Which PCI-E socket for video card?

[Cams]

I just got my Asus P7P55D and i7-860 today and it works! Three months I've been without a computer, thanks to a vendor who treated me very badly and will never see my business again.

This time I had the good sense to test that the system would boot before I spent the time putting it together neatly.

I got the Noctua NH-U12P cooler and am building it in an Antec SLK-3000B case. I have an orange Nexus fan at the front of the case and one at the rear, as well as the Seasonic 550HT. I'm not sure whether I'll use the big old fan on the Noctua or not, but whether I do or not, there is a clear air-flow path from the front of the case to the rear.

I have a single-slot passive video card. Considering the air-flow, would it be better to put the video card in the top PCI-E slot or the bottom one? If it's in the top, the top of the video card is pretty close to the Noctua cooler (the video card's heatsink is on the bottom of the card). That would kind of put it more in the air-flow than if it were in the bottom socket. But the other argument is that if it's in the top socket, it's closer to the CPU and so two heat-generating components are pretty close to each other.

So I'm looking for some advice really on what would make the most sense in cooling terms.

I'm off for a bath and then to build this puppy. I'm so excited!

[lm]

Try the one that is more convenient for you when you don't take temperature into account. Build it and see what the temperatures are. If you are happy with them, you are done. If you are still curious, see what temperatures you get if you switch slots.

[AZBrandon]

You should consult the owner's manual. Sometimes certain slots are only capable of 8X or 4X transfer rate rather than the full 16X transfer rate. Especially with it being a P55 chipset motherboard, there is a good chance only one slot is 16x capable - usually the one physically closest the CPU socket.