Master Chief quiet rig, work in progress

[tlinna]

I named my rig Master Chief, because, well, it's a Chieftec case, which I have damped and tried to quiet as much I can with my limited budget (and I hate Halo almost as much as I hate computers. You can't live without them, you can't live with them). For the main parts it has been the same for two years, though I have made a few small upgrades over the two years. It's not a high-end computer, and never was. It has no fancy pants modding or anything, it's supposed to be simple, effective and quiet. It's also a work-in-progress, and has been for about two years. I upgrade or change something when I feel the need for it.

The specs that matters:

- Some black Chieftec case, two years old
- Nexus NX-3000 PSU, two years old too, runs hot
- Asus A7N8X-X mobo
- AMD Athlon XP 2600+ (Barton), no undervolting, default speed
- Thermalright SLK-800 with Nexus 80mm fan on top, Speedfan controlled
- Radeon 9600 Pro with Zalman ZM80C-HP
- Nexus 80mm w/ fanmate (~950rpm normally) and Papst "12dB" (ha!) 80mm @ 7V as case fans
- Samsung SP1614N with Nidec motor (160G, brand new)
- My ye olde trusty Cherry (!) keyboard, made in West Germany!

I think that covers it, now to the pictures.

Overall look is nothing too fancy. The dampening material is 2mm bitumen plus 1 cm of foam on top, the bitumen makes the case quite heavy. The side panel alone is quite bulky, the whole case is a bit over 20 kg, if I remember correctly. Every bit of unused case surface is covered (except for the square space on the side panel, which was reserved for a 80mm blowhole, there just isn't any). I removed one card slot cover to get the fanmate out of the case.

You can also see the 7V trick on the Papst. I must admit I once short circuited the 12V to the ground when I changed the voltages on the fly ... Never EVER try to stick the bare wire to the ground next to the 12V connector when the computer is on. Luckily the NX3000 has a short circuit protection like every PSU nowadays, so I was left with a nice spark and a shut down. And a nice adrenaline rush.

Note the kleenex (or whatever you americans call your disposable paper handkerchiefs) stuffed beside the dvd drive to remove the slack.





Here you can see the hdd along with the main air intake (two 80mm fan slots, pretty open front panel, as you can see). Good airflow for the hdd, sadly it's screwed on the case. You can barely see that I damped it a bit with a .. kleenex on the right side to remove the slack. And another one under the hdd case too.


And the intake from the front. You can feel the airflow clearly when the case is closed.


The 5,25" mounts. As you can see, the case is damped all around, including the unused 3,5" and 5,25" front panels. Perfect space for future softmounting of the hdd:


Damped front door, it really muffles sounds of the dvd drive! That makes two layers of dampening on front for the perfect future place for the hdd.


It's probably not the best acoustic material available, but what can you do.



Okay, that was the pictures. Now, it's pretty quiet, but there's a couple of problems.

- The hard disk freely emits the (idle) sounds through the front air intake
- There is a clear airflow sound when listened closely, but it's low frequency and isn't too obtrusive
- HDD is screwed normally on the case, which amplifies the seek sounds considerably, though AAM in middle setting dampens them pretty well. Haven't tried the quiet setting though.
- The motherboard emits these electrical whirring and beeping sounds depending on processor load, though they remain MOSTLY inside the case, only the idle beeeeep sound gets through. The sound disappears with load (or, more precisely, it changes into that electrical whirring and squeaking, which can be heard only when the side cover is open).
- No dust filters.
- I broke the hinge on the front door and had to duct tape it together.
- And the loudest (or at least most obtrusive) part on my computer...my 10-year-old Nokia 447V 17" monitor. It's good monitor, it's just .. old and noisy. Electrical (coil?) buzzing mainly.

I think the hdd is my problem (leaving the monitor aside) at the moment, although it's the SPCR recommended Samsung SP1614N w/ Nidec motor... I can change the CPU fan speed with Speedfan and the Nexus case fan with the fanmate, and the overall sound changes only very little.

I've thought about getting a Nexus NX-4090 PSU and getting rid of the last Papst fan (Nexus 80mm fans have MUCH softer noise, most clearly on 1000-1500rpm range), though I'm not sure if that would make the computer much quieter... I don't believe I can suspend the hdd on the 5,25" mounts without some cooling (hot air + no airflow + no conducting heat = not good), and hdd cooler/silencers are very hard to find here in Finland (only decent one I saw was the Level HDD SHELL on coolputer.fi at 40 euros, ick!).

Now you can give me the big blue welcome (and comments and advice of course).

[tay]

Hey nice to see someone still stubbornly sticking to the chieftec dragon case. I've had mine for over 4 years but plan on replacing it soon.

