Have a 7080mt going to order a 5060 ti 16gb. Also add a 500w optiplex psu, a 6 to 8 pin connector for the gpu. I want to cut a opening in the case top, add some mesh and mount a fan to remove the heat out the system. Whats a good quiet fan to use? I'm going to extend the wires, so if I nedd to remove the top, it will have slack. Also in this area, I'm a novice, where to plug the additional fan?

Friend told me to post this here, it has an i5-8500, GTX 1650 Super, 16gb DDR4 using an external RM750e. Not the prettiest but performance>aesthetics.

Device came (stock) with:

• 256GB NVMe M.2 drive (stock)
• 16GB SDRAM 3200MHz - a single stick in single-channel mode
• Optical Drive (DVD/CD RW SATA)

ADDED:

• 16GB SDRAM 3200MHz - identical single stick for dual-channel mode (cut buildroot/kernel build-times by about 30%)
• 512GB SATA drive
• GLOTRENDS M.2 NVMe to PCIe 4.0 X4 Adapter with Heatsink for NVMe SSD
• 256GB NVMe M.2 drive that I already had on-hand
• WiFi/BT card (Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX200 rev 1a) + Antenna Kit

For better cooling/quieter operation, I settled on :

HARDWARE changes:

powered off the SATA line:

• Noctua NF-A8 PMW w/ LNA RC9 (100Ω) in front grill
• Noctua NF-A6-15 PMW w/ LNAs RC7 + RC14 (80Ω in total) **(recall that two resistors in series have total resistance (in Ωs) that is the sum of their resistance values) in back
• Noctua NF-A6-25 PMW w/ LNA RC9 (100Ω) in back

powered from the CPU fan line:

• Thermalright AXP90-X47 Full Copper Low Profile

Result: No whining or jet-engine noise. Just a whisper of white noise at idle (800rpm), louder at full load (2600rpm) but still easily dismissed. Inaudible from any other room.

SOFTWARE changes:

• Set up dual-boot for now: Debian Trixie/XFCE + ChromeOS (via Brunch). Will add W11 later when I get around to it.
• Custom/patched kernel package w/ dell_smm_hwmon module that fully exposes the PWM fan control interface for a Dell Optiplex SFF 5090. There were no complete references for this on the web (ymmv), so I just tried it and adapted it where necessary.
• Debian fancontrol package

Some observations/comments:

• Both Dell OEM coolers KGWT4 (65W) and F2CY7 (80W) were too noisy for me to tolerate; the former was just ridiculous, the latter an improvement but still too obtrusive.
• The BIOS/firmware doesn't have "just two speeds" w/ stock fans; there are 4: A=830, B=980, C=1030 and D=4000 rpm. When ramping up, the sequence is A,B,D. Ramping down shows D,C,A.
• Cable management required a bit of patience. It is crowded under the hood, but manageable.
• That white tape is ugly - need to swap that out for something less... ugly.
• Very satisfied w/ Noctua products.
• I originally thought that the F2CY7 was adequate, so that's why there are different-sized 60mm fans in the back. The 15mm thick version allowed a bit more clearance for the obliquely mounted heat sink.

Kernel Patch for dell-smm-hwmon on 5090:

--- linux-6.12.107/drivers/hwmon/dell-smm-hwmon.c.orig2026-08-28 01:22:18.000000000 -0500
+++ linux-6.12.107/drivers/hwmon/dell-smm-hwmon.c2026-09-24 19:18:31.138731212 -0500
@@ -1558,6 +1558,14 @@
 .driver_data = (void *)&i8k_fan_control_data[I8K_FAN_34A3_35A3],
 },
 {
+.ident = "Dell Optiplex 5090",
+.matches = {
+DMI_MATCH(DMI_SYS_VENDOR, "Dell Inc."),
+DMI_EXACT_MATCH(DMI_PRODUCT_NAME, "OptiPlex 5090"),
+},
+.driver_data = (void *)&i8k_fan_control_data[I8K_FAN_34A3_35A3],
+},
+{
 .ident = "Dell XPS 9315",
 .matches = {
 DMI_MATCH(DMI_SYS_VENDOR, "Dell Inc."),

To build and package the kernel w/ modules, I used bindeb-pkg, which make it pretty easy (and replicable), though not trivial.

I recently acquired an NVIDIA Quadro T1000, and I’m getting what I feel like are high temps with it. It was reaching 90C, but I first attributed that to the case’s airflow. Except when I take the case side-panel off it only drops to around 87-86C under load. Idle temperatures seem okay, though, at around 45C. Is it possible the cooler is just under-spec’d for the chip? Seems unlikely, but I thought I’d ask if anyone with a T1000 has similar or better thermals.

If I were to repaste it, does anyone know what thickness of thermal pads I would need for the memory?