Copyrighted PC case fan design from year 2000s

[Kepalajamuran]

Hi, so Gamemax is making PC cases with included big fan behind the CPU backplate which will spin when the VRM reached a certain temp. They call it COC (Cooling and OverClocking). According to a YouTube reviewer, this design is copyrighted by Gamemax.

However, I vaguely remember a similar design on a PC case from mid 2000s. Can you help me confirm what case was it and if that design exist before Gamemax?

attached are images of GameMax Diamond.

[8tg]

Antec Eleven Hundred, had a mount for a motherboard tray fan for rear side cooling. Exact same purpose, motherboard vrm cooling from the back side.

 

wouldve been 2012 

 

[Blasty Blosty]

Would blowing air at the back of the board actually make a difference?

[OddOod]

Can't find anything hunting through Google Patent
https://patents.google.com/?q=(motherboard+socket+rear+fan)&oq=motherboard+socket+rear+fan

 

4 minutes ago, Blasty Blosty said:

Would blowing air at the back of the board actually make a difference?

Yeah probably some. Especially if it has a metal back plate. Not a ton, but those latest gen intels are ~impossible to cool properly

[Blasty Blosty]

2 minutes ago, OddOod said:

Can't find anything hunting through Google Patent
https://patents.google.com/?q=(motherboard+socket+rear+fan)&oq=motherboard+socket+rear+fan

 

Yeah probably some. Especially if it has a metal back plate. Not a ton, but those latest gen intels are ~impossible to cool properly

Fair enough, I feel like fans on mounting holes on the opposite panel would make a lot more difference, blowing at the actual VRM's themselves.

[8tg]

6 minutes ago, Blasty Blosty said:

Would blowing air at the back of the board actually make a difference?

A little, it would reduce overall board and socket temps rather than letting heat stagnate there. Not in some super major way, but if your case already has 20 fans, what’s one more?

It would be extremely helpful however in systems where your board either has rear side heatsinks, rear nvme ssds, or rear power delivery components. Though those last 2 things are really only seen in high end itx boards.

 

This evga x299 dark has a rear vrm heatsink, which would benefit from a fan

 

and this z690 itx board has a rear m.2 and rear power delivery, which would heavily benefit from a fan

 

 

[Blasty Blosty]

Just now, 8tg said:

A little, it would reduce overall board and socket temps rather than letting heat stagnate there. Not in some super major way, but if your case already has 20 fans, what’s one more?

It would be extremely helpful however in systems where your board either has rear side heatsinks, rear nvme ssds, or rear power delivery components. Though those last 2 things are really only seen in high end itx boards.

 

This evga x299 dark has a rear vrm heatsink, which would benefit from a fan

 

and this z690 itx board has a rear m.2 and rear power delivery, which would heavily benefit from a fan

 

 

I see how in a case like that it could actually make a good difference. Just modern pc's don't really tend to be made to benefit from this so I wasn't sure lol

[freeagent]

This is perfect for the absolute lowest end of boards. Or if you have an ITX mobo with an NVMe at the back.

 

Other than that.. this thing is rediculous.

 

To be fair I have not seen anyone else go to this extent in the last 20 years.. so maybe.

 

I know my Stacker STC-T01 had an actual blower from CoolerMaster that spans the length of the mobo I think.

 

I didint buy it.. but I did have some kickass fans.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

12 hours ago, 8tg said:

Antec Eleven Hundred, had a mount for a motherboard tray fan for rear side cooling. Exact same purpose, motherboard vrm cooling from the back side.

The Cooler Master 590  had the same fan mount on the right panel.  I believe there were a couple more. Plus, some cases whit left-panel side fans that you could interchange with the right side panel. 

However, none that I remember had a built-in motherboard tray fan. The Zalman Z9 had a ventilated SSD mount on the back, not sure if a fan could be mounted there - but probably wouldn't align with the socket anyway.

 

12 hours ago, Blasty Blosty said:

Would blowing air at the back of the board actually make a difference?

Yes. I mean, not if your socket and VRM temps are under control. But if you do have a VRM temp issue, then yes, blowing air over the VRM area, whether from the front, from the back, or both, will make a difference. Case airflow won't be enough, because there can still be a pocket of hot air stagnating over the VRM area, below the rear exhaust, kind of caged between GPU, CPU cooler/RAM, and topmost motherboard components (including VRM heatsinks themselves). Again, overbuilt motherboards with low power CPUs will show no difference at all. But, for example, practically every AM3+ board with an 8-core chip (and unless you got an FX-9xxx, you should overclock it) would benefit drastically from specific, local VRM airflow. I'm talking 20ºC-like improvements (albeit with front-side cooling in my tests), I'm talking lower CPU temps (and lower socket vs die delta) because, without the fan, the VRMs where getting so hot they were heating the socket. I'm talking about preventing this when overclocking:

 

Spoiler

 

(Notice the CPU was not supported by the board, and even for FX-8xx chips the manual would tell you to use top-blow CPU coolers instead of towers, precisely to provide VRM airflow. Same problem with AIOs -no Liquid Freezer II back then).

 

Spoiler

This was a -20ºC "mod" allowing an unsupported board to run an FX-9370 just fine:

 

This one, on a stronger, better cooled VRM set, had a much more modest impact:

 

It still helped a bit due to the HAF XB having a heat trap between the back of the socket and the PSU.

 

Bottom line: it doesn't make a difference as long as there isn't a difference to be made.

[Blasty Blosty]

3 hours ago, SpaceGhostC2C said:

Yes. I mean, not if your socket and VRM temps are under control. But if you do have a VRM temp issue, then yes, blowing air over the VRM area, whether from the front, from the back, or both, will make a difference. Case airflow won't be enough, because there can still be a pocket of hot air stagnating over the VRM area, below the rear exhaust, kind of caged between GPU, CPU cooler/RAM, and topmost motherboard components (including VRM heatsinks themselves). Again, overbuilt motherboards with low power CPUs will show no difference at all. But, for example, practically every AM3+ board with an 8-core chip (and unless you got an FX-9xxx, you should overclock it) would benefit drastically from specific, local VRM airflow. I'm talking 20ºC-like improvements (albeit with front-side cooling in my tests), I'm talking lower CPU temps (and lower socket vs die delta) because, without the fan, the VRMs where getting so hot they were heating the socket. I'm talking about preventing this when overclocking:

Interesting, so it's kinda been phased out with better cooling on the VRM's?

[tkitch]

On 4/23/2024 at 10:46 AM, Blasty Blosty said:

Would blowing air at the back of the board actually make a difference?

yes.

Not for the CPU, but VRMs can get REALLY hot, and a lot of their heat sinks into the motherboard.  So cooling the back could make a noticable difference in temps there. 

[Blasty Blosty]

42 minutes ago, tkitch said:

yes.

Not for the CPU, but VRMs can get REALLY hot, and a lot of their heat sinks into the motherboard.  So cooling the back could make a noticable difference in temps there. 

Yeah that makes sense

[thrasher_565]

cooler master had a case like that a lot of case had it but did it really work or help

same with mb armor they clamed better air flow but it was fake and had to add fans to make it like a mb with out  armor...

Edited April 26 by thrasher_565