PC Case Made Completely of Fans

drgroove writes "I work in a computer store building PCs all day. With every new case there are one or two 8cm case fans included. Most of the systems we build do not need any more cooling than is supplied by the CPU fan as most of our customers generally don't go in for all this 'overclocking malarky.' Looking around the stock room I discovered two large boxes of unused 8cm case fans. Surfing through case mod sites, the most popular mod you see (besides Lexan windows) is some form of whizzy cooling device, be it fan or waterblock. People go to great lengths to keep their PCs cool. Now... putting these two things together..."

Cool!

[Punchinello]

Now that's cool.

Re:Cool!

[bigsteve@dstc]

Yes ... fantastically

Re:Cool!

[DocB]

Unless you get the polarity wrong on those puppies -- then it would really suck.

Re:Cool!

[suso]

And installing it was a breeze.

Re:Cool!

[Gadgetfreak]

I don't know why there are so many fans of bad puns on Slashdot.

Re:Cool!

[MarkRose]

And I don't know why so many moderators blow their points on them.

Re:Cool!

[HardCase]

Nah, the posts just blow.

Re:Cool!

[jerde]

What we need are some new moderators. Now THAT would be a breath of fresh air!

Re:Cool!

[syynnapse]

you all need to chill out.

Re:Cool!

[donscarletti]

I'm not a fan of being mellow.

Re:Cool!

[Shaper_pmp]

Now, now, I think it's important that everyone's able to air their views. No sense in letting it wind (think about it ;-) you up...

Re:Cool!

[shutdown -p now]

What we need is to mod parents down.

Re:Cool!

[qewl]

And sometimes a breath of fresh air is better than tubes of non-boiling/non-freezing metal alloy.

Let's go to Fry's

[Slur]

I used to be a big fan of the case section. Now I'll have to remember to case the fan section.

Re:Cool!

[asliarun]

True, with this barrage of puns, the old moderators should be exhausted by now.

Considering that this is a case-mod, they're also appropriately named mod-raters.

Re:Cool!

[smittyoneeach]

The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits.
Eccl1:6

I just can't figure out if Solomon was talking about slashdot moderators, or duplicate articles...

Re:Cool!

[Infinityis]

Cause it's the cool thing to do, that's why.

Anyone else who thinks otherwise should be pun-ished. Case closed.

Re:Cool!

[suwain_2]

I know. Most of the jokes here blow.

Doesn't anyone have a sense of humor that doesn't suck?

Re:Cool!

[snorklewacker]

I think most of the jokes just whoosh right over you.

Personally...

[loteck]

I think it blows.

Re:Cool!

[Junior J. Junior III]

I was totally blown away by how cool the thing looks!

Re:Cool!

[mesach]

This guy is just a blowhard.

Re:Cool!

[Porkbreath]

Eh. Just another PC fanboy.

Re:Cool!

[vought]

I wonder what will happen when overclockers get wind of this.

Re:Cool!

[Spetiam]

Unless he neglected to make some of them exhaust fans. :)

I mean, he does say that his setup doesn't really cool things down...

Re:Cool!

[secolactico]

Unless he neglected to make some of them exhaust fans. :)

I mean, he does say that his setup doesn't really cool things down...

He also said that air enters in one side and exits the other. Same for top and bottom.

Now, I won't tell you to RTFA because: a. You obviously did and b. I also skimmed it. It was pure luck that I read that particular part of the text.

Re:Cool!

[unitron]

He should have made it all intake except for the bottom and the bottom all exhaust. Custom case and hovercraft in one.

Re:Cool!

[TheRaven64]

He also said that air enters in one side and exits the other. Same for top and bottom.

Which is probably his problem. Unlike light, streams of air can not cross each other. If he has two air streams at 90 degrees intersecting he will get all sorts of turbulence swirling around inside his case. If he turned off the fans at top and bottom, and front and back, then he would get air flowing right through the case, which would probably be more efficient (discounting eddies from irregular shaped components.

IT HOVERS!

[cybercomm]

With so many fans, im surprised it doesnt hover...now imagine if it did, and they put LED fans... RUN FOR THE HILLS!

Re:IT HOVERS!

