Wednesday, February 8, 2006
Cooling my XBOX 360
Because I have a ton of equipment in my entertainment rack, cooling is a concern. Adding an XBOX 360 to the mix made cooling more important.
My solution was to mount 3 PC fans to my equipment rack and power them with a variable voltage power supply. By keeping the voltage low, the fans move the air without being noisy enough to hear. One of the three fans is dedicated to cooling the 360.
The fan visible in the photo is actually pulling air out of the cabinet. I chose to make it an exhaust fan because the 360 already has two fans blowing hot air out of the case.
I also built a (somewhat ghetto) pair of risers out of black LEGOs. These risers (visible in the photo, but not in normal lighting) keep the bottom of the 360 about 1 1/2 above my old XBOX.
I got all of the supplies at Radio Shack (fans, connectors to wire fans to power supply, Y adapter to connect multiple fans to power supply and power supply) for about $25.
Because I have a ton of equipment in my entertainment rack, cooling is a concern. Adding an XBOX 360 to the mix made cooling more important.
My solution was to mount 3 PC fans to my equipment rack and power them with a variable voltage power supply. By keeping the voltage low, the fans move the air without being noisy enough to hear. One of the three fans is dedicated to cooling the 360.
The fan visible in the photo is actually pulling air out of the cabinet. I chose to make it an exhaust fan because the 360 already has two fans blowing hot air out of the case.
I also built a (somewhat ghetto) pair of risers out of black LEGOs. These risers (visible in the photo, but not in normal lighting) keep the bottom of the 360 about 1 1/2 above my old XBOX.
I got all of the supplies at Radio Shack (fans, connectors to wire fans to power supply, Y adapter to connect multiple fans to power supply and power supply) for about $25.
¶ 6:56 PM 
Comments:
I've been meaning to ask you where you got your entertainment rack...or was it custom built? I love it!!
posted by 
Christopher : 1:03 AM
Christopher : 1:03 AM Thanks. It is just a store-bought cabinet from TechCraft. The model # is SF60. I bought it about 5 years ago, but I think it was like $250. It is the perfect height for a 65" rear projection TV.
posted by sMoRTy71 : 7:03 AM
sMoRTy71 : 7:03 AM I wanted to do this with my cabinet. I bought an automatic unit off of amazon, but it runs $108!
I was thinking if this doesn't provide enough cooling, I'd add some intake fans along the bottom of the cabinet, or maybe more exhaust when I am using the 360. Can you give me a parts list please? At minimum what power supply did you use?
Thanks!
I was thinking if this doesn't provide enough cooling, I'd add some intake fans along the bottom of the cabinet, or maybe more exhaust when I am using the 360. Can you give me a parts list please? At minimum what power supply did you use?
Thanks!
posted by Anthony : 10:38 AM
Anthony : 10:38 AM By the way the amazon product I got was:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000K6IOXE/002-2378464-9508808
I think it's a much bigger fan than you are using, but the cabinet I have has closed glass doors in the front, and the plan is to add enough cooling so the doors could be closed during operation.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000K6IOXE/002-2378464-9508808
I think it's a much bigger fan than you are using, but the cabinet I have has closed glass doors in the front, and the plan is to add enough cooling so the doors could be closed during operation.
posted by Anthony : 10:41 AM
Anthony : 10:41 AMblog comments powered by Disqus
About Shawn Morton
Married father of 4, social media strategist at Nationwide, consumer electronics enthusiast, hair metal aficionado.
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