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- Thread starter Blackstone
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jimmycrank
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Dr... did your new FT02S come with the newer AP-181s? If so, where did you get it?
BababooeyHTJ
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Well it looks like one of the fans is starting to crap out on me. I'm not sure why Silverstone chose to use sleeve bearing fans in such an expensive case. I emailed them in hopes of a replacement which I hope that they send since this case is only a couple of months old.
I got it from Amazon, how would I tell if the fans were newer? I haven't been following the saga.
New fans have a "whirlpool" pattern fan grill on top of them. Old fans have a honeycomb pattern fan grill.
No Honeycomb are the older style. They don't break; that's just the latest batch of the newer ones.
The newer AP181's which have a "whirlpool" pattern, do provide better cooling though.
TheOneKnownAsMe
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The APs are the best fans available for this case at the moment, it's just they seem to be having issues with QC. Though I have the old style fans (FNs, I believe?), and they cool just fine, and are sufficiently quiet for me when set to high.
Cool, I won't worry about it for now. Definitely not unhappy, and I am not an "extreme" overclocker at all.
So in this case, with the fans and mobo setup the way they are, how well would the new Sabertooth P67 receive cooling under the flak vest type heat shield thingy? I read it was designed to shield the motherboard from the heat of the parts, but also to receive cooling from a cpu fan that blows air down into the motherboard (since the air would pass under the flak vest and cool off all the bits and pieces and what not). Would the air flow in this case also reach under that flak vest, does anyone know? Or would it really not make much of a difference anyway?
Michaelius
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If it has entry for air under the vest on the bottom then it would reveive some airflow (as Air penetrators end slightly behind mobo so part of air goes behind mobo too.
But you can bet that Sabertooth flak vest is complete gimmick with no serious impact on components (how many times did mobo died on you in past ?)
.
Also in FT2 your hottest part (GPU) will be sending hot air directly outside of case so Sabertooth is even more pointless here than in classic cases.
But you can bet that Sabertooth flak vest is complete gimmick with no serious impact on components (how many times did mobo died on you in past ?)
.
Also in FT2 your hottest part (GPU) will be sending hot air directly outside of case so Sabertooth is even more pointless here than in classic cases.
Oh I understand it's a gimmick 100%. The flak vest with a cooler blowing down into it only makes a 1-2 C difference in mobo temperature at best. But I mean, come on, that's like, the coolest thing I've ever seen (motherboard-wise anyway). It's so original that I actually need it, which makes me sad because newegg took it down for the time being 
Regarding the Sabertooth in this case - I have one for the time being...my understanding is that underneath the armor, the design is "shunted" allowing air that should potentially be coming from a downfacing fan on a heatsink to be passed throughout the board. Marketing gimmick? Well [H] had some preview pics in November.
http://www.hardocp.com/news/2010/11/15/asus_sabertooth_p67_motherboard_spy_pics
Looks pretty standard to me under there. Anyways, In a normal orientation, this air exits from the bottom and right side, so with the 90 degree orientation change we've got the AP's pushing air up through the right side under the armor.
Does it make a difference? Barely if at all. Airflow in the FT02 is so good that I wonder if the armor is actually detrimental.
http://www.hardocp.com/news/2010/11/15/asus_sabertooth_p67_motherboard_spy_pics
Looks pretty standard to me under there. Anyways, In a normal orientation, this air exits from the bottom and right side, so with the 90 degree orientation change we've got the AP's pushing air up through the right side under the armor.
Does it make a difference? Barely if at all. Airflow in the FT02 is so good that I wonder if the armor is actually detrimental.
I wouldn't think it would hurt anything. I can see how it could restrict air flow, but at the same time, the air is also going behind the motherboard anyway no? So I'm sure it's getting all the air it needs.
And say for the time being? Are you unhappy with the Sabertooth?
And say for the time being? Are you unhappy with the Sabertooth?
Not at all, it's an excellent board. I just happened to get my UD7 exchanged for a B3 (long story, it didn't look like it was going to happen) and selling it locally may prove a little more difficult than expected - which means if the Sabertooth is easier to get rid of it'll have to be the one to go.
So installing the fan controller backwards in the case ended up working pretty sweet. I think it looks kinda cool inside of the case, and no knobs sticking outside of the case. It was a pain in the butt to install though because I had to take the entire motherboard out so I could slide the controller in.
Anyhow, I am finally happy with the noise level in my case. I ended up just manually controlling all of the AP181s.
Now time to deal with the rats nest of wires...
Glad it all worked out. So there was no way to slide the controller into the 5.25" bay from the front and then connect the wires? I'm getting my Lamptron FC Touch today, so some rewiring is in order for me too.
