Why don't you submit your findings to Dell Engineering, so they can change their case design, and/or add an cooling additional fan(s). Of course, they will ask if you are experiencing any heat related problems, such as premature component failure, etc. I have the same clam shell case on my 8200 and have never experienced any noise or rattling. I do enjoy how easy it is to open.

Big Steve

Dimension 8200
P-4/2.2GHz/A05/XP Pro
1024MB PC800 RDRAM
80G & 40G ATA100
250MB Iomega Zip
USB 2.0 PCI
1503 FP/Ge4 4600
DVD/CDRW
Microsoft Wireless Mouse/Dell USB Keyboard
SB Live/HK695
Canon S750
Toshiba PCX1100/RoadRunner

The rule of refrigeration is that you can’t cool anything! Once you realize that you can only heat something, it becomes a lot easier to understand.

Apply that to a PC case full of Hot components, and you will see that you heat the air moving through it. Warm air exiting the case indicates that process is working.

Oddly, these household engineers that hang extra fans in the case may cause localized overheating because they disrupt the design flow…

Harmonic vibration can be hard to trace. Start by opening the case and generally check everything for security. If you can isolate where it is coming from, tape or use a wad of paper to brace it. Actually you will be changing it's frequency, but the result is the same…

I just don't feel like cooking my geforce4 ti 4600 that i paid $350 for because the of the heat in the case. As for submitting my findings to Dell i'm sure they could care less what I have to say about their case designs. They just sell to the masses and could care less about invidual concerns. For the average use the case is probably adequate but throw in a gf4 and run a game for a while like Morrowind for example that even brings the gf4 ti4600 to it's knees and it seems like and oven in there. Too bad they didn't make a high performance line of computers with better airflow, larger power supply, and such.

I have a digital thermoeter with the sensor on a wire. I stuck it around areas of the case, doing the most demanding stuff, including overcloacking. I never got the case temp above 90 degreas, It was around 70 in the room. Thats pretty good. So dont worry its fine.



Message Edited on 07/16/02 10:13AM by Mr_Xtm

yea....for my dimension 4100 with 1 fan...passive heatsink...i decided it wasnt up to the task of cooling my case...graphics card is currently at 290/290(need to update sig) and generates enough heat by itself...so i went out and got some case fans...little while later after using the dremel for awhile i had a hsf, 3 case fans and a slot fan. after completely draining my 150 watt ps of power(im suprised you can run a ti4600 with dell power supplys considering at full load they use around 140 watts alone). my case temps were around 100 degrees or higher at full load and after i got it down to around 80 degrees, and as for overclocking..with dell systems you CANNOT overclock the or fsb given no bios options for it or any voltage adjustment, which is needed for cpu overclocking. then again adding extra fans to your case voids the warrenty so if you dont feel like letting heat fry that ti4600 or voiding the warrenty get a card cooler from www.cardcooler.com and you can be assured that your card will not fry

System
Dimension 4100
866 PIII
512 mb ram
PowerColor ATI Radeon 8500LE 250mhz/500mhz
Fireball 20 gig hard drive
Segate 10 gig hard drive 7200 rpm
Windows XP Professional

Mr_XTM what video card do you use? Is it the g4ti4600? Cause they are good size and throw off quite a bit of heat. Much more than my gf3 card does anyway. When you were testing temps did you get the temperature of the memory and core on the vid card cause when i check by hand after stressing it out the video card memory and core are too hot for my liking. I wouldn't want to overclock the card like this. Well i finally solved the problem for myself anyway. I put in a much better processor fan and added a second fan directly towards the video card. It draws the outside air from the bottom much faster and shoots it out quicker from the top with the faster fan up there. The air coming out now is much cooler and after stressing the video card extremely the video card memory and around the core is barely warm at all. While overclocking the video card it gets only slightly warmer so i am happy now. Also of course i made sure no pci cards are directly under the video card. The idea being to circulate the air both in and out much quicker than the stock sytem can. What i made sure not to do was to have more air coming in than can be drawn out becuase that disrupts proper airflow. Plus i havent any extra holes so i'm not destroying the case.