Your take on fan filters?

[LodeHacker]

Hi! My take is that fan filters suck. Sure they keep your PC's inside clean, but in long use fan filters are bad. Not only do they block a good deal of dust, but they also block loads of air. In addition if you don't wash them often the dust that gathers around the filter material will block more air. Also... all filters I've used in the past were tedious to wash. It took a lot of time to wash and dry a single filter that I didn't like it at all.

What is even more annoying is that most intake filters are placed in the front of the case behind the front panel so to get those filters out you need to take more parts off your PC than just the side panel.

In the same time where I wash some dusty fan filters, I could just as well gently blow the inside of the PC with a vacuum. The end result is fantastic and the PC looks like new from the inside. I just pop off the side panel of the case, take out a vacuum, go out and blow the case, put the vacuum back and pop the side panel in. No smelly filters to wash and it takes less time with the vacuum than to wash filters.

What's your take on fan filters? I've came to the point that I dislike them a lot and going old school with vacuums is much better because there's nothing that will block your PC's air intake like a fan filter.

I think air filters have more cons than pros. Sure it keeps your PC inside clean, but you need to clean the filters regularly anyway to avoid the problem of having a lot of dust blocking the air. So why not just give your PC a good blow say once in a month? Ain't that bad and takes less than 10 minutes anyway.

[KlaymenDK]

So why not just give your PC a good blow say once in a month? Ain't that bad and takes less than 10 minutes anyway.

Um, because most of us can't be bothered to "clean house" all that often?

Really, I understand the point you're making. Any regular cleaning habit is fine, filters or not; but if you don't clean it, it's better to have the dust outside than inside. I mean, the dust is going to settle somewhere anyway, and the filters are built to be easily cleanable -- unlinke, say, my HR-01 with its relatively big yet narrowly spaced surfaces (I guess I could clean it with a pipe cleaner plus some hours worth of fiddling).

So you see, I've voted Yes. I have an Antec P180 with dual front-side filters that are easy to come by (no need to open the side panel, but as you say it's a good idea to that anyway).

[LodeHacker]

Of course cleaning habits depend on the person, but even if blowing with a vacuum sounds like hard cleaning work it's done faster than you can think of and the result is awesome.

Also I know what you mean. I have the ZALMAN CNPS-7700 Cu myself (new rig will have CNPS-7000C Cu LED) and in both coolers the fins are spaced tightly. However I have noticed that blowing the heatsink with a good deal of air it will look cleaner, but not like new; with fan filters used it's nearly as clean as new. However it's not like there will be a lot of dust in the heatsink. If you clean the PC inside regularly, either by blowing or by just cleaning the filters, all components including the CPU cooler will look like new totally in mint condition, so the above applies only if you are lazy and clean your PC once a year

[blackworx]

Cleaning out someone else's dust bunny infested machine with a vacuum is admittedly very satisfying work, but I'd never let my own machine get to the kind of state where that becomes necessary, and vacuuming inside a PC which is only slightly dusty is not rewarding at all. Certainly imho the results are never "awesome".

I've never had a PC where getting at the filters involved dismantling part of the case; nor have I ever had a PC where a filter has been detrimental to the cooling performance. Perhaps I've just been lucky, but filters have always been good for me.

Prevention > cure

[Thomas]

Cases and dust filters comes in many incarnations - on some, it takes less than 30 seconds to un-dust them, dismantling included. And if done properly, impact on airflow is reasonably low.

[Olle P]

I use two pretty large filters for vacuum cleaners, mounted side by side in the bottom of my case. All incoming air will pass them, move through a short noise trap and pass one of three parallel 12cm fans before entering the actual computer interior.

Cheers
Olle

[Sylph-DS]

A dust filter is generally quite an impedance (= requires higher fan RPM = more noise), which in my opinion is the only reason not to use one. If cleaning your dust filter is more work than cleaning the inside of your PC, than you're using a shitty dust filter. This counts especially if you're using a smaller case. A p180 may be nice and roomy, but if I want to properly vacuum my Antec Solo that's upwards of 30 minutes of work, simply because my case is full. There is just no space to vacuum it.

I personally use the filter that came with my Antec Solo, it's pretty good and easy to clean, albeit somewhat impeding.

Conclusion: It's really just a matter of choosing whether you want to go through that regular hoovering for that extra bit of quiet.