Negative Air Pressure - More Dust?

[jiyeon]

Hi, so recently I've been running my PC with the two SP120 fans disabled (as in, the fan splitter no plugged in so neither fans spin) and so my PC has basically only had the one cooler intake and then two exhausts, both of which are the same SP120 fan model.

I've illustrated my situation below, with the blue arrows meaning activity, and the two grey ones meaning the fans are currently off.

 

 

I've heard that negative pressure causes more dust but I've not really seen this happen, I was Googling it earlier this week and found this from Anandtech forums:

Quote

<< If you have an equal amount of air going in as coming out, won't you still have all that dust blown into the case? >>

No, typically if people are concerned about dust and go for positive air pressure they will have filters on the incoming air. Filtered incoming air and positive/neutral air pressure equals much cleaner case interiors.

Negative air pressure will mean that you are pulling in unfiltered air through every crack and crevice in the system, including through components like floppy drives.

 

I feel as if I notice more dust coming in if I use my front intakes because even then, the front filter gets clogged a few days after cleaning it.

[Cyracus]

do you even watch the channel bro? https://youtu.be/dLX54ounENY

[aisle9]

Negative vs. positive pressure is overrated IMO. You're going to have to clean your case out every 4-6 months anyway, so I just go with a strong exhaust to get that hot air out of the case, regardless of whether that leaves me with positive or negative pressure.

[Fasauceome]

2 minutes ago, seoz said:

Negative air pressure will mean that you are pulling in unfiltered air through every crack and crevice in the system, including through components like floppy drives.

This would only be true if you have really good airflow through your various cracks and crevices, for the most part negative pressure will be forcing air through standard airflow channels so your dust filters will still work. Not to mention, people get too concerned with whether or not they have positive pressure but forget about airflow in general, and this leads to many problems. I had fixed a noise problem in someone's PC by flipping their top radiator to exhaust because it was creating so much turbulence inside the case with 2 intakes on top, 2 intakes in the front, and GPU fans, all pointing to the same place. In my opinion, it is always best to get more balanced airflow as opposed to chasing an air pressure type.

[jiyeon]

2 minutes ago, Cyracus said:

do you even watch the channel bro? https://youtu.be/dLX54ounENY

I've watched that before. Many times. I've even been recommended that video before here on the forums, and I'll say it once again.

 

My room is dustier than the studio there. The amount of dust I have in a few days is disgusting.

 

[jiyeon]

4 minutes ago, fasauceome said:

This would only be true if you have really good airflow through your various cracks and crevices, for the most part negative pressure will be forcing air through standard airflow channels so your dust filters will still work. Not to mention, people get too concerned with whether or not they have positive pressure but forget about airflow in general, and this leads to many problems. I had fixed a noise problem in someone's PC by flipping their top radiator to exhaust because it was creating so much turbulence inside the case with 2 intakes on top, 2 intakes in the front, and GPU fans, all pointing to the same place. In my opinion, it is always best to get more balanced airflow as opposed to chasing an air pressure type.

Yeah, I get that, I actually do have balanced airflow already with 3 intakes including my cooler and then 2 exhausts, this is excluding my graphics card shroud.

 

The thing is, even with intakes, I don't even notice any higher temperatures so really what I'm left with is that intakes for the NZXT S340 really don't matter and what kind of dust I can expect if I run only exhausts.

[aisle9]

5 minutes ago, seoz said:

I've watched that before. Many times. I've even been recommended that video before here on the forums, and I'll say it once again.

 

My room is dustier than the studio there. The amount of dust I have in a few days is disgusting.

 

 

A vacuum cleaner might not be a bad investment.

[jiyeon]

1 minute ago, aisle9 said:

A vacuum cleaner might not be a bad investment.

You don't wanna know how much times I hoover my room a week, in fact I just did a second ago.

[Fasauceome]

4 minutes ago, aisle9 said:

A vacuum cleaner might not be a bad investment.

just not for use on the PC itself.

[SolarNova]

it does matter but more so in extreme situations.

 

For example 7 exhaust 0 intake.

 

I run

Push/Pull front exhaust (4)

Push top exhaust (2)

Push rear exhaust (1)

 

Reason being is that they are all radiators, i have had them in vairous configurations but the end result is any intake via my rads causes internal case temps to rise and a lowering of cooling perofrmance. So i chose to deal with the dust rather than loose cooling performance.

 

 

I would never recommend som1 do what i have done simply due to the extreme nature of having everything exhaust, dust does build up quicker than usual, but i would advise people to almost always have rads as exhaust to ensure warmed air isnt pumped into the case.

[Cyracus]

30 minutes ago, seoz said:

You don't wanna know how much times I hoover my room a week, in fact I just did a second ago.

get a roomba lol

[aisle9]

1 hour ago, fasauceome said:

just not for use on the PC itself.

Agree to disagree. I find that a vacuum cleaner is a great way to get a warranty replacement for an underperforming GPU.

[filippalfi]

3 hours ago, seoz said:

I've watched that before. Many times. I've even been recommended that video before here on the forums, and I'll say it once again.

 

My room is dustier than the studio there. The amount of dust I have in a few days is disgusting.

 

Same here. Few days and it looks like that, vacuuming every second day. 

[jiyeon]

1 hour ago, filippalfi said:

Same here. Few days and it looks like that, vacuuming every second day. 

Luckily like I mentioned in OP, turning off my intake fans entirely solved this dust buildup!

[filippalfi]

Just now, seoz said:

Luckily like I mentioned in OP, turning off my intake fans entirely solved this dust buildup!

Yeah, but still, i think i will rather clean them every few days, my rad is mounted in the front, an there is no other place for it. 

[Toxic_Elk]

I don't know if anyone else mentioned this already, but if your room is that dusty (and you can't reduce it) then I heavily recommend air purifiers. They will help take the strain off your pc by doing some of the work. I try to position mine on a nearby desk so that it's off the floor and more likely to catch dust in the air it's cycling. 

 

I would also like to mention that you will still need to do regular maintenance. I have a dog that has to be in my room a majority of the day and I can relate. I hope this helps. 

[LogicalDrm]

20 hours ago, Toxic_Elk said:

I don't know if anyone else mentioned this already, but if your room is that dusty (and you can't reduce it) then I heavily recommend air purifiers. They will help take the strain off your pc by doing some of the work. I try to position mine on a nearby desk so that it's off the floor and more likely to catch dust in the air it's cycling. 

 

I would also like to mention that you will still need to do regular maintenance. I have a dog that has to be in my room a majority of the day and I can relate. I hope this helps. 

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