[Jamdee]

Hi XBMC'ers,

I have a Arctic Cooling MC101 click
It is almost the perfect HTPC (Small, nice looking, powerfull, lots of connections, tuner, IR).
Only there's one problem, under load it gets hot, very hot!
I have changed the fan profiles in the BIOS as recommended by Arctic to the optimal settings, which makes the fan pretty noisy & it still gets v hot.
I know part of the design is for the case to act as a heat-sink, but it gets so hot that you can smell the rubber feet burning!
It is on top of my tv cabinet, so well ventilated.
I have tried to get help from Arctic but they were pretty useless, they recommended I buy a usb fan!?
So all I can think of is to give it a new case with better ventilation? I believe it is a custom motherboard, so I am unsure what would fit it?
Please somebody help, I'm at my whits end!

[nc88keyz]

it does get very hot by design, so does the original apple tv.

I use mine horizontally and bought some pc feet for it a while back. They were like 5-6 bucks. Nothing special but look nice. I do use standby though when not in use. Do you?

I have 4 of these btw, and all are similar.

I posted in the official thread the links to buy the feet i described. I never even attempted to use the vertical position and pedestal. Just didnt work right for what i needed.

[Jamdee]

Thanks for the quick reply nc88keyz.
Hmmm ok I'll give that a try, what BIOS settings do you use for the fan?
I do put it in standby when not in use, it starts to smell after about 30 mins of underload usage though.
Could I also ask what set-up you are using? Windows, OpenElec....etc?
Thanks.

[Jamdee]

Anybody got any ideas on a case? would love to squeeze a bluray drive into the mix?

[calibos]

it does get very hot by design, so does the original apple tv.

I use mine horizontally and bought some pc feet for it a while back. They were like 5-6 bucks. Nothing special but look nice. I do use standby though when not in use. Do you?

I have 4 of these btw, and all are similar.

I posted in the official thread the links to buy the feet i described. I never even attempted to use the vertical position and pedestal. Just didnt work right for what i needed.

OP is talking about the newer MC101 not the MC001. AFAIK MC101 is designed to be horizontal anyway.

I've got 5 MC001 too Had 6 but one died on me. Getting refund from Arctic soon as MC001 are now out of production (As indeed the MC101 seems to be unless they are just refreshing the model with a Richland mobile APU. Website says "Not available" for all MC101 models). Gonna build myself something pretty funky for my bedroom instead but based on the design of the MC101.

[Jamdee]

Yes that's correct, the MC101 not the MC001. (See my link above).
Has anybody out there been able to cool there's down? Or retro-fit a new case?

[Dougie Fresh]

It's a proprietary motherboard so you're not likely to find an off-the-shelf case. Someone might custom fabricate one for you or you could build one yourself.

[RaggSokk3n]

Well if your ready to break your warranty anyways, why not just improve the cooling?
Get some nice quality cooling-paste, and use it on every surface that has direct contact with the case - basically everything that is supposed to be cooled by the case. You can also redo the paste under the cpu cooler (but remember to clean the surface well)

Another thing to remember is that these are made to stand in ventilated rooms with a temperature of about 20 degrees celsius... A hot summer day will never be your friend.

I had to mod one of my ml03b(55w psu + 75w gpu = 130w) with 5 extra fans, that's a much bigger case and the case would reach temperatures around 55 degrees celcius in a well ventilated room that had temperatures around 25 degrees celcius. Point being; a room with ventilation and shadow is key for a silent and well cooled htpc - if you don't have that you'll have to compensate with fans and cooling-paste.

[solamnic]

Is you find it toooo hot for your taste ( ;) ) ..

Sell it and buy another htpc ..

It will save you trouble and money in the end ...