BTW, I wouldn't use the front panel case header to connect decent headphones to your Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium HD
Glad it all worked out. So there was no way to slide the controller into the 5.25" bay from the front and then connect the wires? I'm getting my Lamptron FC Touch today, so some rewiring is in order for me too.
BTW, I wouldn't use the front panel case header to connect decent headphones to your Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium HD
Hmm. lol i didn't even try sliding it in from the front. haha. Oh well. It doesn't take too long to pull the mobo anyhow and I did a little bit of wire clean up while the mobo was out (at least that's my rationalization to make myself feel better
). Let us know how your lamptron turns out. That controller looks pretty nice.
Michaelius
Supreme [H]ardness
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Yeah considering they are selling same mobos in even hottest coutries and that they have to worry about little johny putting it into $20 case with something like 1 or 2 fans the stuff we put into RV or FT has paradise like comditions as far as computer equipment goes.
That is so true! We tend to go to extremes which aren't necessarily required. Although, would "Little Johnny" OC their system? That might the key motivation for our extra level of cooling... That and it's just plain fun to do!!!
I bought one of these IR thermometers from amazon.com....figured it would come in handy....so I did some measurements....at 600 rpm...generally, the PCB of the Kaze is the hottest places inside my case (that I can shine an IR beam on, that is). The range is from 96 to 103 deg F (warmest on the side where the wires to the fans extend out). This is viewed on the component side of the PCB...curiously, I did the probing on the other side...where you can read the fan speeds...and the temps are about the same there...in fact, the outer windows where the temps are viewed feels a bit warm to my fingers.
I turned the fan speed to max and did it again...now I get the max temp on that same side but it is around 105 deg F.
Personally, I don't think these temps are much of a problem.
That's not bad at all. The only reason I asked was because I tried out a cheapo Silverstone FP33 controller and its resistors were unbearably hot to the touch when the AP181's were turned down to ~600 rpm.
I've done some IR thermometer sniping inside my case at idle (CPU and GPU at 30C) and while running Prime95 and Furmark (CPU and GPU at 50C) and got some moderately surprising results.
Component: idle temp / load temp, C
Silver Arrow fins: 29/44
Shaman fins: 30/34
Shaman heat pipes: 30/38
VRM G2 fins: 30/32
VRM G2 heat pipes: 31/33
VRM G2 heat sink (the one sitting on top of the VRMs): 29/50
VRAM heat spreaders: 35/60
RAM heat spreaders: 29/34
HDD side: 31/33
PSU side: 33/35
PSU top: 40/48
So by far the hottest components in my build are the VRMs and VRAM on GTX 580 and the PSU.
The PSU fan doesn't ever spin up since I'm not hitting high enough load, so it makes sense that it's running on the hot side. It's great from the noise standpoint, but I wonder if this will shorten its lifespan. Not too worried about it due to Corsair's lifetime warranty.
I guess it's true that the Shaman is great at cooling the GPU, but not as efficient at cooling the VRAM and VRMs even with the help of my passive VRM G2 cooler. It's hard to draw definitive conclusions without being able to measure the actual chip temperatures. I wonder if replacing Thermalright's relatively thick thermal pads on the VRAM heat spreaders and VRM G2 with thin thermal tape would help with heat transfer. Obviously, this would only raise the observed heat sink temperatures.
I'll measure the Lamptron FC Touch temps once I get it installed.
I've been saying that I wanted a nice PC case for years, and for almost as long, that I would build another gaming PC after switching to consoles for gaming the last couple of generations and Macs for PC-related tasks.
With the new B3 boards finally in-stock here, the timing seemed right and I built myself this system last week:
Unfortunately I'm having problems with the motherboard where it's locked to a 16x multiplier at all times, regardless of load (and have tried everything to fix it) so I got these photos just before pulling the board & CPU out to RMA it.
To me, it seems most likely to be an EFI/BIOS issue, but ASUS have said to get the board swapped and the shop has asked for the CPU along with it.
And a quick handheld shot of the case when I first put things together. Only a small image as it's quite blurred at larger sizes, but it gives you an idea of what things look like in less harsh lighting conditions:
I have typically always gone with a cheap PC case for my buildswith my last system I went with the cheapest case I could find that I could stand to look at.
