How many fans do I need?

[joe_ollie909]

I am after getting Arctic P12's.

 

I am thinking of getting 4 for my PC, 3 intake and 1 exhaust. Is this good? Or should I just stick with 2 intake and 1 exhaust to save myself some money.

 

[Blasty Blosty]

If you really need to save the extra cash, 2 intake will do just fine

 

Exhaust is the most important, always have one

[joe_ollie909]

1 minute ago, Blasty Blosty said:

If you really need to save the extra cash, 2 intake will do just fine

 

Exhaust is the most important, always have one

I don't need to save the cash. Will 3 and 1 exhaust be better than 2 and 1?

[Hinjima]

5 minutes ago, joe_ollie909 said:

I am after getting Arctic P12's.

 

I am thinking of getting 4 for my PC, 3 intake and 1 exhaust. Is this good? Or should I just stick with 2 intake and 1 exhaust to save myself some money.

 

If money is tight then 2 intake and 1 exhaust is plenty fine.

I had this in my old PC case with a Ryzen 7700x and overclocked RTX 4080. Was not a problem at all  

The most important thing is to just have airflow!" Adding a 3rd fan probably won't do much.

[Hinjima]

Just now, joe_ollie909 said:

I don't need to save the cash. Will 3 and 1 exhaust be better than 2 and 1?

It will probably not make much difference really.

The only thing is you can run the fans at a bit slower speed for the same amount of airflow, lowering noise.

[joe_ollie909]

1 minute ago, Hinjima said:

It will probably not make much difference really.

The only thing is you can run the fans at a bit slower speed for the same amount of airflow, lowering noise.

Thanks. Does it matter much if I were to get a static pressure fan instead of an airflow one? Even though I don't really have anything blocking my fans.

[Hinjima]

4 minutes ago, joe_ollie909 said:

Thanks. Does it matter much if I were to get a static pressure fan instead of an airflow one? Even though I don't really have anything blocking my fans.

Njah, not significantly.  Static Pressure fans are abit louder but not by much.

Don't overthink or overcomplicate this  

 

[Blasty Blosty]

3 minutes ago, joe_ollie909 said:

Thanks. Does it matter much if I were to get a static pressure fan instead of an airflow one? Even though I don't really have anything blocking my fans.

Possibly, but it will be marginal

 

Some fans, regardless of shape and size, are better than no fans

[joe_ollie909]

Just now, Hinjima said:

Njah, not significantly.  Static Pressure fans are abit louder but not by much.

Don't overthink or overcomplicate this  

cheers !

[joe_ollie909]

Just now, Blasty Blosty said:

Possibly, but it will be marginal

 

Some fans, regardless of shape and size, are better than no fans

thanks !

[Hinjima]

Just now, joe_ollie909 said:

cheers !

One tip is what I always do with any fan is to run it as fast as I can without it being audible.

This has always worked out great to have enough airflow without being bothered by noise.

 

Even my old cheap stock case fans from 2014 was good enough.

Just some airflow is important  

[joe_ollie909]

1 minute ago, Hinjima said:

One tip is what I always do with any fan is to run it as fast as I can without it being audible.

This has always worked out great to have enough airflow without being bothered by noise.

 

Even my old cheap stock case fans from 2014 was good enough.

Just some airflow is important  

i just let the software do the work on silent mode. I got coil whine in my GPU and my GPU fans are pretty loud locked at 1100RPM so a little fan noise wont hurt lol

[leclod]

26 minutes ago, Blasty Blosty said:

Exhaust is the most important, always have one

I disagree, air will move with or without exhaust fan. 

I have 2 P12 as intake and no exhaust, air is definitely moving.

Also an exhaust fan can steal air that would be better used elsewhere.

Edited April 28 by leclod

[BirdieTX]

I've seen a lot of amateur YouTube studies trying to figure out airflow forever now. What I've learned after being in this hobby for almost two decades now, the case matters a lot, but generally speaking you can't go wrong with two or three intakes in the front and one exhaust in the back. The case still matters, but unless you're using a weird case, with weird fan placements, it's probably fine.

[OddOod]

I haven't seen mention of your spec list which matters. If you're trying to cool something with an APU you could probably get away with a single rear exhaust. If you're trying to cool a top flight gaming rig, you'll need a LOT more. 

[Mark Kaine]

On 4/28/2025 at 5:28 PM, OddOod said:

I haven't seen mention of your spec list which matters. If you're trying to cool something with an APU you could probably get away with a single rear exhaust. If you're trying to cool a top flight gaming rig, you'll need a LOT more. 

? Hottest CPU I ever had was a 2200g... (And yes the GPU part was the hot part... Always hovering around 90c during load)