides whether swapping to slimmer fans will help with cooling if the gap between the GPU and fans is bigger. I don't mind getting 15mm thickness variant of noctua fans, but then again not sure if it will be better for the GPU.
pythonic_dude@reddit
See, the gap is not about the performance, but about the noise. There are setups with counter-rotating fans, and they are always stacked against each other flush. If you could stretch your case increasing the gap, it wouldn't get your gpu colder, it would only alter the acoustics, and possibly make it hotter (a very tiny bit. Or maybe not. But definitely not colder). So you do the test to see if the fans are doing anything at all in this setup, and if they do, and if the noise doesn't offend you, then all is great. If they don't, you might as well skip on fans below the gpu altogether, you aren't getting a better result out of significantly worse performing ones with bigger gap.
Sajgoniarz@reddit
Remove those fans and check how temps will be. Probably they are only a waste of power.