a) there are other ways to reduce heat
Yes there are, but not in a chassis as a whole, unless you're 'sinking
the heat-producing components TO the chassis, so that external air is
also dissipating the heat... maybe in the old days cases were thick
enough to do that, but certainly not today unless explicitly designed
for such a purpose.
b) even if there weren't, that still doesn't mean "airflow depends on heat".
It doesn't. The statement is logically false.
"Airflow depends on heat", means that the amount of heat generated by
the system, given proper system design, including adequate heatsinks
on components that need them, dictates the amount of chassis airflow
needed to result in desired rise over ambient.
Again, there are other things involved. You can have the same amount of
total airflow in a BTX system, and the heat in the system can be less.
Only if comparing a very poorly ventilated ATX... of COURSE BTX looks
better if compared to worse-case-scenario ATX, as it would vice-versa.
Wrong. There are other factors - factors which, in fact, the BTX design
considers. For example, you can reduce heat with the exact same total
airflow simply by using cooler air.
Yes, but did I really need to mention that this would be considered a
constant? That's pretty much a given, if it were being considered
variable for the example it would've been mentioned.
In a normal ATX design, all else being
equal, the air going over the CPU is warmer than the air going over the CPU
in a BTX system.
By a very small amount, true.
You can also reduce heat with the same total airflow by
directing and concentrating that airflow.
true, but only of the componets in that directed airflow. The reason
you'd have warmer air in ATX as you mentioned above, is because it is
COOLING components. I didn't realize you think airflow is only
supposed to cool the CPU and video card.
The CPU "air funnel" employed in
a BTX system also does this.
The "air funnel" is not a bad design, but it requires even more,
additional airflow to keep the rest of the system cooled, the parts
not in that "air funnel". That's MORE noise.
There is greater efficiency because the air is
forced to flow directly over the CPU, rather than wandering aimlessly around
your case, getting trapped in swirling dead ends around fat IDE cables, etc.
That's where we start to differ in opinion, that it's reasonable to
redesign the whole system chassis because Intel can't get their chips
running cooler, and won't use an adequate heatsink but instead are
passing the buck, trying to make other parties pay for their CPU
cooling. If it's cheaper for them to run a CPU faster and faster and
reduce core size that small, seems to me the prices should go down.
Again, it's POSSIBLE to design the inside of an ATX case so that efficiency
is increased, but it's not INHERENT in the design of ATX, and that's what
we're discussing in this thread.
Wrong.
No, what I wrote is correct. You were narrowly interpreting it to
suit your argument. The correct interpretation is literal, that it
means chassis airflow, not CPU cooling. Heaven forbid we have
something in our systems besides that Intel CPU that needs cooling.
They took an egocentric atttitude even though it is partically
logical.
So far Intel CPUs have ran cool enough that a few degrees one way or
the other aren't a problem, but they want the industry to switch to
designs that help them take the lazy and cheap way out. The truth is
that these fairly minor changes intel wants, mainly the concentration
of air over the CPU, could be easily implemented on ATX by moving the
fan up a few cm or adding second chassis fan mount, but instead they
went to extra measure to make it incompatible. That is what I'm most
opposed to, the incompatibilities that don't offer any benefit
whatsoever, not the way they want the airflow routed for their CPU.
