question Is it okay to run your system with no case fans?

[Wheezey]

I built this computer a while back and only now just gotten around to using it. The system has no case fans and only a water-cooled CPU and the fans from the GPU. 
I didn't realise there were no fans for a long time, like a year, and was wondering if its likely I have caused damage this way?

[tealflip]

That's not good. Cutting to the point, you should definitely get some fans, whether it be for the radiator, or front fans. The GPU fans can't save the entire system.

[Levent]

Depends on the case to be honest. I ran my computer with no case fans for years, but then again I didn't have side panels on so it made no difference having case fans or not.

[Boyohan]

6 minutes ago, Wheezey said:

I built this computer a while back and only now just gotten around to using it. The system has no case fans and only a water-cooled CPU and the fans from the GPU. 
I didn't realise there were no fans for a long time, like a year, and was wondering if its likely I have caused damage this way?

It isn't necessarily bad but it depends on the temperature of the different components in your PC. 

But fans on the radiator of your CPU cooler is usually a minimum requirement and 1-2 case fans are never a bad idea. 

 

You probably haven't damaged anything as there are safe guards that lowers the clock speeds of your PC if you have to high temps. 

 

[mmk]

You don't have fans on your radiator either?

[Wheezey]

8 minutes ago, Levent said:

Depends on the case to be honest. I ran my computer for no case fans for years, but then again I didn't have side panels on so it made no difference having case fans or not.

 

7 minutes ago, Boyohan said:

It isn't necessarily bad but it depends on the temperature of the different components in your PC. 

But fans on the radiator of you CPU cooler is usually a minimum requirement and 1-2 case fans are never a bad idea. 

 

You probably haven't damaged anything as there are safe guards that lowers the clock speeds of your PC if you have to high temps. 

 

I should have posted my system specs so I'll do it now:

 

RTX 2060

Ryzen 7 3700x 

AORUS X570 Elite

1000 Watt Gold Rated Corsair PSU 

Corsair H100i Hydro CPU Cooler

32 GB 3200Mhz RAM

Phanteks Enthoo Pro 2

 

And the radiator does fans on it, just to be clearer. 

 

There has been some performance impact on the PC that there shouldn't be, my friend has basically the same rig and is able to run Dying Light 2 on high with over 60fps, sometimes close 100fps. Whereas I am sitting around 40fps - 60fps on low settings.

 

Could the heat be impacting me a lot here?

 

[Wheezey]

4 minutes ago, mmk said:

You don't have fans on your radiator either?

Sorry just seen your post

V

1 minute ago, Wheezey said:

 

I should have posted my system specs so I'll do it now:

 

RTX 2060

Ryzen 7 3700x 

AORUS X570 Elite

1000 Watt Gold Rated Corsair PSU 

Corsair H100i Hydro CPU Cooler

32 GB 3200Mhz RAM

Phanteks Enthoo Pro 2

 

And the radiator does fans on it, just to be clearer. 

 

There has been some performance impact on the PC that there shouldn't be, my friend has basically the same rig and is able to run Dying Light 2 on high with over 60fps, sometimes close 100fps. Whereas I am sitting around 40fps - 60fps on low settings.

 

Could the heat be impacting me a lot here?

 

 

[Boyohan]

2 minutes ago, Wheezey said:

 

I should have posted my system specs so I'll do it now:

 

RTX 2060

Ryzen 7 3700x 

AORUS X570 Elite

1000 Watt Gold Rated Corsair PSU 

Corsair H100i Hydro CPU Cooler

32 GB 3200Mhz RAM

Phanteks Enthoo Pro 2

 

And the radiator does fans on it, just to be clearer. 

 

There has been some performance impact on the PC that there shouldn't be, my friend has basically the same rig and is able to run Dying Light 2 on high with over 60fps, sometimes close 100fps. Whereas I am sitting around 40fps - 60fps on low settings.

 

Could the heat be impacting me a lot here?

 

Ok so fans on the radiator is good and should keep the CPU at decent temps. 

But the slow performance could still be heat related but we can't really know that until you check what your temps are during gaming. 

My PC runs with CPU temps at 55-60°C and GPU temps at 60-65°C during gaming but anything below 85°C is fine. 

