Switching case fan orientation

[Pope Mobile]

Hey guys, i guess this could be useful information....

I was somewhat unsatisfied with my load temps, reaching the mid 50's and sometimes higher with my Pentium 4 Northwood 3.2 GHz cpu. I decided to switch my case fans around. On my particular case, on the stock setup, there is a side exhaust fan (92 mm) in the middle left side case. It's right across from the processor/heatsink. The other fan was on the top, is also 92 mm, and was an input. I switched the side left case fan around and made it an input, observed the temps, and saw i was running 6-7 degrees Celsius cooler. I then switched the top fan to an exhaust, and this was about a 4-5 degree Celsius improvement over the stock setup. For now i've settled on the two input configuration. I have the power supply fan as exhaust, and i observed it's outputting more air now (mostly cool, so i guess i'm ok). The motherboard temperature has dropped as well, so i can only assume the case interior is at acceptable temps. Anyone have a similar experience/comments?

[Gorestink]

Not much experience yet though my first build is gonna be assembled shortly so I'm quite curious. My case has 1x120mm front; 1x80mm side; 1x80 top; and 2x80mm rear. I was expecting to use front and side as input, with top and rear as exhaust. It seems illogical to me that you are finding cooler system temps with top as input, my reasoning being heat rises therefore a top fan would allow more efficient airflow as an exhaust. The side fan will be input as this should take cool air from outside and throw it directly at the CPU/mobo. The front fan (mounted at the bottom) and the rear fans (located around the middle of the back panel) should cause the air to flow through the case, taking the side input air with it.

I can think of two reasons why your temps are better with top as input, 1) something is blocking good circulation of the air, cables perhaps. 2) the top input fan is blowing directly on to the temp sensor. While this may appear an improvement, I wonder if it is doing the CPU and AGP/PCI slots any good.

Are these case temps/ CPU temps?

regards

Gore

[Pope Mobile]

I was surprised that the top as exhaust did not improve temperatures as much as an input,as well. There isn't any major cable blockage, so...

The temps i listed were CPU temps, idle at around 30, load usually 45, gets to 50 at max. Not sure about case temps, but the motherboard runs in the higher 20's to lower 30's.

Ok, checking motherboard monitor, case temps are 28.