Dell OptiPlex 7060 Micro 40mm Front Fan Holder

I designed a front fan holder to mount a 40mm Noctua NF-A4x10 5V USB fan on the front of my case. This machine is set up as a server with enterprise NVMe drives. While the CPU temperatures were fine, the drive was running hot at around 70°C. Adding this fan has brought the drive temperature down to around 55°C without increasing the CPU temperature.

The holder is designed to be friction-fit, allowing easy adjustment to find the optimal placement. Despite the fan sitting behind a half-vent in this area of the case, my testing shows this positioning offers the best cooling performance for my setup.

The fan is powered via a rear USB port. I'm considering adding a USB-connected potentiometer to adjust the fan speed for quieter operation. I also tested several 40mm fan grill designs, but they increased the pitch of the fan noise too much, so I opted for a bare fan. A grill that matches the front vent pattern of the case would be a nice aesthetic upgrade, though.

EDIT: I added a potentiometer like this, and it enabled dialling the fan speed down and still keeping the cooling benefits.

This was a quick design, so the dimensions aren't perfect, and there’s definitely room for improvement. It should fit other Dell OptiPlex micros with the same dimensions, but unable to test as I don't have them.