Questions about the Obsidian and cooling.

[Meng-Na]

First time poster on this site, I've been reading here for a couple of days now though.

I'm planning on building a new rig at the end of the year, and have been doing heavy research for the last 2 years, originally I was planning on using a different case but fell in love with the Obsidian as soon as I saw it. I just hope that by the end of the year it will be available for purchase here, as ATM there's not one retailer carrying it, And I doubt I could afford to ship this behemoth from abroad.

I have a couple of question about water cooling and cooling in general, I'll ask what I remember now and add more later if something else comes to me.

Some general info up front: The rig is going to be based on a Core i-7 system (gulftown if released by then), ASUS or Gigabyte motherboard, Crossfire 5870 or what other high end GPU AMD releases by then, SSD boot drive and a Raid 5 storage array.

These are the most important stuff, and I'm planning on running a single water cooling loop which will cool the CPU, GPU's and maybe the chipset (haven't decided yet).

So my questions are:

1. I wish to mount a triple radiator on top, with 6 fans on it in a push-pull manner, all inside the case. The radiator I want is 34mm thick, so with 25mm thick fans above and below the rad it will measure about 84mm thick. Will there be enough clearance about the MB tray for it to fit? The top drive bay doesn't matter to me.

2. I'd like to try and go for a positive air pressure inside the case, so besides the bottom mounted 140mm fan I wish to reverse the back 140mm fan to intake, and on the radiator have the 4 fans closest to the front of the case pulling air in and the 2 fans closer to the back expelling air. With all the extra vents I've seen on this case I think this should suffice to create a positive air pressure, but I wanted to ask for peoples opinions on whether they think it'll be fine? More specifically if only 2 120mm fans exhausting air is enough vs. the 2 140mm fans and 4 120mm fans pulling air in? I might in the future add a 140mm radiator on the back for some extra cooling power too.

Sorry for the long read and I'd completely get it if you all go tl:dr on me.

Thanks.

Edit: I'm looking at some photos of the case, and can someone tell me if I'm right in thinking that the spot of the fan in the back can also support a 120mm fan? I hope so, because 120mm rads are a lot easier to find than 140mm ones...

[RAM GUY]

You will have about 100mm between the top of the case and the top of the mounted motherboard so you should be able to run push pull with a triple radiator with no problem. The rear fan mount supports both 120mm and 140mm, so you can use either size. As far as creating positive air pressure within the case, it sounds like you may want to do some real world testing and try a few different configurations of the fans once you get everything set up.

[MJinZ]

First time poster on this site, I've been reading here for a couple of days now though.

I'm planning on building a new rig at the end of the year, and have been doing heavy research for the last 2 years, originally I was planning on using a different case but fell in love with the Obsidian as soon as I saw it. I just hope that by the end of the year it will be available for purchase here, as ATM there's not one retailer carrying it, And I doubt I could afford to ship this behemoth from abroad.

I have a couple of question about water cooling and cooling in general, I'll ask what I remember now and add more later if something else comes to me.

Some general info up front: The rig is going to be based on a Core i-7 system (gulftown if released by then), ASUS or Gigabyte motherboard, Crossfire 5870 or what other high end GPU AMD releases by then, SSD boot drive and a Raid 5 storage array.

These are the most important stuff, and I'm planning on running a single water cooling loop which will cool the CPU, GPU's and maybe the chipset (haven't decided yet).

So my questions are:

1. I wish to mount a triple radiator on top, with 6 fans on it in a push-pull manner, all inside the case. The radiator I want is 34mm thick, so with 25mm thick fans above and below the rad it will measure about 84mm thick. Will there be enough clearance about the MB tray for it to fit? The top drive bay doesn't matter to me.

2. I'd like to try and go for a positive air pressure inside the case, so besides the bottom mounted 140mm fan I wish to reverse the back 140mm fan to intake, and on the radiator have the 4 fans closest to the front of the case pulling air in and the 2 fans closer to the back expelling air. With all the extra vents I've seen on this case I think this should suffice to create a positive air pressure, but I wanted to ask for peoples opinions on whether they think it'll be fine? More specifically if only 2 120mm fans exhausting air is enough vs. the 2 140mm fans and 4 120mm fans pulling air in? I might in the future add a 140mm radiator on the back for some extra cooling power too.