[LouisvilleDebugger]

That's brilliant, invading aliens would never think of looking for you in the HILLS.

"Yes, but eatable ants. I found that out." -- Orson Wells

First Thought

[presidentbeef]

"They are making a case out of computer enthusiasts? Whoa! Hardcore!"

Re:First Thought

[Janitha]

haha..


But still, I dont see how this passed as a Slashdot story. Its just lots of weak small fans. No performance gain, not much cooling, extremly unefficient cooling, unwanted magnetic fields around your computer, and there isn't much aesthetic values to that either.

Maybe innovative, but my no means should this have been posted in /.

Re:First Thought

[Jarlsberg]

Come on, this is pretty nerdy. And I for one enjoyed seeing the pics. For me, this is more interesting than that story about the Quark boss leaving, or that story about the FCC.

If you don't like the story, don't read it. I avoid Slashdot like the plague on 1. april, but I don't complain about it. Well, not much anyway.

Ho hum.

[kryogen1x]

Been there, done that. [mini-itx.com]

Re:Ho hum.

[akeyes]

But yours wasn't on slashdot.

Re:Ho hum.

[mnbjhguyt]

This one [unito.it] is another approach.

Re:Ho hum.

[suso]

But the Cool Cube has WAY more class. I'm impressed.

He's gonna need all those fans...

[Anonymous Coward]

To keep his server from melting during the slashdotting.

As an aside, that thing has to be LOUD AS HELL!

Re:He's gonna need all those fans...

[networkBoy]

Didn't help.
fans must have fanned the flames very well though.
-nB

Re:He's gonna need all those fans...

[mrjb]

On the contrary. Want a quieter case? Use a fan with bigger blades. Like that, more air can be moved with lower rotational speed and noise will be reduced. With a case built entirely of fans, I imagine each fan only needs to rotate very slowly for good ventilation. This thing has the potential to be extremely quiet!

Neat? Yes. Cool? No.

[Nomihn0]

The case isn't very cool. It's neat, though.

Re:Neat? Yes. Cool? No.

[hoka]

Basically. A while ago I found a hot deal on a 32 or so pack of 200cfm 120mm Delta fans, and I started running the numbers and realized that when you start stacking so many fans together, you can create a significant amount of breeze. A wall of two packs of fans would have came out to like 40 or 50mph going through a reduced space to increase velocity. Unfortunately, such a thing is really a pipe dream because the fans can never hold pressure at this velocity, putting together a large number of fans doesn't

Intent

[pipingguy]

Does this design cool the computer super-efficiently or eliminate the user due to oxygen deprivation?

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:Intent

[prockcore]

Well.. I thought the case was fairly breath-taking...

Re:Intent

[pipingguy]

Good question.

If I put you (or me) in a room with a high-powered exhaust fan, would the transient air be enough to keep a human alive? I still can't figure out why dogs love to stick their heads out of moving cars.

I figure they must have some magical dog ability or something. You'd never see a cat doing that, as cats are risk-averse.

Re:Intent

[cbiltcliffe]

Quickly moving air is lower pressure (read: vaccuum) than slow moving air.
That's how planes fly. The top of the wing is curved, the bottom straight, so the air going over the top of the wing moves further, at a higher speed, than the air at the bottom. Hence, uplift.

Fast air moving by your nose/mouth would therefore suck the breath out of you. Have you ever been outside in a really strong wind, and had difficulty catching your breath? That's the effect that the GP was talking about.

First thought...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Watch your fingers."

Anyways, it's a New Zealand mod. Which doesn't use Number 8 wire.

For shame.

Obligatory misreading

[ilyag]

Imagine: a Mac with a case made entirely of Apple fans, all in an Apple t-shirt and beaming smiles.

Re:Obligatory misreading

[DashEvil]

Now THAT is thinking different!

Next!

[DoorFrame]

Next thing we need is a fan made entirely of old computer cases!

Re:Next!

[RoadkillBunny]

Next thing we need is a fan made entirely of old computer cases!
You gotta move to soviet russia for that.

Re:Next!

[MarkRose]

Next thing we need is a fan made entirely of old computer cases!
You gotta move to soviet russia for that.

In Soviet Korea, old cases fan you!

You know, I've used a few case fans for that, actually.

