Zalman 9700LED, fan speed

Quote:
Case fans are stock, in their original positions (no front intake fan). I must admit, it felt a bit weird placing that Zalman almost right in between top and rear exhaust fans - seems to me that they do the work already, and the fan on the Zalman is superfluous (if I don't have a front intake fan...)

Yeah, thats like my Zalman, I notice a 1-2c drop idle and 3-4c drop Load, when I use the full fan speed setting. I dont have a front intake, I was thinking of picking up the Antec 900. Looks nice and cools nice by the sounds of it

Definitely add that front intake, not only for your CPUs sake but also for your graphics card(s) I noticed that Antec designed this case for systems built specifically to be silent so they weren't really banking on people using monster graphics cards in this case so they expected the dual exhausts to cause enough negative pressure to suck ample cool air through the front but it just isn't enough IMO, I added a SilenX Ixtrema I had lying around to the front and with it at 7v and all TriCools on "L" I noticed substantial temperature drops.

EDIT: Instead of mounting a 120 to the front of the case conventionally like I chose to, you can also leave the upper hard drive cage in place and use the included wire brackets to mount the 120 fan directly in front of your graphics card(s) that way the fan is closer to your CPU and would give it even better airflow, try it and see if it helps, I have the revision 2 P180B which has 3 25mm thick fans instead of 2 25mms and a 35mm so the wire bracket may not come with the revision 1, I'm not sure. If you can open the front door all the way until it touches the side of the case, you have a revision 1, revision 2s only open about 180-190 degrees.

This was the layout with my old rig (Opty 170). Right now, still similar, only that the bottom fan is gone

Thanks for the input, guys.

Remonster: I seem to have a revision 2, since the door does not open all the way, and I got the wire brackets . Would seem like the way to go, since I have five drives - four in the bottom cage, and my boot drive in the top cage. However, the X1950XTX is quite large, not sure a fan will fit behind the drive cage. Perhaps it may fit in front of it - there seems to be a bracket there.

Chozart: Nice cable management there - now I must seriously reconsider my own - it's not nearly as neat. That must help airflow a lot too - I have an annoying flat IDE cable to the DVD, always been a cause of grief... Did you remove the top exhaust fan, or is it just not visible on the picture? It seems a bit overkill to have the two exhaust fans up there so close, when the Zalman fan sits just below the top one, and in front of the rear one.
How's the temp on your drives with the lower fan removed?

Anyway, it is definitely lack of airflow, since if open the side of the case, CPU temp drops 10 degrees C...