PC Question

Hey friends. I have limited space and was wondering if I could get away with this setup. Main concern is airflow. I have 2 to 3 inches from back wall. And almost 4 inches in Front on right side. But its also in closet. Wondering Ill be OK or not. Thanks in advance for taking time to help me out.

Can you embed the photo in your post?

I thought it would be an interesting experiment to put my PC in the closet next to me. There's not much in there, it's got plenty of space to breath, I could just have a few really long cables running out of the closet over here to my desk, it would look real neat, it would be real quiet, etc. I figured my PC would run a little warmer, but I had some wiggle room there.

My PC never shut itself down or anything while in there but when I opened the closet it felt like opening the oven. It wasn't actually that hot, but it was pretty hot, and my PC parts definitely were running over 90C after playing games for a few hours.

I cracked open one of the doors and that helped some, but it was still too hot in my opinion. Later I left the doors wide open and that solved the heat problem well enough, but then the cables were messier than ever and the noise from the computer wasn't being dampened at all (it wasn't all that loud, but honestly having the room dead quiet while playing games was so nice).

So I wound up taking it out of the closet entirely and setting it back up at my desk.

What I'm saying is, if you're willing to leave a closet door open, you should be fine, but if you want to put your PC in a closet and leave the door closed, I think you're making a mistake.

I really wouldn't chance it, cases are designed to pull in air and push it out for a reason. Any mechanical parts will wear out sooner and I don't think the rest of your PC would enjoy the experience, all the expensive parts have fans on them, and even memory sells with cooling fins nowadays.

@justin258: embedded

Oh I think that shouldn't be too bad at all, I was thinking along the lines of someone I knew who had a box with four sides (cut outs for cables) and a door about 3 times the size of the PC. He was running it wih the door open. It looks like you might get a little warm in the summer though :)

You'll probably not have major issues, but if your room is hot in the Summer you may wish to direct a fan towards it so there's cool air being pulled in, or at the very least non-stagnant air going in. You've got plenty of space for exhaust so it should dissipate okay provided your cooling solution is up to scratch. Since it's side-on, the space from the back wall isn't so important, as it won't be pushing much air out that way. The only other advice I might give is nudge the whole thing maybe another inch away from that wall on the right, just so there's a bit more space for intake, but honestly you've probably got enough space there so that's really just caution talking.

Use a software like Speccy to check internal temps regularly, especially after intensive sessions, and specifically take the temps during hotter periods. If you're seeing your components get to 70 or above on a regular basis, consider a better cooling solution (large aluminium heat sink with copper pipes) or more intake fans if you already have that, or approach the placement again to try to get better airflow.

That it pushing it a little, but you should be fine, as long as your PC has good cooling. If you PC doesn't get too hot from gaming or video editing then its okay. But I would recommend you shut off the PC fully when you're done and not have it in sleep mode with that cramp setup.

That looks fine.

It's hard to tell from the picture, but it appears that you have an AIO top mounted. Is it intaking or exhausting air? If it's set up to exhaust, then I'd assume there are front mounted intake fans, and it's possible you could pull in some of the exhausted hot air from the top due to the case proximity to the shelf above and wall to the side.

OK. Thanks to all of you for the advice super appreciate it. :)