I must say, I'm impressed with the build quality of this case, and it almost makes me wish I had gone with the silver oneI reckon they probably have a good finish on it that would rival Apple's hardware. The main thing that stopped me was the fact that you can't get any optical drives to match it, I already had a drive I wanted to re-use, and wanted to add a second. (yep, still living in the past)
While I'm impressed with the build quality of the case, the cable management wasn't nearly as good as I expected though, and it was disappointing to find that only one of the five hard drive bays actually has a backplane so you can hot-swap the drives. (though it takes so long to actually put the drives into one of the caddies, it wouldn't really speed things up anyway)
For a case the size it is, I expected there to be a bigger space behind the motherboard, and some kind of rubber to hide the cables like Corsair uses in their cases would have been nice.
I'm also a bit disappointed that they didn't use black cables and/or sleeve the cables inside the case, considering the price. I might see about sleeving those cables along with the one for my CPU fan while waiting for a new board.
Until I actually started building in the case, I didn't realise that the top optical drive had to be screwed in, and I was just lucky that my new Samsung drive was shorter than the Pioneer one below it, or else I wouldn't have had to have a blank spot at the top. That said, I ended up screwing in the Pioneer drive as well. While you can lock the drives in place without screws (I wouldn't call it a tool-less system though as the front plates are screwed on) it isn't really solidly in place unless you screw them in.
I was also surprised at the noise from the case. With so many people calling it quiet, I wasn't expecting the constant low hum that I get from it. It seems to transfer the noise from the hard drives right into the floor a lot better than my old case didthe PC is actually kept in another room with long HDMI and USB cables, and I can still easily tell when it's on.
When the fans are on high (fortunately this does not seem like it will be necessary to keep things cool) the case is positively loud.
I had decided against putting my T-Balancer in to control the fans, but as the ASUS board doesn't seem to lower the CPU fan speed (I guess you need 4-pin fans) and because case fans are pretty noticeable, it might be worth finding a space for it after all.
Maybe it's just because I've been used to mid-range systems in the past rather than hearing a modern high-end PC, but I definitely wouldn't call it quiet, and I'm thinking about getting some sorbothane feet to put on the bottom of the case in an attempt to quieten it a bit. (worked wonders on my old case)
Definitely glad that I bought the case though, and I really do hope that more companies move towards 90° rotated boards, but I'm not sure that it's worth the extra cash over the Raven unless you really hate the look of it. I did spend a bit more on some items purely for aesthetic reasons with this build, I'm not a fan of the plastic front/top on the Raven, and the shop I use didn't have the RV02-E without a window, but it seems to be 90% of the case that the FT02 is for half the price.
With the new B3 boards finally in-stock here, the timing seemed right and I built myself this system last week:
Intel i5-2500K
Thermalright TRUE Black (from my previous system)
ASUS Sabertooth P67
8GB Corsair Vengeance 8-8-8-24 1.5v
EVGA GTX570-SC
Corsair AX850 PSU
I had planned on picking up one of the new Intel SSDs, but the switch to a Marvell controller and performance worse than the previous generation of drive that I've been using in some cases has made me hold off until all the new SATA3 drives are out and tested.Thermalright TRUE Black (from my previous system)
ASUS Sabertooth P67
8GB Corsair Vengeance 8-8-8-24 1.5v
EVGA GTX570-SC
Corsair AX850 PSU
Unfortunately I'm having problems with the motherboard where it's locked to a 16x multiplier at all times, regardless of load (and have tried everything to fix it) so I got these photos just before pulling the board & CPU out to RMA it.
To me, it seems most likely to be an EFI/BIOS issue, but ASUS have said to get the board swapped and the shop has asked for the CPU along with it.
And a quick handheld shot of the case when I first put things together. Only a small image as it's quite blurred at larger sizes, but it gives you an idea of what things look like in less harsh lighting conditions:
I have typically always gone with a cheap PC case for my buildswith my last system I went with the cheapest case I could find that I could stand to look at.
I must say, I'm impressed with the build quality of this case, and it almost makes me wish I had gone with the silver oneI reckon they probably have a good finish on it that would rival Apple's hardware. The main thing that stopped me was the fact that you can't get any optical drives to match it, I already had a drive I wanted to re-use, and wanted to add a second. (yep, still living in the past)
While I'm impressed with the build quality of the case, the cable management wasn't nearly as good as I expected though, and it was disappointing to find that only one of the five hard drive bays actually has a backplane so you can hot-swap the drives. (though it takes so long to actually put the drives into one of the caddies, it wouldn't really speed things up anyway)
For a case the size it is, I expected there to be a bigger space behind the motherboard, and some kind of rubber to hide the cables like Corsair uses in their cases would have been nice.
I'm also a bit disappointed that they didn't use black cables and/or sleeve the cables inside the case, considering the price. I might see about sleeving those cables along with the one for my CPU fan while waiting for a new board.