Nice Case

[Senjutsu]

- What?

I SAID, "NICE CASE!"

- WHAT??

Oh forget it.

- WHAT?!

Worst. Idea. Ever.

Jokes are funnier...

[heatdeath]

if you repeat them!

WHAT?

Jokes are funnier if you repeat them!

What?

Noise Noise Noise.

[CEHT]

Hopefully you are using high quality fans... Otherwise it will be noisy and affect your gaming experience.

Re:Noise Noise Noise.

[Senjutsu]

Set it up on your desk blowing towards you for the full "Wind in your hair, bugs in your teeth" experience.

Wow.

[Robotech_Master]

I wanna join this guy's fan club.

Re:Wow.

[Mulletproof]

Why is that? You can tell by the webpage that this guy is a blowhard.

Uhg, somebody shoot us all and get it over with :p

Finally ...

[kitzilla]

... a computer case my kids won't touch. All except Stumpy. He'll mess with anything.

This was IBM's Quad 3 GHz G5 Case Design

[Nova Express]

Strangely enough, shortly after they showed this to Steve Hobs, Apple decided to switch to Intel...

Mirror

[mattOzan]

Should have put some of those fans in the webserver...

But Mirrordot [mirrordot.com]'s got it...

I wonder

[BCW2]

If he laid it on it's right side, would it hover?

Re:I wonder

[MarkRose]

And if he were to attach a bag to it, would it Hoover?

Re:I wonder

[TheGratefulNet]

And if he were to attach a bag to it, would it Hoover?

"I didn't know it was physically possible, but this both sucks and blows"

-b. simpson

Re:I wonder

[pyrrhonist]

If he laid it on it's right side, would it hover?

I bet it wouldn't even breathe heavy.

Re:I wonder

[Elminst]

Only if it got distracted right before it hit the desk...

(/is finishing tHHGttG...)

That's the....

[Dunbal]

That's the last time the cat is sleeping on the CPU case...meeeeeeeoooosplsplsplsplsplspl ewwwwwww

Re:That's the....

[Fallon]

<blockquote> That's the last time the cat is sleeping on the CPU case...meeeeeeeoooosplsplsplsplsplspl ewwwwwww</blockquote>

That does't stop our cat... at least once a week we hear this Bzzzzzt sound as she stuffs her paw into the power supply fan. Apparently she thinks it's entertaining.

Is the owner now deaf?

[John Jorsett]

My PC's two fans are bad enough. The racket from that many must be unbelievable.

Ah yes

[messiah_b]

The Computer Case of toe and finger removal +5

Fragile

[MavenW]

Gotta be careful with those plastic fins on the fans. They're not very durable. Last week we had a guy with four or five pieces of paper in his hand, rolled up into a cylinder. He accidentally touched the processor fan with them and three of the fins busted right out. That made the rest of the fan imbalanced and it made a terrible racket until he yanked the power cord.

If a small cylinder of paper can break them, think what a pencil or a shoe could do.

Broken fin

[QMO]

I was given a computer that made a funny noise.
I looked inside and noticed that one of the fins on the CPU fan was bent.
It was actually under warranty, as the person that gave it to me had an extended warranty, but why would I spend the postage to send the computer in just for a new CPU fan?
I tried to straighten it and it broke off.
I didn't want a wobbly fan on my CPU, so I broke off the opposite fin.

It's worked fine for over a year.
(Slot Athlon 1GHz)

I hope you aligned the fans in the right direction

[lashi]

I hope the fans are all blowing airs in the same direction instead of blowing against each other causing turbulance.

I could swear some of them are of opposite directions in the bottom picture.

Re:I hope you aligned the fans in the right direct

[Dunbal]

I hope the fans are all blowing airs in the same direction instead of...

Actually they probably are blowing in opposite directions - to prevent the damned thing from taking off!!! :)

Cool, but stupid

[Gollum2001]

While I and probably every other PC user on earth are trying to reduce power usage and noise, this guy go the exact opposite. Weird. But, it's probably the perfect case for a dual intel p4. ;-)

Strange.

