Bitcoin Forum

Are server cases for mining worth it over open airframes? Which one are you usingng and which one is your favorite please tell us why, the only issue I have with server cases is the noise of the fans what about you?.

Server cases can be too noisy because to many cooling fan installed on them, if you have more than two of them around I use open air frame for all my rigs because I can easily remove GPUs or face any troubleshooting compare to server cases that requires opening the case apart.

The cheapest solution is an open case. It can be used for video cards RTX 3050-3070 and analogues, and for RTX 3080-3090 you need to use closed cases, because they provide good cooling.
I don't see the point in using the RX 580 in a closed case. It is very expensive.

All depends on your mining room. I have an 100m² room for my 200 GPU´s, so i don´t need any closed cases. We have only 2x 40cm exhaust fans for summer. They start if the room temperature go above 25C slowly and with not making any noise. This 2 fans are enough to bring down room temperature for about 5 - 10C. And in my opinion this is the most important think - bring the warm air out of the room.

We build our own open cases - i work as a design engineer in a sheet metal processing company.

I am using open cases the most,even in a riserless motherboard which I got recently where heat is a bit more than in a motherboard that works with risers because here cards stand next to each other adding to the heat.The temperatures are acceptable for me with my weakest card the Rtx 2060 12 GB being a maximum of 55 degree celsius and cards like Rx 6800 Xt,Rtx 3060 ti and Rx 5700 Xt are all under 50 degree celsius or at a maximum of 50 degree when the room temperature is 15-18 degree celsius.

In the end different environments require different setup and cooling and there is no golden rule that this x is better than this y.

Server case cools GPUs better than open frame cases also open frame cases are less cheaper than server cases, if you are using AMD GPU or 3090 that are very hot in temp it's better to use a server case for such cards mind you server cases are too overpriced.

in my opinion the server cases are more beautiful on an aesthetic level but the open cases are much more practical if you have to change / replace some pieces

If we talk about server cases, they require additional maintenance. It is enough to blow air through video cards in open cases, and in closed cases it is necessary to clean or wash the dust filters. Closed cases are much more expensive, so the issue of aesthetics is not always relevant.

I have both.

Server cases are better.

But they cost more.

The room size means a lot.

The bigger the room the less need for server cases.

Hot massive cards like server cases.

I have a new shelf set up


_______________
|case 1.      case 3|
|case 2. L7 case 4|
_______________
|case 5.     case 7|
|case 6 L7 case 8|
_______________
|case 9.      case 11|
|case 10 L7 case 12|
________________
|case 13.    case 15|
|case 14 L7 case 16|
_________________
foot           foot


it does lower maintenance a bit since no case is buried in stack of three or four.


the shelf setup is 90 inches wide and 24 inches deep

three of them allow for

48 cases and 12 L7 Ltc miners

use about 140kwatts for this mine.

when done it will be 270 inches long 24 inches deep and 72 inches tall.

or 22.5 feet by 2 feet by 6 feet

or 7 meters by .6 meter by 1.8 meter note 📝 i rounded to meters in my head i could be off a bit.

A mining rig needs the most hashes you can get. This means high clock speeds and GPU fans that will be spinning fast. You cannot get away from the noise, just deal with it. Closed cases are designed to do good cooling and airflow be are too expensive if you have many cards, rather just build open racks and place fans behind the rigs to blow away the air and a proper aircon to fit your room size or extractors to get out the hot air. Save on cases and rather spend it on aircon or extractors.

I only use cases now, much easier with cooling the the riserless MOB are a huge advantage.

There are pros and cons for both.

Generally most go for open air because it’s cheap and quiet. However if you got tons of rigs and not enough room you will run out of space.

Server chassis is good because it’s compact and it’s easier to direct air flow in and out. You can’t do that with an open air rig. With open air the heat goes out everywhere. So if the room is hot you will have issues exhausting the air. With a server chassis you can hook up some tubing and direct it outside.

However they are crazy loud and expensive to buy.

Enclosed cases work better in a more professional environment where higher density is desired
and has additional environmental control, and of course, noise is not an issue.

Drifting a little offtopic, fixed slot spacing on riserless mobos limits the size of cards that will fit
with proper spacing for ventilation. My only complaint about riser mobos is the flimsy PCIe tab,
a direct USB connection is preferred.

