We're in the middle of giving a neglected gaming rig some much needed TLC. So far we've gone through and given it a good cleaning, now we're ready to get in and boost the airflow so it can stay cooler for longer.

The trick to this making sure you've got a unified stream of air moving right through your case and hitting all the right components. Typically the front of your case makes for the best air intake, while the top of the case makes the best extraction point.

Of course all of this is dependant on a number of factors: does your case have the ability to mount a top fan? Where do you keep your tower? Is there room at the rear of the case for ideal air flow? It's best to consider all of this when installing your fans and directing your air current.

With all that in mind, let's get to it.

Go with the Flow

We're working with the Cooler Master Storm Enforcer, a great mid tower with plenty of mounting options. We also made sure to point out that it's better for the owner to keep their rig on their desk so it isn't sucking up as much dust from the carpet.

Bring the cold air in from the bottom of the case makes sense when you start thinking about hardcore things like thermal dynamics.

If hot air rises, and then the air moving through your case will naturally want to move up anyway, making an air current with less resistance. Huzzah!

With that in mind, we strapped in a Cooler Master MegaFlow 200mm Silent Fan to the front of the case for air intake, and a second to the top of the chassis as an extractor.

To give this Storm Enforcer a unique look, we swapped out the factory red LED fans for a nice frosty blue (but more on that later…)

Now we've got a cooling system that runs through the HDDs and through the GPU, then passing the RAM and CPU before exiting out the top. Perfect!

Manage You Cables!

After putting all that effort into making our fans as fast as a Ferrari, we'd be pretty silly not to clear the road of any obstacles…

Cable management isn't so much an exact science as it is a mini game. Wrangling cable to the back side of your chassis may sound easy, but keeping it organised and being able to close your case after you're done is a lot harder than it sounds.

Pro Tip: before you start wrangling, be sure that everything is plugged in and give your computer a quick boot to check for any error messages. The last thing you want to do is get the side panel back on, go to turn your rig back on and find that something doesn't work.

Now that things are all clean and tidy, you'd think we'd be finished, right?

Continued in part 3…