Nexus Breeze - disappointment *sigh*

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MainframeGuy
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Nexus Breeze - disappointment *sigh*

Post by MainframeGuy » Wed Nov 03, 2004 12:49 pm

Well I have more or less finished putting together my latest build, quite a high spec machine but I was also hopeful of reasonable quietting....

and I have to say a lot of my hopes were pinned on the Nexus Breeze....

Anyway - incase you are not aware the system comprised basics of:-
MSi k8n Neo Platinum 2 mobo with Winchester AMD64 3500
Radeon 9700 pro minus stock fan with Arctic I cooler instead
Zalman 7000 cooler for CPU
plus the PSU that comes with breeze case (Nexus 3500)
and two spinpoint smasung 160GB drives

That covers the noise sources....

I was too late to read rusty's comments on my NB heatsink (which does not fit along with Arctic VGS cooler) and migvht be slightly nervous until I have some idea of actual temps etc.... etc...

Anyway system is up and formatted and running - temps are refreshingly low and performance is definitely outstanding....

BUT it does make more noise than my old XP3000+ which I spent out some money quieting and only has fans on PSU (probably not active) and CPU....

Moral of the story is I guess... more fans = more noise..... and the Nexus case packs two and I added three, making five as oposed to just two in my old rig - that said the old rig runs a LOT hotter and also is nothing like as fast....

time will tell what I can work with...

On a positive not - both machines are drowned out by my laptop when it is under load and fires up its fan!

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Post by teejay » Wed Nov 03, 2004 1:21 pm

Please keep us updated. I was anticipating your new system almost as much as you were yourself... ok, maybe a little less :)

So, it's down to the usual song and dance I suppose: stop individual components and see if there is a single culprit or that everything just adds up. At what speeds (rpms) are you running the fans? What are your drive temps like? Go to standby mode to get your hdd's to power down to see if that makes a difference, etc.

Hope you enjoy your rig anyhow!

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Post by MainframeGuy » Wed Nov 03, 2004 2:13 pm

oh yes I shall enjoy - and there are a number of things I really must let people here know about the breeze case too (it is good, but not all it is cracked up to be for sure!).

The usual - yes I kniow what you mean - yet I am having a lot of thoughts about this - one of the most radical is that if my old rig has a lot right about it then take what I need out of the new and move it to the old - like a mobo transfer I guess.....

A bit or work for sure - and I need to think long and hard before powering down the two machines I rely on the most! (Damn! Makes me itch for a third backup, but I guess that is where this infernal laptop comes in!) Then again my nightmare scenario would be to end up with TWO moderately noisy machines instead of one quiet(ish) and one unnaceptably quiet....

If you know the background of how I came here the irony of this is that the plan was for the old XP3000 to be moderately loud (going into hallway as server) and the "breeze" build to be the quiet one - so it just goes to teach one a lesson when things turn out reversed! At least it goes to show I did all the right things with my old rig..... I feel proud of that.... Just there is the feeling of missed opportunity on the new build.

Then again.... it is a lot cooler..... so with a fan controller who knows what is possible yet? As you suggest - I shall indeed keep you all posted (oh and BTW my next spend will probably be on patronage here - an invaluable resource!) ;)

PS Only speeds I have are for CPU and NB fans - they are at 1.6 K and 5K RPM respectively so I am highly suspect of that little NB critter! However I have to say I cannot single out a frequency and my gut instinct is that it is all added up - esp. since I can easily hear the difference when I reduce the fanmate on the CPU fan to take it down from 2.6 to 1.6K RPM.

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Post by sthayashi » Wed Nov 03, 2004 3:02 pm

Stop the fans in question. They'll survive a stopped fan for a minute or two, if not longer (stability is another issue/question). And you should have seen the look on my face when I discovered that the northbridge fan on my shuttle is/was causing most of the noise in my system.

Also, I'm not familiar with how the Breeze has its drives mounted, but hard mounting a Samsung is a no-no depending on the case. In a BQE, it's rather noisy and suspension goes a LONG way. So consider booting with the drives unplugged and see how it sounds in comparison.

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Post by teejay » Wed Nov 03, 2004 3:10 pm

IIRC, the Breeze has the hard drives hard-mounted and outside most of the airflow... two of my major gripes with the case. There is room for all sorts of suspension setups though. That's why I suggested going into standby mode from Windows (if running that): quick and easy way to power down the hard disks.

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Post by burcakb » Wed Nov 03, 2004 3:43 pm

Hmm, a 5K fan? That alone would be racing your notebook in terms of noise. My guess is that the Breeze case + the internal dampening material is significantly containing the noise.

The Zalman at 1.6K??? The fanmate can dial it all the way down to 1300. Only then it's quiet. Or you could also add a little inline resistor to drop it down further. I'm running mine at less than 1300. (Don't ask how much, the BIOS reports range from 0 to 600, obviously wrong. I guess it to be around 700 rpms)

Have you undervolted your CPU? A64s undervolt wonderfully.

When you've gotten rid of your northbridge fan and turned down your Zalman, I think you'll find your problem to be the NX3500 PSU. Somewhere - very recently - I think I saw Nexustek began offering the Breeze with the NX4090 as standard. Wonderful news if it's true.

