New Card

I agree, but why would they waste ?10 on a fan if it isn't needed? If
dust gets into the system and the PSU blows, the customers are going to
buy a new computer system.

My CPU reaches 45 degrees under load, with 3 case fans, 2 in, 1 out.
Without the case fans it reaches 50 degrees idle after a few days. And
dust builds up a lot more with case fans.

You need cool air to circulate in the case, otherwise all the hot air
from the CPU, VGA and memory gets trapped. You're then trying to cool
hot components with hot air.

I went for a cheap option and took the side off so i dont need any case
fans and I can keep an eye on the amount of dust which doesnt build up
as much as when you have some case fans.

Taking the side of a case off helps, but having fans is, I imagine, better still. Surely just having a big opening doesn't mean that the hot air is getting shifted and replaced by cool air? I'd guess this is what a good setup of case fans will do. Obviously better than nothing however, taking the side off my case drops my system temp and CPU temp about 5 degrees, I'm hoping the fans will see a better drop.

Yup, having the side off will allow warm air to escape and cool air to
flow in, but having fans helps even more. Kinda like having a passive
heatsink as opposed to a heatsink with a fan.

People obsess waaay too much with things that have hardly any impact, such as their full load case temperature. Honestly... nothing in your PC won't work at 80 degrees (celsius), and even with high temperatures, the shortening of lifespan that people so readily bang on about, even if it halves a given components lifespan, probably still won't cause the component to die before it is simply obsolete.

Unless you have a BTX case, everything you buy for your PC has to stick to the ATX 1.1 standard. This standard does not include case fans, and so a component that fails because there was no case fan is faulty, as it must have been designed to meet the standard. A Dell PC probably doesn't follow the ATX standard, so any comparisons to a Dell are flawed. If you overclock, you take components out of spec and so will probably need a case fan or two to make up for this.

In summary - is your case temp a bit higher than you want? Forget it. Is your PC crashing all the time? You probably have a problem that isn't related to heat at all, or something trivial like a fan stopping or a heatsink being clogged up with dust is making one particular component overheat.

well said. :smile:

Crono said:
I didn't say they don't work, I said they're not worth the money.

Ahh, but I paid less than half price :wink:

Ahh, but I paid less than half price :wink:

And how would I have known that before you said it ... 3 minutes ago? :razz:

True...

Jeff, we never once mentioned product lifespan, we were talking about temperatures, nothing else.

And Dell, Mesh, even PC World are sticking case fans in their PCs. I
just took the side of my parents mesh PC, which is no-where near top
spec these days and BOO! 2 case fans. Why would they waste money on
case fans if they weren't neccesary?

To prevent anything from ever happening (As in a just in case scenario) and fans do circulate air to keep dust from settling.
It costs them money for you to bitch, it also gives customers a peace of mind (seriously).
I said all of this on like the last page...

If you're not talking about performance then be quiet. No one cares.