Until I actually started building in the case, I didn't realise that the top optical drive had to be screwed in, and I was just lucky that my new Samsung drive was shorter than the Pioneer one below it, or else I wouldn't have had to have a blank spot at the top. That said, I ended up screwing in the Pioneer drive as well. While you can lock the drives in place without screws (I wouldn't call it a tool-less system though as the front plates are screwed on) it isn't really solidly in place unless you screw them in.
I was also surprised at the noise from the case. With so many people calling it quiet, I wasn't expecting the constant low hum that I get from it. It seems to transfer the noise from the hard drives right into the floor a lot better than my old case didthe PC is actually kept in another room with long HDMI and USB cables, and I can still easily tell when it's on.
When the fans are on high (fortunately this does not seem like it will be necessary to keep things cool) the case is positively loud.
I had decided against putting my T-Balancer in to control the fans, but as the ASUS board doesn't seem to lower the CPU fan speed (I guess you need 4-pin fans) and because case fans are pretty noticeable, it might be worth finding a space for it after all.
Maybe it's just because I've been used to mid-range systems in the past rather than hearing a modern high-end PC, but I definitely wouldn't call it quiet, and I'm thinking about getting some sorbothane feet to put on the bottom of the case in an attempt to quieten it a bit. (worked wonders on my old case)
Definitely glad that I bought the case though, and I really do hope that more companies move towards 90° rotated boards, but I'm not sure that it's worth the extra cash over the Raven unless you really hate the look of it. I did spend a bit more on some items purely for aesthetic reasons with this build, I'm not a fan of the plastic front/top on the Raven, and the shop I use didn't have the RV02-E without a window, but it seems to be 90% of the case that the FT02 is for half the price.
Michaelius
Supreme [H]ardness
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Actually my Raven 2 also transfers hdd sound despite diffrent mounting system for HDDs.
But I don't really care since they will be replaced by huge 5900rpm drive in SQD and 1-2 ssds as soon as possible.
But I don't really care since they will be replaced by huge 5900rpm drive in SQD and 1-2 ssds as soon as possible.
Great-looking build. I would space out your 3 HDDs though and use slots 1, 3, and 5. That is unless you have a fourth HDD in the first slot already, can't really see because of the hot-swap bracket.
If you're bothered by the HDD seek noise, I would consider soft-mounting them. SPCR has a lot of guides on this. I'm not too sure how you would do all three, but you can see how I did my single HDD here.
Sabertooth P67 has one 3-pin fan header with adjustable voltage, CHA_FAN 2. The current rating for it is impossible to find out, but all three AP181s set at 50% or less would draw less than 1A, so it's probably safe to hook them up to just one header through a 3-way splitter. This way you'll just control them through Asus Fan Xpert and won't have to find space for your T-Balancer.
You mean the Sabertooth mobo?
Thanks.
I only have three drives at the moment, but due to how I have the SATA cables arranged, the current layout works best. (keeps the drives on the ports that I want) I doubt moving them is going to really affect airflow/noise. While it's only three drives at the moment, I've been thinking about adding another 2TB shortly as the prices seem to have come down now. One of the drives is actually an older 500GB that could probably do with getting replaced soon as well. (the other two are 1.5TB "green" drives)
Looks like that works well, but seems like it would be tough to do with the three drives, especially if I'm going to add more. Just a shame that the caddies didn't really help dampen the noise at all. Fortunately as I said, it isn't kept in the same room as the display it's hooked up to. I would definitely be looking into other options if I was in the same room as it, though it may just be as simple as buying sorbothane feet to put on the bottom of the case.
I'll have a look for that. I'm not too concerned about leaving the chassis fans on at low speed, but my CPU fan is running at 1400rpm. It is a quiet fan (Scythe Gentle Typhoon) but it's probably still audible over the AP181sI'll have to test that when I get a replacement motherboard. (everything is all boxed up now)
Well that, the fully modular AX850 instead of an HX850 or non-modular PSU, Corsair Vengeance instead of similarly rated XMS RAM, NZXT sleeved cable extensions to keep things tidy.You mean the Sabertooth mobo?
I will say though, the main thing that pushed me to getting the Sabertooth was the extended warranty period on it compared to the other boards, but I do like how it looks. Same reason I spent a bit more to get an EVGA card instead of a cheaper GTX570.
Hi andrewfee, great looking build you got there! I too am considering of purchasing the FT-02 case.. and I was curious what heatsink fan is attached to your thermalright heatsink? Also, I noticed you said it isn't as quiet as what people claim it to be, but is the noise coming from your HDDs or the case fans?
It's a Scythe Gentle Typhoon 1450 rpm fan which is supposed to have a very good airflow-to-noise ratio.
