should i use Noctua as case fans?

[Ludwig]

hey guys, just got a new case (Cougar QBX) and the temperatures have been astoundingly bad (94c on GPU R9 390, 86c on CPU i5 6600k).

Reference: Cougar QBX

 

perhaps it's because there's basically little to no airflow in the case right now.

so i'm in the market to get some new fans for my case to keep temperatures down.

might be looking to occupy the case with all Noctua fans, is it a good idea?

 

the case is able to hold (in it's state right now) the following number of fans:

5x 120mm  

1x 90mm

1x 80mm

 

2 of the 120mm fans are going to be replacements for the GPU fans (will take off the original GPU fans and replace them with the Noctua ones).

the other 2 120mm fans are going to be strictly top exhaust fans.

and the last 120mm fan is going to be either a future aio radiator fan or a fan directly above the cpu cooler (right now it's a Cryorig c7).

the 80mm fan is an intake fan at the front and the 90mm is an exhaust at the back.

here are my choices:

1x Noctua A8-PWM

 

1x Generic 90mm Fan (or another A8 if my case allows it or an A9)

 

5x Noctua F12-PWM

 

Also, will be getting a PWM fan controller to be able to control these fans.

What do you guys think about a generic fan controller such as the one below?

Will I be able to control the RPMs via a software such as SpeedFan?

 

 

Please do let me know your thoughts on this config and if I should look into alternative fans which can deliver the same performance AS strictly case fans, thanks!

[Duckster]

Just saying, that case looks super choked of air.

 

As for your question, im not exactly sure, but I would change cases.

[Constantin]

1 hour ago, Duckster said:

Just saying, that case looks super choked of air.

 

As for your question, im not exactly sure, but I would change cases.

Left View optimum ventilation solution. As much as intake as you can. as for the fans, i would go for the Corsair 120 ML PRO

 

[LogicalDrm]

What mobo do you have? SpeedFan isn't supported on most of the modern ones, so you would need use either mobos own software or Argus Monitor (paid).

 

Also, you should connect as many fans directly to mobo as possible. Using hub all fans will follow same fan curve, determinated by fan connected to header 1.

[cluelessgenius]

im bias ill always say go all noctua 

but in this case im not sure its neccessary but hey why not

an aio would cool things down but youre case will always be quite restrictive so you might just need to ramp the fans a bit higher when it gets hot.

the bottom fans im not sure about . they dont seem to help much unless you take off the plastic shroud off of the gpu.

also i dont think the 80 mil and 90 mil are gonna do much maybe focus on the 120s

pwm hubs are fine. although your case already look cramned and im not sure how youll fit it all but lets say you do. the hub will take the sginal of off one fan (the port is usually labeled) and pass that to the mobo. and then just copy the mobos signal too that fan for the others. works great but need seperate power and all fans will ramp up and down together. which i or one am perfectly fine with but if you have like one really annoying fan on there with the rest that can be a problem. 

anyway before you spend like literallly 150 bucks on noctua coolers i would rather get an aio first and see how that goes

 

 

 

22 minutes ago, LogicalDrm said:

What mobo do you have? SpeedFan isn't supported on most of the modern ones, so you would need use either mobos own software or Argus Monitor (paid).

 

Also, you should connect as many fans directly to mobo as possible. Using hub all fans will follow same fan curve, determinated by fan connected to header 1.

 

 

[Duckster]

11 hours ago, Constantin said:

Left View optimum ventilation solution. As much as intake as you can. as for the fans, i would go for the Corsair 120 ML PRO

 

I’m not the person asking the question...

[WoodenMarker]

A powered pwm splitter like what you posted a photo of should work fine. 

Are you only using the stock case fan? Is the fan mount above the cpu cooler open? What motherboard are you using?

Where are you shopping / located? Budget?

