Visually inspect air flow?

[Row1]

hello - does anyone have suggestions for how to visually inspect air flow?

i am about to build, and want to use as few fans as possible to keep noise level low.

there have been a couple posts recently about strategic placement of fans, and it made me realize that you could add a fan to your system, and make things worse by creating a whirlpool - hot air staying in the computer longer than it should because you have made some turbulence or whirlpool or loop happen, -- or have one fan blowing against a current that otherwise would be moving steadily out of the computer, and so raising case temps by adding a fan.

is there some way to put something smoke-like through the system?

can i get cheap heat-vision glasses somewhere?

i plan to monitor cpu temp, vid card temp, mb temp, and ram temp, figure out what is too hot for comfort, then modify somrething, then wait a while and look at temps again, but it seems like if i could have it be like a wind tunnel test where they have that smoke you can see, that would be cool. but i am sure it would be kind of dangerous or bad to assemble the computer next to a big bonfire, and the ash might mess things up. a misting spray thing could make things rust. etc.

any ideas?

 

[archie123]

its a minefield mate its trial and error , im an avid overclocker and cooling is always a problem but everyone has thier own ideas , do you balance the airflow? do you blow in slower than you exaust out? you'll hear differant views from everyone.

I have 2 120mm fans bringing air in from the front , 1 120mm fan drawing air out from the back (but this fan is a panasonic panaflow and moves alot of air) and i have one side fan , thats coupled with thermalright cooling for my cpu and i use riva tuner to control the fanspeed of my gpu.

i can turn all my case fans on or off so its a quiet system when im not gaming , buy a good quality case too , Antec , that sort of thing

unfortunately your just gonna have to try out a few combinations

 

[Row1]

darn.
good answer, but darn.
well, anyway, i will have a good learning experience.
wouldn't it be cool to just wear some kind of super vision glasses and see the heat moving around?

you have good advice. i have gotten a case by thermaltake. it supports a front fan, plus has mesh over most of front, for airflow. plus two intakes on side panel - one for cpu air channel.

i am gonna play around with restricting air flow from front and from side to improve the stream of air through the computer.

lots of trial and error.

 

[Fragrant Coit]

The only "Visual" way I can think of is smoke - like stick a cigarette or an incense stick at the front of the case and see where it goes.

Obviously the side would have to be off!

 

[mailpup]

Or the side has to have a window. I think if you remove the side panel to be able to see the smoke, you will not get a true airflow picture. The flow will be disrupted by the missing panel and your test/experiment will be of limited use.

 

[technicalfury42]

Even if you could see the airflow, correlating the movement of the air to thermal-readings from your various sensors would be a crapshoot.

If you're really interested in getting temperatures down quietly, buy good copper heatsinks with large fans and secure with Arctic silver.

 

[Samstoned]

fans are cheap
measure air in ,air out Aahh cheap
thermal imaging camera very expensive
I need a cheap FLIR anyone got one

 

[Tedster]

simple - use thermal convection to your advantage. In on the bottom/sides. exhaust on the top and back.