Cougar MX300 - Cooling Solution

Salman_Nove · August 25, 2014

Hello Everyone,

This is my first post in LinusTechTips and I need your help to decide for a Cooling Solution in my case - Cougar MX300. Many of you may say that the case looks ugly, but I got it for $24 - so I did not give importance to the looks. The case has got a size limitation when it comes to coolers and I was not aware of it when I decided the parts for my build. There are very less build videos and the forums say that the cpu cooler limitation is ~160 mm. So, here I am

What I like to do: I want to OC the processor to about 4.5 to 4.7. So please suggest what sort of cooling solutions I can do with this case.

Budget: I can go upto $150 approx. Anything more, I will have to do a lot of overtime

My Rig is

Processor: AMD FX 8350

MotherBoard: Asus M5A99FX Pro 2.0

Ram: Patriot 8 GB 1600 Class (Single Stick)

PSU: EVGA 750 Bronze B2

GPU: EVGA GTX 770 with ACX

SSD: Kingston now v300 250 GB

HDD: WD Blue 1 TB @ 7200 RPM

Case: Cougar MX300

Cooling fans: 3x Cougar Blue LED fans. 2 at the top as exhaust(+ 1 rear exhaust) and 1 at the side as intake - Negative Pressure Setup.

Currently I am using the stock cooler and it is very noisy and the Asus CPU monitor is showing temp as high as 61 degree celcius on gaming - WatchDogs (Got it free with the Graphic Card). Please let me know which will be a better cooler for me - Air Cooler or AIO liquid cooler. My observations about the case are,

1) Top exhaust can accomodate only 2 fans (120 mm or 140 mm) - not enough space for a 240mm radiator.

2) Case rear exhaust is only having the provision for 120 mm fan.

3) 2 exhaust on the side and 2 at the front.

4) Water cooling tube outlets are found in the rear.

5) There are no bottom exhaust fan provision.

6) Dimensions - 195(W)x450(H)x490(D)

Pics and more details at http://www.cougar-world.com/products/pc_case/mx300.html

Please help me out to decide the cooler.

Thanks in advance,

Salman.

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