[Ludwig]

On 7/18/2019 at 6:37 PM, cluelessgenius said:

im bias ill always say go all noctua 

but in this case im not sure its neccessary but hey why not

an aio would cool things down but youre case will always be quite restrictive so you might just need to ramp the fans a bit higher when it gets hot.

the bottom fans im not sure about . they dont seem to help much unless you take off the plastic shroud off of the gpu.

also i dont think the 80 mil and 90 mil are gonna do much maybe focus on the 120s

pwm hubs are fine. although your case already look cramned and im not sure how youll fit it all but lets say you do. the hub will take the sginal of off one fan (the port is usually labeled) and pass that to the mobo. and then just copy the mobos signal too that fan for the others. works great but need seperate power and all fans will ramp up and down together. which i or one am perfectly fine with but if you have like one really annoying fan on there with the rest that can be a problem. 

anyway before you spend like literallly 150 bucks on noctua coolers i would rather get an aio first and see how that goes

hmmm it seems like i need to do more homework on this. 

btw, so sorry to everyone for the late replies! been preoccupied with other things recently.

 

i got myself a pair of generic 120mm fans for the top of the case and 1x 92mm and 1x80mm Noctua fans for the exaust and intake respectively.

temperatures have improved! ...slightly.

GPU is still at a very toast 90c, but atleast the CPU is now only maxing out at 62c.

 

i've got around to getting myself a 240mm aio for my gpu so i'll be waiting on that in the meantime.

i think aio is definitely the way to go, especially when talking about the gpu.

i got a tip from a couple of mates telling me that it would be a good idea to flip the case upside down so that the gpu has headroom to breathe.

well, it worked! 83c is max now.

still throttling, but atleast now its not that hot and at idle the fans finally turn off.

[Ludwig]

On 7/20/2019 at 5:37 AM, WoodenMarker said:

A powered pwm splitter like what you posted a photo of should work fine. 

Are you only using the stock case fan? Is the fan mount above the cpu cooler open? What motherboard are you using?

Where are you shopping / located? Budget?

got myself the generic fan hub and i'm happy to say that it's working as intended!

well, not really.

i can only really control the fans if its directly connected to the CPU fan hub.

i don't know if that's by design or if its bugged in some way.

 

my motherboard is the Gigabyte Z170N-Gaming 5 ITX illustrated below for those asking:

Reference: Gigabyte Website

 

i tried to finesse the fan hub by plugging it into the CPU header and the CPU fan to the SYSTEM1 header.

well, it works, but then the controls would be reversed.

i think that's fine, pretty ghetto but its alright if i want to get my fans to turn off when i'm just doing normal tasks (currently my PWM fans are stuck at around 1600RPM at all times).

i think i'll just have to figure out the fan graphs and play around with the settings to find a reasonable temperature so that my CPU can maintain the 4.3Ghz overclock AND have the ability to control my fans through software (using GIGABYTE's fan software).

[Ludwig]

sorry, got a little carried away there. 

to answer your questions:

 

On 7/20/2019 at 5:37 AM, WoodenMarker said:

Are you only using the stock case fan? Is the fan mount above the cpu cooler open? What motherboard are you using?

my setup in terms of fans is the following:

 

2x 120mm exaust fans at the top of the case

1x 92mm Noctua NF-B9 for exhaust at the back of the case

 

1x 80mm Noctua NF-A8 for intake at the front of the case

 

 

NOTE: my case right now has been inverted for better GPU cooling. alignment of the fans in terms of physical aspect is the same except for the "top" mounted 120mm exhaust fans which are now considered bottom mounted exhaust fans

On 7/20/2019 at 5:37 AM, WoodenMarker said:

Where are you shopping / located? Budget?

i'm located in Malaysia. no real budget, but obviously the cheaper the better. 

but to be honest, i think i'll stick with Noctua's offerings to maintain cohesiveness.

[richie30]

I have the exact same case.

 

Check out build log black and gold..

 

I have a corsair h100i cooling my 2400g.

The fans im using are 4 nf-a12x15

1 92mm nf-a9x14  and 1 80mm nf-a8

 

All the fans powered of the h100i.

The 4 120s on splitters on 2 of the connectors set on balanced

The others on the other connectors at 40%.

 

Temps running cinebench 20 went upto 60 and sat there. Need swap the paste to my kryo.

 

This is stock bios settings so turbos up at 1.4v

[Ludwig]

12 hours ago, richie30 said:

I have the exact same case.

 

Check out build log black and gold..

 

I have a corsair h100i cooling my 2400g.

The fans im using are 4 nf-a12x15

1 92mm nf-a9x14  and 1 80mm nf-a8

 

All the fans powered of the h100i.

The 4 120s on splitters on 2 of the connectors set on balanced

The others on the other connectors at 40%.