Here's a shot of it from my old buildI installed it when the motherboard was in the case this time around so it wasn't possible to get a "front" shot:
I have another one as well that I used as a case fan in that build, so I could use them in a push-pull configuration but I don't expect it to be necessary in this case. I'll see how warm things get once I can actually start overclocking the 2500K.
One thing to note is that the fans have enclosed edges and require a little bit of modification to attach the fan clips. (just a couple of minutes with a hacksaw)
Before & After:
As for case noise it's more than just the hard drives. The AP181 fans aren't as quiet as I was expecting when running on low (clearly audible) and when all three are on high there was some noticeable oscillation/buzzing from them.
As I said though, I haven't really had a higher-end system in a long time (at least not in the era of dual-slot graphics cards and massive CPU coolers etc.) so I don't know if this is considered to be loud or not. It's possible that my expectations of what a "quiet" system is are unrealistic.
I'm certainly not bothered by it (at least with the case fans on low) and couldn't say how it compares to running the same hardware inside another case, it's just not as quiet as I was expecting.
Once I get my replacement motherboard (turns out it was a faulty board keeping the multiplier at 16x) I'll maybe see if I can get a recording of how things sound.
I have the Raven RV02, but it has these same issues (though I got mine for a lot less than what yours cost, but I still think making the case a bit wider would be an excellent idea).
Agreed.
I think you mis-place the blame here. Any case can be noisy if you have the wrong components. Some HDDs make more noise than others, too. The more of them you have, the more noise you can expect. Most cases can be made quiet, too.
The 3 fans have a high/low switch. You can make them quieter using the low switch. Or you can do as I did and use a fan controller and run them around 600rpm or less. That makes them very hard to hear (I have my case on the top of my desk at ear-level). I would only expect to run them on high if/when I'm doing something that generates a lot of heat. In that event, I'll tolerate noise. Oftentimes that will be when lots of sound are being made by the system, so fan noise won't be much of an issue. But for everyday typical operation, the system can be made very quiet while providing great cooling.
I like the looks of your case better than that of the Raven I have. But I got mine for $139. At that price I can deal with the looks. Looks just aren't that important to me though I do appreciate them. I also don't like the busy top of the Raven case. But I general I don't deal with my cases that much...they mostly just sit there once I complete a build. So one simply has to decide what you want in your build.
Michaelius
Supreme [H]ardness
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Raven is quiet a good deal money wise.
I was looking at competitors like fractal or P183 but once you factored cost of buying/replacing fans inside with something of good quality the costs easily racked up to same levels as RV02.
I was looking at competitors like fractal or P183 but once you factored cost of buying/replacing fans inside with something of good quality the costs easily racked up to same levels as RV02.
So I just pulled the trigger on this case a few hours ago, anybody got a quick summary of the first 118 pages of this thread
I saw something a few pages back on there being different fans being used, whats that all about?
Im going to be putting x2 6970s in this case, will i need to remove the fan shrouds on the bottom to get them to fit...I assume not since a 5970 fits and the 6970 is shorter.
Any additional tips/hints would be great.
I saw something a few pages back on there being different fans being used, whats that all about?
Im going to be putting x2 6970s in this case, will i need to remove the fan shrouds on the bottom to get them to fit...I assume not since a 5970 fits and the 6970 is shorter.
Any additional tips/hints would be great.
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So I just pulled the trigger on this case a few hours ago, anybody got a quick summary of the first 118 pages of this thread
I saw something a few pages back on there being different fans being used, whats that all about?
Im going to be putting x2 6970s in this case, will i need to remove the fan shrouds on the bottom to get them to fit...I assume not since a 5970 fits and the 6970 is shorter.
Any additional tips/hints would be great.
I think all FT02s come with the updated fans now. Your cards will fit fine.
Make sure you have a modular PSU, long Blu-Ray drives may block last PCI slot. Be careful with the window, may scratch easy. Clean with a soft cotton cloth, I use an old shirt.
Top buttons are a little sensitive but solid, so don't lean on the top of the case. It's the best case I've used ever, so you'll enjoy it a lot.
Awesome goodness....PSU IS modular with the exception of the ATX power connector. How dusty does the case get after prolonged use? I keep reading that the postive pressure will keep dust out but how bout the guys in the trenches with these things, the system really keep pretty clean as advertised?
If you keep it on 24/7, it will be pretty clean. Just don't forget to clean out the four dust filters every few weeks and use a compressed air duster for all the crevices on the top case panel under the cover.
Right on, the panzerbox case looks like it has the same kind of mesh to it so I've got experience dealing with that kind of mesh.
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