I'm new to building PCs and am setting up my first case and cooling system. I have an Arctic Liquid Freezer III 360 AIO, a Lian Li O11 Dynamic case, an Intel 250KF processor, a Z890 Gaming WiFi Plus motherboard, an RTX 4070 Ti, and an RM750x power supply. I'm considering Prism 4 RS fans and want advice on the ideal number of additional fans, how many should be standard or reverse-blade, the best airflow layout, and whether switching to an air cooler would make more sense.
3 Answers
Reverse-blade fans are mainly useful for appearance. They let you keep the attractive side facing the glass while still using the fan as an intake. Use reverse-blade models for the bottom and side intakes, and regular fans for the rear exhaust. The AIO’s included fans can remain on the top radiator as exhaust.
Keep the Arctic Liquid Freezer III 360. It’s a capable cooler for that CPU, and the O11 Dynamic is designed around multi-fan and radiator setups, so an air cooler would generally be a downgrade here.
A practical layout is to mount the 360 mm AIO at the top as exhaust, install three fans on the bottom as intake, three on the side as intake, and add one rear fan as exhaust. That gives you seven case fans plus the three fans attached to the radiator. You can run fewer fans, but this layout gives the case strong, balanced airflow.
I was considering six additional fans besides the AIO fans, so that would mean three on the bottom and three on the side, with the radiator handling top exhaust. Would that be enough without adding a rear fan?