 

Temps running cinebench 20 went upto 60 and sat there. Need swap the paste to my kryo.

 

This is stock bios settings so turbos up at 1.4v

ah nice! sounds very similar to my eventual build.

nice to know that the temperatures are going to be decent.

i've got kryonaut on both my CPU and GPU right now so when my 240mm aio comes in the mail, hopefully it gets the temps in control.

but i would expect it to be around the 60c range at full load anyway. 

[cluelessgenius]

17 hours ago, Ludwig said:

hmmm it seems like i need to do more homework on this. 

btw, so sorry to everyone for the late replies! been preoccupied with other things recently.

 

i got myself a pair of generic 120mm fans for the top of the case and 1x 92mm and 1x80mm Noctua fans for the exaust and intake respectively.

temperatures have improved! ...slightly.

GPU is still at a very toast 90c, but atleast the CPU is now only maxing out at 62c.

 

i've got around to getting myself a 240mm aio for my gpu so i'll be waiting on that in the meantime.

i think aio is definitely the way to go, especially when talking about the gpu.

i got a tip from a couple of mates telling me that it would be a good idea to flip the case upside down so that the gpu has headroom to breathe.

well, it worked! 83c is max now.

still throttling, but atleast now its not that hot and at idle the fans finally turn off.

im not sure how you want to fit a 240 rad in there. i think 120 might be better. also flipping the case might have helped but do you really want it to be flipped all the time. i would be really curious to see what happens to temps if you undo the outer plastic shroud on the gpu and have 2x 120s blowing at it. well that being said. what gpu exactly do you have because i just thought of myself with my crappy blower style cooler if you got a big cooler from one of the big players on there then obviously removing it will do nothing much.

[Ludwig]

5 hours ago, cluelessgenius said:

im not sure how you want to fit a 240 rad in there. i think 120 might be better. also flipping the case might have helped but do you really want it to be flipped all the time. i would be really curious to see what happens to temps if you undo the outer plastic shroud on the gpu and have 2x 120s blowing at it. well that being said. what gpu exactly do you have because i just thought of myself with my crappy blower style cooler if you got a big cooler from one of the big players on there then obviously removing it will do nothing much.

yeah i was thinking about if a 240mm aio instead of a 120mm aio would be overkill for cooling just a GPU, but i decided to pull the trigger anyway.

the GPU aio that i ordered has a bunch of mounting options for both NVIDIA and AMD ranging from older Hawaii AMD cores to the latest RTX series of GPUS.

knowing myself, i'm always in the secondary market for GPUs so i had it in my mind that getting a 240mm aio that is compatible with a wide range of GPUs can also help cool them and extend longevity of my system.

 

the current GPU i have right now is the GIGABYTE Windforce AMD R9 390 illustrated below:

 

Reference: GIGABYTE Website

 

i don't mind at all that the case is inverted, it can stay like this forever if need be (and most likely will be).

the case in general is completely symmetric, especially because i removed the "COUGAR" branding sticker on the front panel.

 

i dunno, i think aio is the way to go in my case (no pun intended) as it'll hopefully reduce temperatures for both my overall PC and also my ambient room temperature.

being able to re-purpose the aio for future GPU endeavours is also something that i'm personally excited for!  

[cluelessgenius]

3 minutes ago, Ludwig said:

yeah i was thinking about if a 240mm aio instead of a 120mm aio would be overkill for cooling just a GPU, but i decided to pull the trigger anyway.

the GPU aio that i ordered has a bunch of mounting options for both NVIDIA and AMD ranging from older Hawaii AMD cores to the latest RTX series of GPUS.

knowing myself, i'm always in the secondary market for GPUs so i had it in my mind that getting a 240mm aio that is compatible with a wide range of GPUs can also help cool them and extend longevity of my system.

 

the current GPU i have right now is the GIGABYTE Windforce AMD R9 390 illustrated below:

 

 

Reference: GIGABYTE Website

 

i don't mind at all that the case is inverted, it can stay like this forever if need be (and most likely will be).

the case in general is completely symmetric, especially because i removed the "COUGAR" branding sticker on the front panel.