Server case is better but not for RTX nvidia :/ i have AMD RX580/590 in case and RTX 30xx in open air rig

Video in Russian, where the miner has 4 closed cases on a small balcony. The noise is not very strong and with the door closed it does not even interfere with living in an apartment, but there are problems with cooling these mining farms in the summer.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U--8eT3FbPc

Nice pocket farm. Looks like he is close to 1.7gh

Open case if you have space. Easy to access the cards for any issue.

I'm team open air frames.  Cheaper, and I think they do a better job cooling on a small scale.  If you're got a massive farm going, obviously server cases would be the better way to go.  If you're just a guy wanting to build a GPU rig for cheap to run in a spare bedroom or garage, you won't do better than open air and I don't think noise is much different either way.  I also have both and I don't have enough hardware running in my opinion to justify using server cases.  Not to mention I love being able to swap out hardware or remove things in a hurry for maintenance from the open air frames.  Even dusting is a much simpler task...

I like server cases because they are more protective from dusts and mistakes from people around you (family).. I always hated them until a friend build his miners with server cases and opened one for me to take a look inside, the GPUs are almost dust free compare to mine that's open air frame.

It's not a problem. Onin once a year you take the farm outside and blow it with a special compressor from aliexpress, which costs $20. Cleaning filters on server cases is a big problem. But you will not be able to install hot RTX 3080 and 3090 graphics cards in open cases, because there will be problems with lowering the hashrate.

False, i have 3080 Ti rigs working perfect on open cases, If you want use a octominer for 3090 or 3080 ti you waste a lot of space becuase you need a octominer x12 for only 6 cards, the space is too little inside and even with the fans working as ASICMINERS (with the high sound) they cant cool the cards, thats why you need put max 6 cards...

well I own a few server cases.

octominer 12 card
minerdude 12 card
minerdude 8 card

if you have rtx a2000 rtx a4000 rtx a4500 rtx a5000 the 12 card cases are very good.

but if you have fat ass cards minerdude's 8 card case fits 7 fat cards easy peasy along with 1 rtx a2000

or 8 fat cards with a bit of a struggle.

the 12 cards cases from minerdude can be 4200 watt or 3600 watt

the 4200 watt case does 12 rtx a5000 cards with zero issues


I just got three 8 card cases in.

I will be juggling all my 12 card cases to pull all the fat cards out and put in the eight card cases.

this will free up the 12 card rigs to load up with the rtx a2000 cards coming in.

give me some time I will photo the room.


I purchased this to monitor temps and humidity

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08PKWPKM2?
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01N17RWWV?


I hooked up 2 android phones and 3 iPhones to it.

my partners and i will get room temps and room humidity readings and heat notices 24/7

Ok, how do you cool your graphics cards in the summer? Even if you install video cards at a distance of 20 centimeters from each other in an open case, you will still have problems with overheating. Therefore, I will not believe that you do not use additional cooling.

Almost all open air rigs have fans that push the air to the front... what you do with that hot air is your design. I have 6 exaust 12 inch inline fans AC Infinity CLOUDLINE S12 to puch the air outside for example.

Less mechanical assistance is required with open air rigs in a well ventilated room.
A simple box fan works great.

Very expensive solution
https://www.acinfinity.com/hvac-home-ventilation/inline-duct-fan-systems/cloudline-s12-quiet-inline-duct-fan-system-with-speed-controller-12-inch/
That's why I don't like 3090 or 3080 series

A well-ventilated room is not enough for my comrades in the summer, some video cards still overheat. I look for other people's experience, and for 3090 or 3080 series miners try to buy closed cases, because it's cheaper than doing good ventilation

Where I'm from there is always too much dusts here and there either when it's rainy or sunny days and I used few open frame cases for some rigs which gather dusts too fast but the server case one I have is neat only the outer surface is dusty not the GPUs.

You can use any fan you want, i use those ones because they are silent,..

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Put some filters on your intakes.

Are you telling me you can keep GPUs cooler when they're closer together in an enclosed case
than with an open air rig in the same room using the same number of fans? If so I don't believe you.

----

Another factor with cases is the type of GPU. Teslas & Quadros are designed to be placed closer together
and usually blow the hot air out the back instead out the sides into the case like most gaming cards.
Gaming cards need more space and don't work as well in cases designed for blowers.