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Hi all I was wondering if anyone could tell me what the most effective methods / hardware were of keeping the computer cool that you can add on.

Well, the most effective one is a liquid nitrogen cooling, but it´s real expensive and only makes sense for hardcore overclocking weirdos and is nothing for everyday use...
http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20031230/

Next would be water cooling, the prices for such devices have fallen in the last time, and the safety inceased (they say)...
http://www.water-cooling.com/
But to be honest I wouldn´t like the fact that water is flowing in my system, a little leak would cause heavy damage, I don´t know people which use such devices but I know people with fish tanks and their problems with water pump leakages, technically it´s almost the same.

I´m using the good old fans, reliable and pretty cheap. For my AMD socket A I use a Arctic Cooling Copper Silent 2L, it has a adjustable fan speed and is really silent. Silence is imo very important, especially when you have to work for hours.
Also important is the case, it´s good when it´s a big one with much space so the air can flow in the case, I use this one for both of my boxes:
http://www.ms-tech.de//en/produkte/geha ... ndex.shtml
It has a nice design, much space inside, a preinstalled 120mm-fan on the front which also cools the HDDs and is really cheap!
To make sure the air can flow inside the case it´s inevitable to use rounded IDE cables.
Here´s a pic of my main box:


Looks nice, was pretty cheap and the system is stable and silent, even in the hottest summer day....

If the above post didn't help(which, I'm quite sure it did )...just look around.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/
http://www.compusa.com/
http://www.computergeeks.com/
(just a few computer hardware sites..)
Like I said, look around, compare prices, etc.
I agree with Bad_Brain on the water cooling though...I don't like the idea of water in my system.

Now, the fact that I use the top of my box to hold my drink, as an eating table, and a place to hold my keyboard..and occasionally random items... has nothing to do with this.

keeping my puter cool in this dusty basement wall hole is hard, not just the fact of keeping cool, but keeping it dust free...im gettin a nitrous set, just so i can say i got one

A cheap way to keep you computer cool is to open up the case about once every two weeks and using a can of compressed air to blow all the dust away. Also, in a recent article that I read, the Cooler Master's Hyper 6+ ranked number one out of ten air-cooling systems tested.

Right, Cyberpulse! Should be done at least once a month.
Checked the Cooler Master Hyper 6, surely the cooling performance is really good, but there are several problems:
- the weight, 1060 grams is really heavy so the cooler needs to be taken off when you want to transport the PC in order to avoid damaging the mobo. and even without moving the PC around the mobo can be damaged just by the weight.
- mouting the device can be a big problem because of the universal mounting system and the size of the device.

well, I´m a silence-freak, so the Thermaltake Sonic Tower would be the right thing for me, but gawd, the device is so damn big...

Yeah, weighing two pounds by itself is a big problem. The Thermaltake Sonic Tower is a real beast looks pretty cool though.