[Wheezey]

Just now, Boyohan said:

Ok so fans on the radiator is good and should keep the CPU at decent temps. 

But the slow performance could still be heat related but we can't really know that until you check what your temps are during gaming. 

My PC runs with CPU temps at 55-60°C and GPU temps at 60-65°C during gaming but anything below 85°C is fine. 

I have ran Dying Light 2 and had a look at MSI AB to check the temps whilst I'm on that  title since it seems to be the one I'm having issues with.

 

I hover around 62-67°C whilst playing. I just can't for the life of me figure out why I am losing out on so much performance. 

[Boyohan]

1 minute ago, Wheezey said:

I have ran Dying Light 2 and had a look at MSI AB to check the temps whilst I'm on that  title since it seems to be the one I'm having issues with.

 

I hover around 62-67°C whilst playing. I just can't for the life of me figure out why I am losing out on so much performance. 

62-67°C is great so the temps are not the problem.

 

Is everything running at normal clock speeds ?

Have you enabled XMP / DOCP for your RAM ?

What is your CPU/GPU usage % during gaming ?

The 3700X is a great CPU and should be able to run any game at +100fps (as long as the GPU is powerful enough). 

[Wheezey]

16 minutes ago, Boyohan said:

62-67°C is great so the temps are not the problem.

 

Is everything running at normal clock speeds ?

Have you enabled XMP / DOCP for your RAM ?

What is your CPU/GPU usage % during gaming ?

The 3700X is a great CPU and should be able to run any game at +100fps (as long as the GPU is powerful enough). 

Everything is running at normal clock speeds, RAM is running at the speed its meant to and does have XMP enabled.

 

CPU is at about 50-60% utilization running at 4.17Ghz.

GPU is around 14% utilization however between alt-tabbing to type here it darts to about 30% and ten falls down to normal numbers again. Running at 1890Mhz according to MSI AB

RAM is at about 50% utilization. 

[Mattias Edeslatt]

Off-course it's fine to run a system without additional fans, your system is a good example of that.

 

Many people think they need lots of fans, I would say in many cases (and with many cases) they are just making it worse with all those fans or layouts of how you are able to mount those fans and radiators.  Most cases are sold purely for looks and not for being good environments for the components. Just look at how many that is vertically mounts their GPU right up against the side panel and starving it on air/cooling just for the looks. Just look att all the cases that are sold that is blocking off all form av intake of air with fans spinning that hardly gets any airflow. Most cases are hotboxes for the components, but "they look good".

[Mattias Edeslatt]

3 hours ago, Wheezey said:

Everything is running at normal clock speeds, RAM is running at the speed its meant to and does have XMP enabled.

 

CPU is at about 50-60% utilization running at 4.17Ghz.

GPU is around 14% utilization however between alt-tabbing to type here it darts to about 30% and ten falls down to normal numbers again. Running at 1890Mhz according to MSI AB

RAM is at about 50% utilization. 

 

With only 14% utilization of the GPU when gaming there is something wrong. 

[Wheezey]

9 minutes ago, Mattias Edeslatt said:

 

With only 14% utilization of the GPU when gaming there is something wrong. 

Do you have any suggestions as to what the issue could be?

[GeorgeMKane]

I would recommend getting at least 2 or 3 additional fans in there. It looks like your motherboard has only 2 fan headers, so there's a couple of ways you can do this.

1. Add 2 fans, one at the front (intake) and one at the back (exhaust). Kind of minimal airflow increase, but it's better than nothing.
2. Add more than 3 fans, and use a 3 to 1 fan splitter for the front intake fans.
3. Add Corsair RGB fans, and use the commander core XT. Get a good 6 case fans in there.