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Post by Tibors » Wed Nov 03, 2004 6:54 pm

burcakb wrote:Somewhere - very recently - I think I saw Nexustek began offering the Breeze with the NX4090 as standard. Wonderful news if it's true.
Your remark made me check it out.
Yes, it is true for an additional €40.

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Post by MainframeGuy » Thu Nov 04, 2004 2:29 am

I was well aware of the NX4090 offering with the breeze case - however there were availability problems and I am hoping the 350 will be up to the job for my needs.....

When I regain enthusiasm I shall be going back inside and endeavouring to determing which fan(s) are the problems.

My big question before I do that - is it worth investing in a fan controller for my experiments? I guess a "four way" would be able to control the case fan, AGP, and Northbridge - but believe PSU should be left alone since it is temperature controlled.

Then again - if I find NB is the main culprit I have to decide if I am happy taking rusty's advice and sawing up my heatsink to replace the fan.... I guess if I can cut the revs low it will be doing same as heatsink and be reversible if there are any stability issues?

This never gets any simpler - I am hoping it will feel a bit more simple as I get closer to my aims.....

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Post by teejay » Thu Nov 04, 2004 2:56 am

Before you go out and grab a fan controller, first I'd check to see if that would help you by doing the "stop this, stop that" routine. You can easily stop the northbridge fan by inserting a soft object in the running fan and close the side panel... no mods needed. Just as an experiment and for a short while only of course (max 1 minute). By the RPM levels you posted it might very well be the problem. If the case fan adds significantly to the noise you could also hook it up to the Fanmate (splice some wires, only connect 1 rpm monitoring wire though), I think it can handle the load. But I doubt it since it's a Nexus.

IIRC Rusty suggested to cut a Zalman northbridge cooler to make it fit: excellent advice! Swapping the NB cooler is usually reversible unless you have to use thermal epoxy to attach it, but I think your board uses mounting holes. You will have to take your mobo out though, that sucks.

And of course burcakb is right (as usual :)): get the Zalman as low as possible, it will cool fine probably. What are your temps like? Even though slightly OT, I am still very curious about drive temps in the Breeze.

We'll get this baby quiet yet! Just wait and see :D

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Post by burcakb » Thu Nov 04, 2004 1:08 pm

Why do you keep the NB fan at all? that's a A64 system right? I mean on a A64 system the NB doesn't do anything like memory access to get it real hot. My board has a large passive sink on it and it barely gets lukewarm. I mean like nearly half the temp of a nForce2 ultra NB and THOSE can be cooled passively so go figure

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Post by MainframeGuy » Fri Nov 12, 2004 12:59 am

HMMmmmmm well last time I was in the case I put my finger as close as could fit and seemed my small NB fan was hot, as if it might get too hot to touch in operation. This makes me feel it had a job to do and also I have read MSI forum posts to this effect. However I have found a mobo utility that lets me slow the NB fan in theory. Unfortunately when I do the fan monitoring goes screwy so I am not sure if it is workin without openning case to try to see/hear.

Right now I am living with my disappointment - there is great irony to me that this custome built into a Nexus Breeze case is SIGNIFICANTLY louder than my old XP3000 Athlon in a generic no-name case that I spent out money to quiet! There is a lesson there.... not sure what it is yet though!

The thing is I have had various issues to resolve just to get new rig running right (still one outstanding with my HD speeds) and only after that shall I return to quieting it (unfortunately budget is almost zero now - all money spent on new build!).

It is hard to quantify the difference into DBa - but I should say my old Athlon system is in the realms of 18-20 DBa (excl. HD noise) and the new AMD64 system in the order of 22-28 DBa. Essentially one is ALMOST acceptable for nighttime and the other is NOT. I was hoping for an ALMOST and an ACCEPTABLE. I think we could all understand what would be acceptable for nighttime operation in the bedroom :) Hence my use of that alongside DBa numbers.

OK - will post again when I come to quiet more - probably as a new thread this time though.

Thanks Burca - but do check some MSI Neo2 threads - think I MAY need the fan...

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Post by Tibors » Fri Nov 12, 2004 8:46 am

If I read the whole thread I get the impression that you are still running the Zalman 7000 at full speed. A Z-7000 at full speed is not quiet. The reason the Z-7000 is so highly recommended is that it still cools well with the included fanmate set at its lowest value. Then and only then the Z-7000 is considered quiet.

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Post by MainframeGuy » Fri Nov 12, 2004 9:41 am

Thanks for the feedback - you are right of course, the way I run my rigs is on full load during daytime when ambient temps and noise are warmer ad louder I turn fanmate up full - then at quiet/late times I turn it fully down (but as you may know this only cuts revs to around a thousand, not as low as I maybe could go).