Sorry for the long read and I'd completely get it if you all go tl:dr on me.

Thanks.

Edit: I'm looking at some photos of the case, and can someone tell me if I'm right in thinking that the spot of the fan in the back can also support a 120mm fan? I hope so, because 120mm rads are a lot easier to find than 140mm ones...

 

To preface - that was pretty painful to read, so I may be only addressing the questions that actually pop out at me. Line breaks and hard returns are important.

 

1) Should be. I have a 38mm fan, a 25mm fan, and an H50 in one slot, which is roughly 88mm, and it does not go over the motherboard.

 

2) I have the rear 140mm fan as an intake. Bottom 140mm fan as intake. The top 3 120mm fans as exhaust. There are no other fans in the case for airflow, the other ones cool your HDs.

 

Yes, the rear fan has screw holes for 120mm mount.

[Gewch]

Just from my personal experience - I was unable to get a TFC 360, TFC shrouds, and 3 Scythe S-FLEX 25mm fans to fit internally.

[MJinZ]

Just from my personal experience - I was unable to get a TFC 360, TFC shrouds, and 3 Scythe S-FLEX 25mm fans to fit internally.

 

I think 38mm fans with slim shrouds or no shrouds could be the better solution here.

[Gewch]

I think 38mm fans with slim shrouds or no shrouds could be the better solution here.

 

I agree. Unfortunately I purchased my components while I was waiting on the case to come out. I'm just now getting around to assembly.

[Meng-Na]

You will have about 100mm between the top of the case and the top of the mounted motherboard so you should be able to run push pull with a triple radiator with no problem. The rear fan mount supports both 120mm and 140mm, so you can use either size. As far as creating positive air pressure within the case, it sounds like you may want to do some real world testing and try a few different configurations of the fans once you get everything set up.

 

Thanks for the info!

Now I just hope someone will start making 140mm fan filters! The seem almost impossible to find.

 

To preface - that was pretty painful to read, so I may be only addressing the questions that actually pop out at me. Line breaks and hard returns are import********

 

1) Should be. I have a 38mm fan, a 25mm fan, and an H50 in one slot, which is roughly 88mm, and it does not go over the motherboard.

 

2) I have the rear 140mm fan as an intake. Bottom 140mm fan as intake. The top 3 120mm fans as exhaust. There are no other fans in the case for airflow, the other ones cool your HDs.

 

Yes, the rear fan has screw holes for 120mm mount.

 

Sorry about that :) English isn't my native language and I sometimes get carried away when writing. I'll try to do better :)

On the other hand you did actually get all of my questions so thanks for replying!

The reason I want to set 4 of the top 4 fans for intake is because I assume that just the bottom and back fans won't suffice to create positive air pressure.

BTW, what is a "hard return"? "Line breaks" I get, but the other one has me confounded :)

[Synthohol]

Thanks for the info!

Now I just hope someone will start making 140mm fan filters! The seem almost impossible to find.

scotch brite pads work wonders and they are washable about 200 times.

http://img.epinions.com/images/opti/dc/d0/Scotch-Brite_Heavy_Duty_Scour_Pads-resized200.jpg

[Meng-Na]

scotch brite pads work wonders and they are washable about 200 times.

http://img.epinions.com/images/opti/dc/d0/Scotch-Brite_Heavy_Duty_Scour_Pads-resized200.jpg

 

I never thought of using scotch brite. Thanks for the info!

I have no experience whatsoever with actual fan filters, but I just did a quick test;

I took a scotch brite pad and an 80mm 35 cfm fan I had laying around and tested it outside the case, the fan seems unable to exhaust air through the pad, but it can intake, although it seems to move less then half the air it did without the pad.

I don't know how dense normal fan filters are, but scotch brite seems too dense.

I guess for connecting it you simply screw through the pad right?