For option 1: Get 2 of these. Noctua P12 redux-1700 PWM 70.75 CFM 120 mm Fan

 

For option 2: Get 4 of these, and a fan splitter. Noctua P12 redux-1700 PWM 70.75 CFM 120 mm Fan | Cable Matters 2-Pack 3 Way 4 Pin PWM Fan Splitter Cable - 12 Inches

 

For option 3: Get 2 of this set of Corsair case fans (3 140mm fans at the front (intake), and 1 140mm fan at the back (exhaust)), and the Commander Core XT to connect them to the motherboard much easier. Corsair iCUE SP140 RGB ELITE 68.1 CFM 140 mm Fans 2-Pack | CORSAIR iCUE COMMANDER CORE XT, Digital Fan Speed and RGB Lighting Controller

[Wheezey]

42 minutes ago, GeorgeMKane said:

I would recommend getting at least 2 or 3 additional fans in there. It looks like your motherboard has only 2 fan headers, so there's a couple of ways you can do this.

1. Add 2 fans, one at the front (intake) and one at the back (exhaust). Kind of minimal airflow increase, but it's better than nothing.
2. Add more than 3 fans, and use a 3 to 1 fan splitter for the front intake fans.
3. Add Corsair RGB fans, and use the commander core XT. Get a good 6 case fans in there.

For option 1: Get 2 of these. Noctua P12 redux-1700 PWM 70.75 CFM 120 mm Fan

 

For option 2: Get 4 of these, and a fan splitter. Noctua P12 redux-1700 PWM 70.75 CFM 120 mm Fan | Cable Matters 2-Pack 3 Way 4 Pin PWM Fan Splitter Cable - 12 Inches

 

For option 3: Get 2 of this set of Corsair case fans (3 140mm fans at the front (intake), and 1 140mm fan at the back (exhaust)), and the Commander Core XT to connect them to the motherboard much easier. Corsair iCUE SP140 RGB ELITE 68.1 CFM 140 mm Fans 2-Pack | CORSAIR iCUE COMMANDER CORE XT, Digital Fan Speed and RGB Lighting Controller

I think option 2 is pretty good here, I'm definitely gonna go with that and see how I get on. Hopefully that will improve the performance 

[GeorgeMKane]

2 hours ago, Wheezey said:

I think option 2 is pretty good here, I'm definitely gonna go with that and see how I get on. Hopefully that will improve the performance 

Happy to help! You should be able to mount 2 or 3 of those 120mm fans at the front, and connect them to the motherboard's 1st fan header, with the 3 to 1 pwm fan splitter easily. (If getting 4) You can then mount 1 fan at the back of the case (exhaust), and connect that to the second fan header on the motherboard by itself.

 

You have the AIO mounted at the top of the case actually, or at the front? If you have the AIO mounted at the front, make sure the fans are mounted as intake fans (either push or pull configuration). If it's at the front, then you can mount all the case fans as exhaust at the top and back of the case. I would still recommended the same amount of fans as well (3 or 4).

[Moonzy]

If you're not over heating then that's no issue

I specifically built a fanless PC before, for silence

 

Have you tried using ddu?

[Wheezey]

1 hour ago, Moonzy said:

If you're not over heating then that's no issue

I specifically built a fanless PC before, for silence

 

Have you tried using ddu?

I am not entirely sure what ddu is 

[Moonzy]

Just now, Wheezey said:

I am not entirely sure what ddu is 

display driver uninstaller

[Wheezey]

2 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

display driver uninstaller

I have not tried it but I can give it a go, anything I'd need to know?

[Moonzy]

Just now, Wheezey said:

I have not tried it but I can give it a go, anything I'd need to know?

download DDU and latest nvidia driver

 

disconnect from the internet (prevent windows from auto grabbing their driver), run DDU, install nvidia's driver, and see if issue persists

[Wheezey]

4 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

download DDU and latest nvidia driver

 

disconnect from the internet (prevent windows from auto grabbing their driver), run DDU, install nvidia's driver, and see if issue persists

I'll give it a shot now 

[Wheezey]

21 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

download DDU and latest nvidia driver

 

disconnect from the internet (prevent windows from auto grabbing their driver), run DDU, install nvidia's driver, and see if issue persists

So I attempted to boot into safe mode but every time I tried I got a blue screen. Stop code: SYSTEM THREAD EXCEPTION NOT HANDLED

[Moonzy]

9 minutes ago, Wheezey said:

So I attempted to boot into safe mode but every time I tried I got a blue screen. Stop code: SYSTEM THREAD EXCEPTION NOT HANDLED

try disable your ram XMP