Anyway check out powergyozas system here as it contains good tips for silencing the chieftec dragon.

I like your case too and it was fun reading your comments. I've broken the door on mine as well and shorted stuff while moving around live molex wires My system is set up much like powergyoazas except i didnt cut out a hole for a PSU duct, but just removed some drive bays (doesnt apply to you cuz you have a 120mm fan psu).

[juansolo]

The Dragon is a good case, plenty of space in there and well made.

I've got no reason at all to get rid of mine.

[Jan Kivar]

First, let's do the welcome:
Welcome to SPCR, tlinna!

You really have to suspend the HD. The removable drive cage really amplifies the noises from the drive (both idle and seek). Here's an idea to utilize. This way it'll be in airflow path and still cool nicely (with similar mod on my Antec 1030B I went from 31°C to 35°C w/ SP1213N, no fan).

While I have no personal experience, it is said that the purple fan mounts can resonate depending on fan resonance. Follow the link tay provided, there's a way to mount them quite nicely (with foam strips). Search the forums for zip-tie method as an alternate way to mount the fans.

Cheers,

Jan

[tlinna]

Thanks for the welcome.

I bought Nexus NX-4090 to replace my old NX-3000 and removed the last Papst fan, now there's only one Nexus 80mm at the back panel blowing out (and the NX-4090). I removed the Nexus case fan for a few days and had only the NX4090 blowing the air, and it did seem to work pretty well too (hdd was a couple of degrees hotter at about 36C). No significant difference in noise or temperatures. Even turning the case fan at max doesn't affect temperatures more than one or two degrees (noise increases clearly though). (Now, with the case fan at 500-600rpm, CPU while folding (100% load) is ~61C, CPU socket ~50C, motherboard 31C and the hdd at 32C)

The main problem therefore is the hard drive. I don't like suspending it, because I like to keep the temperature as low as possible... and there's no fans at the front to cool the hdd directly. Some heatsink/suspending solution is the best bet, I think, then I could put it in the well dampened area over the dvd drive (no direct way to emit sound through the front panel).

I haven't found any hdd cooling/silencing products available in Finland other than the HDD Shell at coolputer.fi... Which COULD be okay, I guess. Just a bit on the expensive side. Here's a pic. What do you think? At least it looks like it could keep it cool. And you could always suspend THAT, if the mounting mechanism isn't adequate. Screws on foam on the sides, I believe, and I'm not sure if I can mount the 5,25" rails correctly because the dampening material gets in the way.

I guess I'll try to softmount the case fan when I get around to it, I should have some suitable foam lying around. And cut the grills, but I don't have the tools.

[nathan_Chan168]

very nice sound dampening job there

one thing u might want to do is put a 120/92mm fan in the front with an air filter infront of that

otherwise its gonna get dusty =|

and make/find something to mount your hdd at the front instead of where its sitting now, it should help cool it.

the two fans at tbe back look loud, but i have no idea wat their rpms are

looks good!

-nathan

[tay]

Yes that case does get dusty fast because its so open. I just clean it once every few months.

tlinna, you can buy that enclosure i guess, but you will gain a lot just by suspension. Aphonos' drive suspension article (somewhere on the site if you browse around) shows a suspension with a chieftec dragon case. My single HD is sitting on some foam.

Softmounting will gain you a lot for nothing, especially if everything else is quiet. You dont need expensive tools to snip those grills out, you can use tin snips or nibblers which are available here for $10. Maybe its 10 euros there who knows.

Cheers!

[GenghiS_KhaN]

i used to have that case too and a pretty similar system.
Nice setup but i have some questions and ideas.

When I wanted to suspend my hd in that case i removed the bottom removable cage and attached the harddisk with some rubber cord to the removable cage in top. This work but my rubber cord was old and I replaced it by placing my HD on top of a sponge at the bottom front of the case, this way its still in the airflow path and its relatively well dampened.

I still use the sponge method in my new case...

U should really undervolt your CPU if you are so keen about low temperatures. Mine used to be high too untill i undervolted, I gained 10° in idle, 15 under load. My cpu is running at 1.425V now. I tried using a program to slow down the cpu too when not in use but this didnt really help, just one degree.

Did your bitumen and foam dampening help a lot? Because im looking to install some cheap dampening too or maybe i'll get the BeQuiet package but I wonder if the Bequiet is worth the extra money.

Did you gain a lot by replacing the nx3000? Because I have it and its running on the hot side and the air woosh it makes is now my main noise source.

Offtopic: should i replace my Arctic Silencer1 with a passive Zalman 80d?

