Fan Setup in 760T case. Noob needing Advice.

Hello All,

First time posting on this forum. If you check my profile you'll see my PC specs are all blank... Because I've never built a PC before. I've spent the last several - like 6 - months researching specs and building different setups on PC Part Picker because while I'm a ways off from actually doing this I really want to build my own gaming/GPU rendering computer one day and drop some cash into it to personalize it to my passions and needs. I've been doing this primarily to get a computer spec'd through work but I want to build my own one day.

I am in love with the 760T white case and that's driven a lot of my choices for components. I'm a designer by trade so I want to keep this thing really clean and cool - hence I've been looking at the ML LED fans. I want to use Blue for Intake and Red for Exhaust and I was hoping to put the Red on the Front with a CPU cooler (probably 115i because of the appearance) with Blue fans on the top and back of the case (Corsair gpu and cooler). My initial question is whether or not putting the exhaust on the front is normal? Pretty much everyone that's built with the 760T that I've referenced keeps the intake in the front with the 140mm fans. I don't care about noise so I was gonna go with 140's all around.

I'm a super noob when it comes to placement for optimal performance. I'm also looking at the Corsair/MSI 1080ti with it's own cooler (swap to blue led fans). That way I could put both "Blue" radiators where they're visible and then have the red glowing in the front. While I like RGB I think they get obnoxious really fast and they automatically denote gaming rigs. I want this thing to be multipurpose and the appearance should reflect that. Almost like a "sleeper" car.

Lot of info on the first run but I kinda vomited sentences there at the end :P

Any advice you guys give would be super helpful in helping me decide. And maybe one day I can post pictures of the finished build.

Thanks,

T.

My first thought would be to get the H110i rather than the H115i, as it is considered by many to be a better cooler and is still 280mm. Using 140 mm fans wherever possible will actually keep your rig quieter, as they move the same amount af air at lower speed.

When I first saw that you were going to use red and blue fans, I thought "that's a great idea, blue fans on the front for the cool air being pulled in and red on the top for warm air being exhausted", oh well.

I have 2 of the 140mm ML fans (not led) on my cooler and I think that they are great.

Anyway, good luck with your first build, take your time, check any manuals that you have (especially the motherboard one) and remember "Google is your friend"

Theoretically, a "reverse flow" set-up can work, but it is very case and hardware specific. What works in one may not for another. In your situation, I strongly recommend the traditional front intake/top+rear exhaust because of the cooling arrangements. The best part about liquid cooling the GPU and CPU is you just eliminated the overwhelming majority of your case heat. To dump it back into the case not only throws away your biggest benefit, but with a Ti + CPU that is a lot of wattage. I am running a similar set up now, with H110 and a liquid cooled Titan on an AIO, top & rear. My case temps are laughable. It goes up 1-2C when under long duration load. Rather than just sounding nice, your case temps will have an effect on both your CPU and GPU temperatures. It you heat the case up by +10C, the liquid inside the radiators will also have a baseline temp of +10C. Furthermore, since you are dumping all the heat straight out, you no longer have a need for massive case air exchange. This means you can run all the fans moderate to low speed with no adverse affects. That may have high value if you need to do longer loads like rendering, etc.

Color scheme sounds nice and I have done that one before too. However, the one glitch is the 760T white will come with white AF140 LED fans in the front and not the red that comes with the black. Obviously, you can still set them up this way, but will need extra fans. There are many to chose from, but I would recommend the ML140 + 120 LED series for your radiators. It's a good fan, with a wide range that can run quiet or high speed if needed. It does well when inverted, with little bearing noise. You can get these in red. For the front 140x2, you have a choice. The traditional would be 2xAF140 LEDs in your blue color. These are effective, fairly quiet and will do the job. For most people, this is what I would recommend. However, if you are just starting your collection of gear and perhaps want a little more flexibility, you could also get another pair of ML140x2 in the blue LED. You don't need to run these at 2000 rpm and a low speed will do just fine. Since they are PWM LED fans, they will not dim as you reduce the speed. This is an advantage over the 3 pin DC AF140 series. Also, getting 2 blue here will give you another color scheme option. You will get a white ML120 with the Ti hybrid set up, plus white AF140's with the case. This would allow you to change it up to white/blue, white/red, or R-W-B combo, should the desire arise. Of course, I tend to do that sort of thing monthly, so I my tendencies drift toward that way of thinking.

Thanks for the great info guys! I've been on PC Part Picker for a long time now researching various builds and I believe I currently have 5 or 6 that I rotate out on with parts and such.

In response to C-attack's post I guess I was more looking for if the case is hardwired to be intake only on the front if reversing the fan's faces would create intake or exhaust. I mean I would've assumed you could put the fans anywhere you want and change those placements to intake or exhaust but I wasn't sure if the case's built in fan controller would override the intake/exhaust preferences of the user. I had already planned to swap out the fans that come with the case and coolers anyway but I hadn't really considered the airflow vs speed side of things so I may go back to the 115i with the big 140's. It may also help with proportional/visual case vs component filling. (...did that make any sense?)

The built in case fan controller will not care if the fans face forward or back, so intake or exhaust is possible. However, they are 3 pin DC fans and the controller is of that type. If you want to use the case controller, you need DC motor based fans. DC or PWM fans can be controlled from your motherboard. These days, most every board can control multiple fan sets and may have advantages for doing so. Some people like a simple 5, 7, 12v knob, but there is no requirement to use it. However, keep this in mind if you are choosing a replacement fan. You may have to decide on the control arrangements beforehand.

The biggest advantage of 280mm cooler is you can let the fans just sit and spin with no real plan. It has enough surface area to be effective with minimal speed and a high speed pair like a ML140 or even the stock fans provide more airflow than you need (past the point of temperature decrease). Don't read too much into the marketing literature for the H110i and H115i. It is a complicated story, but the performance is the same with some small differences between the two.