 

i dunno, i think aio is the way to go in my case (no pun intended) as it'll hopefully reduce temperatures for both my overall PC and also my ambient room temperature.

being able to re-purpose the aio for future GPU endeavours is also something that i'm personally excited for!  

i meant fitting a 240 might be tough because of the psu. i dont know the case but i have only seen them with 120 rads on the side panel. 

[Ludwig]

10 hours ago, cluelessgenius said:

i meant fitting a 240 might be tough because of the psu. i dont know the case but i have only seen them with 120 rads on the side panel. 

the side panel by specification can hold both 120 and 240 rads on the side panel. 

i'm gonna try to finesse the rad and the tubing in a way where i can fit it on the bottom panel under the GPU.

definitely won't have enough clearance for the fans to be attached to the rad when its on the bottom so i'm gonna try to mount the fans on the outside and the rad on the inside with the case in-between using some very long screws. 

hope it works, but if it doesn't then i'll just mount it on the side.

[WoodenMarker]

On 7/21/2019 at 6:57 AM, Ludwig said:

i can only really control the fans if its directly connected to the CPU fan hub.

i don't know if that's by design or if its bugged in some way.

i tried to finesse the fan hub by plugging it into the CPU header and the CPU fan to the SYSTEM1 header.

well, it works, but then the controls would be reversed.

Sorry for the late reply -- been a bit preoccupied. 

The cpu_fan header is the only one on your motherboard that supports pwm so that's what you should plug the powered splitter into. The sys_fan header only supports voltage control which would work fine with normal splitters. 

On 7/21/2019 at 7:05 AM, Ludwig said:

2x 120mm exaust fans at the top of the case

1x 92mm Noctua NF-B9 for exhaust at the back of the case

1x 80mm Noctua NF-A8 for intake at the front of the case

Are they all 4pin pwm fans? 

On 7/22/2019 at 6:40 AM, Ludwig said:

yeah i was thinking about if a 240mm aio instead of a 120mm aio would be overkill for cooling just a GPU

Yeah, a 120mm would already be plenty. 

Since you've already got the 240mm, you can see how it fits first. It should help gpu cooling 

The 120mm above the psu would probably be more effectively used as an intake instead below the graphics card. 

[Ludwig]

12 hours ago, WoodenMarker said:

Sorry for the late reply -- been a bit preoccupied. 

The cpu_fan header is the only one on your motherboard that supports pwm so that's what you should plug the powered splitter into. The sys_fan header only supports voltage control which would work fine with normal splitters. 

that's very strange because the sys_fan header has 4 pins which would mean they have pwm control function, no?

because they do indeed allow me to control the speed of the fans of my cpu cooler (from 0 to maxRPM) from both the bios and the GIGABYTE fan control software when i do plug it into the sys_fan header.

don't have my computer in front of me right now but the bottom picture is an illustration of what my motherboard looks like with the circle pointing to the fan headers (white for CPU and black for sys_fan)

 

12 hours ago, WoodenMarker said:

Are they all 4pin pwm fans? 

yep, they're all 4pin pwm fans

 

12 hours ago, WoodenMarker said:

Yeah, a 120mm would already be plenty. 

Since you've already got the 240mm, you can see how it fits first. It should help gpu cooling 

The 120mm above the psu would probably be more effectively used as an intake instead below the graphics card. 

yeah got it coming in the mail in a few days.

again, just thinking about longevity across both NVIDIA and AMD compatibilities in terms of mounting options as well as controlling temperatures as TDPs are vastly different across the offerings for not only both platforms but as well as generational differences between the GPUS (e.g. GTX 980ti vs GTX 1080ti vs VEGA56 vs VEGA64, etc).

yeah, still thinking about where to actually mount the rad on the case. i think i have a rough idea on where to mount, but its nice that this case has multiple mounting points for fans, and therefore radiators.

still need to keep in mind of effective airflow though. 

 

[WoodenMarker]

4 hours ago, Ludwig said:

that's very strange because the sys_fan header has 4 pins which would mean they have pwm control function, no?

because they do indeed allow me to control the speed of the fans of my cpu cooler (from 0 to maxRPM) from both the bios and the GIGABYTE fan control software when i do plug it into the sys_fan header.

4pin headers don't necessarily mean that they support pwm. Depending on the board, certain pins may be wired differently or be dummies. 

The sys_fan header supports dc control but not pwm.