Intake or Outtake?

[Lucious_DeMorte]

So i've finally got me a H100i, the question i have is when mounting, should i have the fans drawing air from outside and blowing into the case, or drawing the air from inside the case and exhausting it out the top.

 

Logic to me dictates that if heat rises, then it should draw the air out the case and up and away, but if that is true then surely some of the cooling is lost as the temperature of the air through the radiator is warmer than the ambient air outsi....... Oh no i think i've gone cross eyed......

 

Corsair themselves recommend the fans should draw the air through the radiator as an intake but i'm not so sure.

 

 

[helping]

So i've finally got me a H100i, the question i have is when mounting, should i have the fans drawing air from outside and blowing into the case, or drawing the air from inside the case and exhausting it out the top.

 

Logic to me dictates that if heat rises, then it should draw the air out the case and up and away, but if that is true then surely some of the cooling is lost as the temperature of the air through the radiator is warmer than the ambient air outsi....... Oh no i think i've gone cross eyed......

 

Corsair themselves recommend the fans should draw the air through the radiator as an intake but i'm not so sure.

 

The differences are not that great. Use it as exhaust unless you need to maintain pressure or have a sealed top for the sake of noise. 

 

Running it as intake will cause the innards to run slightly warmer under load compared to the CPU running a degree or two warmer with them as exhaust. By priority GPU temp > CPU temp, prefer exhaust.