Installation for members of the cooling community will be a snap for the most part unless they're aiming to use the fan control and have packed all of the bays on the front of their case or would rather mod and move it. The provided screws will fit most processors and configurations and in the case of an upgrade, the Smart Fan II is still the same size as a standard 80mm fan so there's no worry. The blower comes with multiple screws to use in a case where there is no fan cage present. Both components installed in this case without a problem at all. The only issue that I experienced was with speed feedback as I was short on 3 pin connectors for the blower feedback to go into on the motherboard. Other than that the parts started up perfectly and were ready to cool this system down.
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Prior to installation measurements were taken via the Gigabyte bios to compare with the new components. For those following current Gigabyte trends, the readings are taken from the die instead of the socket in their latest bios releases and so the readings shown reflect this new path that they've taken.
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Standard Volcano 9 Cooling |
X-Blower Volcano 9 Cooling |
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CPU Idle: 45c
Case Temp: 33c |
CPU Idle: 44c
Case Temp: 32c |
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CPU Load: 47c
Case Temp: 33c |
CPU Load: 46c
Case Temp 33c |
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As you can see there is a bit of a difference in the cpu temps from this addition. The blower fan seems to be very effective in removing the dead air that would normally be recycled through the Smart Fan II. It also keeps heat from the PSU and AGP area to a lower amount instead of freely flowing in the isolated area of the cpu. The fan control system is quite nice to control noise levels although it has a safety system to keep the fans from going dead which seems to be a drawback for silent cooling enthusiasts even at mid level there is a bit of noise from both fans.
The fans can be mounted in a few optional ways as many have seen with other brands. The Blower mounted solo on the heatsink isn't all that effective as it's just taking in dead air and the Smart Fan II is simply taking out air as fast as a standard 78cfm fan would. The standard configuration seems to be one with the best results as we can see here.
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Standard X-Blower Configuration |
Reversed X-Blower Configuration |
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CPU Idle: 44c
Case Temp: 32c |
CPU Idle: 45c
Case Temp: 30c |
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CPU Load: 46c
Case Temp: 33c |
CPU Load: 47c
Case Temp: 31c |
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