Any tips for keeping dust off the front panel?

[YoungBlade]

I really like my Phanteks P300A. It looks great and gives great temps. Or at least, it usually looks great, until there are two dust circles right in front of the intake fans. These form every few days since the system is on 24/7. Obviously, it's better that the front mesh is catching that dust, but ideally, there wouldn't be any dust there at all.

 

Does anyone have any tips for how to keep dust from building up?

[char3327]

Clean your house??

[YoungBlade]

Just now, char3327 said:

Clean your house??

It's only a thin layer on the front of the case, held there by the fans, that's only noticeable because it's black. It's not like there's a huge layer of dust everywhere. The table it's sitting on is also black, but has no noticeable dust on it.

[Helpful Tech Witch]

Just now, char3327 said:

Clean your house??

Geez dude, some people live in houses that acumulate a lot of dust (and cleanign the hoiuse would displace dust, which could then be sucked there making it worse.

Plus if theres  lot of people or pets, theres doign to be a lot of dust, deal with it

No, you cant really do anything but not have a mesh pannel

[char3327]

@YoungBlade If it doesn't ruin the aesthetics you could spray paint the front of the case a different color so the dust is harder to see?

[YoungBlade]

1 minute ago, char3327 said:

@YoungBlade If it doesn't ruin the aesthetics you could spray paint the front of the case a different color so the dust is harder to see?

If I only wanted to hide it, I could just turn on the RGB for the fans and then it's not noticeable. It forms in two perfect circles on the front, which is then masked by the RGB fans.

[GuiltySpark_]

I'm not sure I understand the question. The dust accumulating on your case is from your house, so if the question is how to keep dust down in your home, its regular cleaning and air filtration. Really no other way around it.

[YoungBlade]

8 minutes ago, rickeo said:

I'm not sure I understand the question. The dust accumulating on your case is from your house, so if the question is how to keep dust down in your home, its regular cleaning and air filtration. Really no other way around it.

I've never had a computer with a mesh front panel. My previous computers didn't have this problem. It would take weeks or months for a noticeable amount of dust to appear anywhere on the computer. And as mentioned, I don't have an issue with dust accumulating this rapidly on other surfaces nearby, nor anywhere else on the computer. Not even other places on the front mesh. It's only in two circles directly in front of the intake fans.

 

I figured that having a noticeable amount of dust appearing every few days might be common, but that people have figured out tricks to minimize the issue. I don't see why that's an unusual thing to ask.

 

So do you think, if I got a small air filter and put it near the computer, that it would help?

[GuiltySpark_]

4 minutes ago, YoungBlade said:

I've never had a computer with a mesh front panel. My previous computers didn't have this problem. It would take weeks or months for a noticeable amount of dust to appear anywhere on the computer. And as mentioned, I don't have an issue with dust accumulating this rapidly on other surfaces nearby, nor anywhere else on the computer. Not even other places on the front mesh. It's only in two circles directly in front of the intake fans.

 

I figured that having a noticeable amount of dust appearing every few days might be common, but that people have figured out tricks to minimize the issue. I don't see why that's an unusual thing to ask.

 

So do you think, if I got a small air filter and put it near the computer, that it would help?

You now have a case with a large mesh surface that's catching the dust. Lots of fan area pulling against a large flat perforated surface that's quite high visibility.

 

There isn't some magical recipe that will change this apart from a different case or less dust. 

[IkeaGnome]

1 hour ago, HelpfulTechWizard said:

Geez dude, some people actually live in their houses

FTFY

7 minutes ago, YoungBlade said:

I figured that having a noticeable amount of dust appearing every few days might be common, but that people have figured out tricks to minimize the issue. I don't see why that's an unusual thing to ask.

 

So do you think, if I got a small air filter and put it near the computer, that it would help?

Have you checked the air filter for the house? There's a chance that it's getting plugged up and not working well anymore. Plugged up filter, less circulation, less dust pulled into that filter. 

[YoungBlade]

14 minutes ago, IkeaGnome said:

FTFY

Have you checked the air filter for the house? There's a chance that it's getting plugged up and not working well anymore. Plugged up filter, less circulation, less dust pulled into that filter. 

There's been nothing running for months; I don't have AC at the moment and it's warm enough not to run the furnace yet. I'd imagine the air filter has caught literally nothing since last winter.

 

Do you think the problem might stop once the furnace is running again?

[IkeaGnome]

Just now, YoungBlade said:

There's been nothing running for months; I don't have AC at the moment and it's warm enough not to run the furnace yet. I'd imagine the air filter has caught literally nothing since last winter.

 

Do you think the problem might stop once the furnace is running again?

It might. I don't have AC, but I've got central air. Most of the time, you can set the fan to run for a certain amount of time per hour or hours without heat or AC. I think I've got mine on 15 minutes per hour if there's no heat. That's with a "dumb" furnace too. It won't necessarily fix the dust. It more forces old dust to different places, and then fresh air is a bit more filtered, if that makes sense. 

[Spoose]

The easiest way to reduce dust accumulation would be to reduce the air intake. If your temperatures are good, then reduce the fan speed. Just keep an eye on your GPU/CPU temps, etc. I have a PC (11th gen i5, GTX 1080 Ti, 4 case fans) with a mesh front panel that doesn't accumulate much dust even though I use it all the time for gaming, etc. I keep it above my desk on a flat surface which I think helps with the dust. If pet hair is an issue, maybe try to keep them clean, brushed and trimmed. If you have room/ceiling fans, maybe turn them down/off if they are near you pc.