[blackicye]

Oddly enough, the motherboard temperature of this case (25C) is identical to the temperature inside my current casing (Lian Li PC-60: 3x 80mm intake fan, 1x 120mm exhaust, and 2 fan power supply)

I guess airflow through most well designed casings is pretty good these days.

Though I bet this "case" won't have any "hotspots". It has to be as noisy as hell though, I can't believe noone else thought to do this first.

A Much Better Fan Case...

[Planky]

http://www.mini-itx.com/projects/coolcube/ [mini-itx.com]

airplane

[pintomp3]

with all those fans, will this computer start flying around when you play games?

Re:airplane

[Blakey Rat]

Yes. Yes it will.

Airflow is backwards:

[photon317]

He claims "Looking from the front of the case, air flows in through the left side and out the right side. The front an back blow air into the case and air flows from the top of the case down and out the bottom... theoretically anyway."

Ideally, the top/bottom flow direction should be from bottom to top, since the coldest air is on the floor of your room (heat rises). Most datacenter-class stuff goes bottom to top as well, but that's just because that's where the A/C is, underneath the servers in the raised flooring.

And having two major airflows intersecting in the case (left->right vs top->bottom) seems inefficient as well.

Personally, I would have set it up with the bottom, front, and back as intakes, and the top and both sides as outflows. Only issue there is the usual power-supply placement puts it outflowing on the back, but I guess in such a custom case you could move the power supply so that the "rear" of it is blowing out one of the sides or the top.

Re:Airflow is backwards:

[aXis100]

There's one problem with bottom-top airflow for home PC's. the bottom is where all of the dust settles on desks/floors etc.

Cluster

[McGiraf]

Imagine a beoWHOOOOoooOOOSH ............

In Soviet Russia

[Man in Spandex]

Case Winds YoWHHhhhooOOOOOOshhhhhhHHHHHHh

Well Done

[CrazyJim1]

So thats what you need to do to your server to avoid it being slashdotted.

Noise

[Trogre]

I didn't see in the article if he was running these fans at the standard 12V or had underclocked them.

Since noise produced by air is generally proportional to fan speed and inversely proportional to fan size, you could consider each side of this mod as a single large fan.

If you set each of these fans to a few hundred rpm this beast just might be quieter than a single fan pushing the same amount of air and with much better air flow.

Took you a while to get onto /.

[a.koepke]

Seen this before 6 months ago: Throlspuddle's Built from scratch [coolcasegallery.net]

Date Submitted : December 3rd, 2004

Oh *FANS*

[An Ominous Cow Erred]

Am I the only one who read it initially as "PC Case Made Completely of Flan"?

That sounds a lot tastier!

Re:Full Article Text (due to near /.ing at 0 comme

[Refrozen]

Err, wow.

AND the cached link: the cached link [nyud.net]

Re:Full Article Text (due to near /.ing at 0 comme

[TelJanin]

Try some of these: \n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Re:Full Article Text (due to near /.ing at 0 comme

[atomic-penguin]

nl2br('\n\n\n\n\n\n\n');

Nobody wants to read the article...

[uberdave]

People don't want to read this kind of article. They want to see the pictures. Next time post the pictures.

Re:Its time to let go...

[compm375]

Let's see you make a case out of water...

I present Teh ICEboX!

[Nomihn0]

I pity the fool who builds his/her case out of ice.

Re:I present Teh ICEboX!

[fiftyfly]

I pity the fool who builds his/her case out of ice.

That's whats this new fangled dry ice stuff must be for then?

It also blows.

[NixieBunny]

Hopefully it sucks exactly as much as it blows.

Re:Simply Fan-tastic

[LurkerXXX]

The 20" box fans was a better way to go. It would have moved more air and ran quieter than several dozen 80mm fans.

Re:Simply Fan-tastic

[Kid Zero]

Found it! It was from 2000, five years ago. Geez!

http://www.envador.com/cases/PVCII/ [envador.com]

PVC and a 18" box fan. Wow.

I was wrong above, only one fan but considering I've kept that image in my head for five years now, that's not bad.

Re:At the risk of posing a stupid question...

[symbolic]

I wonder if all of those fans are blowing outward...if so, it wouldn't be surprising that the results weren't any better.

Re:/.'ed site is in New Zealand

[hengist]

We don't use sheep for power, we use hobbits.