[tlinna]

Ohh, I'm exhausted. I just cut off the grills with my trusty Leatherman Squirt P4, strained my thumb, cut my finger on the remains of the grills, sandwiched my hdd with the Level HDD Shell, and cleaned the dust.

First of all, the Level HDD Shell seems and feels like a very sturdy hdd casing (and it should, after all it's Finnish quality work...).

So what was in the box? Two blocks of extruded aluminium, four blocks of thick foam, two thin end blocks of aluminium/plastic composite or somesuch, a molex extension cord, screws and clear Finnish instructions. I really like the "asennuksessa saa käyttää pelisilmää" ending in the instructions (I can't translate it).


Certainly it looks like a nice piece of aluminium:


Strategic places before the day's work:



And after, the decoupled case fan (using some foam I found lying around):


The front grills, begging for an air filter... processor (folding) temperature dropped about 10 degrees after cleaning the dust and removing the grills. I can feel the extra airflow. I just couldn't get rid of the horizontal steel plate, because I couldn't get the plastic front panel off (to see the screws). It was impossible to open that last clip on the upper right corner without taking the "wrong" side panel off, and I dismissed it as too much work.. if I only knew what was lying ahead.


And now the HDD Shell with my Samsung SP1614N Nidec (which I don't consider a very quiet drive... I could swear my old Maxtor Diamondmax Plus 9 80GB was as quiet (while NOT seeking) before it began killing my nerves with a very high pitched whine, probably was going to break), it was pretty basic to put together after I got the hang of it. Now I finally realized why they included an extra molex cord with the shell...




Then the kicker: the back plate didn't fit.


After making sure the connector was as deep as it goes (it wasn't) and the plate really wasn't going to fit using civilized amounts of force, I started grinding the back plate with my leatherman. After about half an hour of grinding and cursing later I finally got the back plate in place.


And there it was! The saviour of my silence! It feels rigid and looks very nice too. No slack, the hdd is firmly in place.


Okay, now I just need to get it into the computer...but how? Okay, I'm going to mount it in the 5,25" drive bay normally through the front panel. Yeah, I screw the mount brackets into the foam on the sides (the foam is pretty dense, so the screws hold pretty well, though you obviously can't tighten them much). Okay, in we go! Oh wait, it doesn't fit! The bracket is too high and doesn't fit through...


Oh well, unscrew and screw it again lower, and in it goes. I put back the steel plate with the bitumen/foam damping and the plastic 5,25" cover in front of the shell, so the front panel stays clean and decent looking.

And there it is, just waiting to cablegami the case into shape.


...But what's this! Oh no, I've mounted it upside down! Just my luck. It really is symmetrical apart from the cables coming out in the back, so I just didn't notice. Of course I just had put the cables in order before I noticed something is wrong. Oh well, it can't be hard, just pry the front panel open again and take the shell out and turn it around... RIGHT. Of course, it didn't fit, because the brackets were screwed lower. So I had to unscrew and screw them again...

When I FINALLY got the computer operating after hours of cursing and a strained thumb and a bleeding fingertip later, it was much quieter. The hdd can still be heard though (soft low frequency whoosh), and the airflow is much better than before, except for the hdd. There's no effective airflow around the 5,25" drive bays at all, so hdd temperature has gone up a bit:


That chart covers a time of 2,5h, so I guess it's the air around the shell that's warming up gradually (it took half an hour to reach 35C, which was a normal operating temperature before, and over an hour to stabilize with web surfing etc mainly). I guess I'm satisfied, though always I could think some ways to improve airflow around the drive bays.

[tlinna]

U should really undervolt your CPU if you are so keen about low temperatures. Mine used to be high too untill i undervolted, I gained 10° in idle, 15 under load. My cpu is running at 1.425V now. I tried using a program to slow down the cpu too when not in use but this didnt really help, just one degree.

My motherboard doesn't support undervolting...overvolting yes, but no undervolting, otherwise I already would have done it. It would definitely be nice to run the cpu fan at lower rpm's, though I think the hdd is still my main noise source.

Did your bitumen and foam dampening help a lot? Because im looking to install some cheap dampening too or maybe i'll get the BeQuiet package but I wonder if the Bequiet is worth the extra money.

Heh, I really don't know. I've always have had this case dampened, so I don't know how it would perform without.

Did you gain a lot by replacing the nx3000? Because I have it and its running on the hot side and the air woosh it makes is now my main noise source.

Well, maybe some, but not very much. NX-3000 was pretty quiet, though my unit developed a bit of bearing noise over the years. The NX-4090 mainly benefits from the bigger fan (maybe a bit more benign noise and better aiflow). I can't compare directly, because I changed other fans at the same time.