The fan noise would negate the value of having hifi. Usually there is a clearance round the various boxes given in the instructions. I suppose it would be best if the stuff using the most Watts was on top.
Shouldn't be as big an issue as years ago when valves were used. Now there was some heat.
The hi-fi stack is slowly coming together, built from 15mm ply on drawer runners. Looking as though everything will {just} fit although there isn't a lot of leeway.
I plan to cut ventilation holes in the shelves, but with (top to bottom)
Centre speaker
Tivo box
HTPC
Stero amplifier
AV amplifier
There is going to be quite a bit of heat generated at times. I am now wondering if additional forced ventilation might be a good idea.
The obvious choice seems to be 12v PC case fans blowing up the stack from the bottom through holes in the shelves.
This then requires on or more power supplies with suitable connections.
I could always cannibalise old PCs for both fans and power supplies but this seems overkill as the PSU will be bulky and have its own fan to keep it cool and you don't really need a PC PSU to drive a few case fans.
So is there a simple solution to safely power some case fans? Wall wart with 12v output and some fancy wiring?
Alternatives to PC fans? I can see USB powered laptop coolers but these seem a bit OTT and wasteful.
Discreet switching would also be desirable as all the power is under the stack below floor level and needs the AV amp sliding out to access.
Cheers
Dave R
How about water cooling, using micro-bore attached to the underneath of each draw (heat rises),& aradiator on the north-side of the house
Some amplifiers have a remote switch output to control things - what make/model is the amp, and will the fan on onyl when the amp is on be satisfactory?
Otherwise you could install a room thermostat in the cupboard, and control the fan with that?
a 12v fan just needs a small 12v power supply, you may have one in your "man drawer" already.
You can also include a speed controller like this
AV amp is an old Sony STR-DB940 and it has a control bus for other Sony devices.
Stereo amp is a new Marantz PM6005 which also had a device control bus.
Turning the fan on and off is an interesting issue - could perhaps only be needed when both the AV and stereo amp are on at the same time.
Ah! There is a power out socket on the back of the AV amp (two pin plug, possibly US style) which supplies power to associated kit and turns it off when the amp turns off. Hopefully this means when it goes into standby and isn't just a fancy marketing puff to say that this is an extension lead so you only need one wall plug for two devices.
Testing required.
Could use a remote control power strip as well (I have one in stock and not used at the moment) and just power the amps down along with the fans when not required.
I need to keep the Tivo box powered up all the time.
Cheers
Dave R
Room thermostat is an interesting idea.
I had this problem with a cabinet that held several large chargers and other eqpt. I fitted a mains voltage fan controlled by the main power switch and also a roomstat, the latter connected so the fan ran when the temp was too hot, not the normal way that starts a boiler when the room is too cold. The fan was at the top at the back and pulled the hot air out. There were vents in the bottom. The thermostat was set to turn the fan on at 30deg C.
The fan was mounted on tensioned rubber strips the way they used to mount microphones. There was a minute gap between the fan body and the surround. That didn't leak much air and it stopped the fan vibrating the surround. The wires to the fan were very thing and coiled before reaching the surround. The result was that the fan was almost inaudible. You couldn't hear it at all when there was any ambient noise.
Apparently every 10deg of heat reduced the life of electronics by half.
Bill
Turns out that that isn't correct with hard drives where that has been measured very rigorously indeed with server farms.
As temp exceeds 40 it is. Below that the graph is something else. There's a survey on this (google?) that only covers upto 40, and thus draws altogether the wrong conclusion
NT
Put the fan halfway up the shelf stack. You might find temps back there are ok, its not needed. Power from a switchable voltage wallwart.
NT
Hifi is designed to operate without fans in ambient up to about 40C.
The difference between no airflow, and a reasonable fanless convection is about 4-8:1
Then another 4:1 for real fan blown.
In practice if there is somewhere for cold air to get in and warm air to get out you will be OK. No need for fans
Its sealing the heatsinks that destroys the kit.
No, that was what was disproven.
The backblaze survey covers over 40 too.
NT
On 23 Feb 2015, David grunted:
For what it's worth, I recently set up a similar quantity and type of kit in a cabinet below the TV (only one amp though, and that's what gets hottest).
My cabinet is quite spacious inside, and has doors on the front (the kit is controlled via IR remote extenders - all very neat and SWMBO-friendly!) and has quite small ventilation slots on the top rear, and the front bottom below the doors, and deep gaps at the back of the shelves, to encourage a bit of airflow.
The plan was to monitor the temperature in the cabinet with a min-max thermometer and then add forced ventilation if required. I've found it reaches 32 deg max, which I've felt wasn't high enough to cause immediate panic. Would be nice to keep tt a bit lower though, so I'm watching this thread with interest.
In message , The Natural Philosopher writes
I am surprised that there is thought to be a need for fans.
I've probably posted before about the prototype computer box that I made for silencing machines. It consisted of a small plywood construction top and bottom that forced the air to zig-zag in and out, with a plywood box that sat between the zig-zags. There was a mixture of boat-engine soundproofing and felt-like sound deadening to quieten the whole contraption.
The noise reduction was excellent and the measured temperatures of the machine inside the box were lower than when it stood in free air. Convection works.
I know computers have fans, but don't think that is relevant. In the end we bought quieter machines rather than build a load of heavy boxes.
Perhaps the OP would best leave a little gap at the back and just check the temp
NT
My main issue is that there is minimal clearance between shelves. Also, that as it is sunk into the chimney opening there isn't much scope for convection to take the air upwards as I have (quite understandably) sealed the chimney further up and the only opening is the access slot for the cables behind the TV which will have a brush seal.
I will post photos when the whole thing is a little more cosmetically respectable.
At the moment I have solid plywood shelves 400mm deep which have a 300mm *
30mm cut out at the back to allow wiring to fit behind the shelves.Further experimentation may result in a larger cut out and holes/slots in the shelves to increase airflow and clearance.
Cool air can be sourced from the under floor void.
The HTPC (when I can cut it loose from the print server/scanner server duties in the office) has the potential for a lot of fans but at the moment it runs so cool I have disconnected the two (non speed controlled) case fans to make it quieter. I could always use this as a built in air shifter with fans in the correct orientation to push air out of the front as it can have fans at the front and back and sides (including in each HDD stack).
There is scope at the top of the stack for extractor fan(s) to push air out into the room.
I could always further modify the chimney to pull air out behind the TV.
I won't really now if I have a problem until I fire the whole thing up. I'm just noting the warmth which get trapped in the HiFi cabinet from Ikea which I have above this PC (especially the Cambridge Audio DAC100 which has me looking for a cooling fan, which in turn prompted these thoughts).
Cheers
Dave R
But what is presented is AVERAGE temperatures, not peak temperatures.
Wrong.
+1
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