The point is in the new build the Zalman is not the greatest source of noise at the lower revs - there are other ciulprits adding to it (I am suspecting if I could erradicate NB fan and PSU fan I would approach standard I set on my other rig)

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Post by teejay » Sat Nov 13, 2004 1:47 am

FWIW: I've read through the MSI forums (well, some of them anyway, after a search for "northbridge and cooling and passive") and I really couldn't find any serious problems as a result of a heatsink swap. I've done that swap for the Zalman passive unit on ~10 mobo's (and a few older video cards as well) without any problems.

On one board the sink gets almost too hot to touch (I'd say ~40-50) and still the machine runs rock-stable. So if I were in your place I'd go for that swap and get the biggest noise reduction right there. Not sure if you posted them before, but what kind of cpu temps are you getting? Chances are you can run the 7000 at lowest setting 24/7...

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Post by MainframeGuy » Tue Nov 16, 2004 3:19 pm

sorry teejay - only just picked up your post.... I may well do as you say exactly but I have been focussed on getting my system FUNCTIONAL before addressing quieting again and have had to migrate Windows from IDE to SATA HD (not trivial!) ...

So when I regainb enthusiasm I may well indeed go in and take out mobo for that operation - but before doing so I have to take quite artful measurement and "sculpt" my heatsink as I intend to retain all fins I may - and the rear of my arctic VGA cooler curves over where it will be.... plus I can only test assemble for fit by putting together....

so I must be prepared for some time without my new rig when I do this - you know how it is... quieting costs in more ways than one (*but feels ohhhhh so satisfying when it works!)

By the way if you want to see my load temps for real look in the CASES forum under nexus Breeze initial feelings - I have a thread with speedfan screenshots there///

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Post by teejay » Wed Nov 17, 2004 12:02 am

Same reason why I am postponing suspending my hdd's/changing cpu hsf/doing a psu swap: I have to disassemble the entire thing to drill out the hdd cages and I just want my machine running... not in a lot of pieces. One advantage: noise irritation builds up this way so when you do get around to quieting... instant bliss!

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Post by MainframeGuy » Tue Nov 23, 2004 1:38 am

Right- I now have a Nexus 4-way fan controller in there - presently only connected to Case, Northbridge, and CPU fans. However this is enough to tell me that thew majority of the noise is coming from either my PSU or my Arctic VGA cooler!

Seems since people here have recommended the VGA cooler as a quiet solution it thertefore must, to my amazement, be the Nexus PSU supplied with the case!

Of course I will investigate further before swapping it out for a Tagan, but this is how it looks right now!

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Post by teejay » Tue Nov 23, 2004 2:59 am

Does your controller enable you to actually stop the fans? If not, I would not draw that conclusion so quickly. Just unplug or manually stop the fans with a soft object to see if your assumptions are correct. The Vantec Nexus fan controller uses PWM (if that is the one you are using; Nexus does not build fan controllers IIRC) so PWM resonance could also be what you are hearing right now.
MainframeGuy wrote:Seems since people here have recommended the VGA cooler as a quiet solution it thertefore must, to my amazement, be the Nexus PSU supplied with the case!
People here also suggest the Nexus PSU so I'm not sure if this is true: just stop the fan and find out! You can do that to a PSU as well, just don't insert metallic items :wink:

Another suggestion (I know, I've made it before): the Breeze case has the hdd's hard-mounted to the case. Have you stopped those to make sure they do not contribute significantly to the noise signature? Just put WinXP in stand-by mode and listen.

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Post by burcakb » Tue Nov 23, 2004 10:23 am

...swapping it out for a Tagan
Have you read the many posts here on Tagan?

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Post by Trip » Fri Nov 26, 2004 5:12 pm

I built a system using the same Nexus PSU, and it was very quiet (though in a Sonata case w/ another 12cm case exhaust fan). The PSU fan must be turning fast b/c of the added heat... A Seasonic Tornado 400W is probably the best solution if you want to stick with that case. Its fan ought to stay low under higher temps.

Just out of curiousity, how open is the 12cm intake vent?

Could you Glue two No Vibes III by the intake with the HDDs in them? You'd prob. want to glue foam under the No Vibes. I imagine the HDDs are creating some noise.

EDIT: Tornado 460W --> 400W
Last edited by Trip on Mon Nov 29, 2004 11:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Post by MainframeGuy » Mon Nov 29, 2004 4:07 am

thanks for that tip Trip - I shall sometime soon be going in there and stopping things and listening to work this one out - need to verify my fan controller is up to scratch anyway....

The level where HD's are the main noisemakers is about where I stop with quieting (or at least where I TRY to make myself stop ;) ).... After all one has to be satisfied at some point.... Just my feeling.

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Post by teejay » Mon Nov 29, 2004 6:33 am

MainframeGuy wrote:The level where HD's are the main noisemakers is about where I stop with quieting (or at least where I TRY to make myself stop ;) ).... After all one has to be satisfied at some point.... Just my feeling.
Trust me: you wouldn't if you had 2 Maxtors hard-mounted in a aluminium case... they drown out the noise from 4 Nexus fans @12V, easily... and I never run them at 12V :(

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Post by xxkrnxstylezxx » Wed Dec 15, 2004 6:25 pm

I'm thinking about getting this case...If i just left everything the way it came, and Zalman 7000B hsf, arctic cooling VGA silencer... Would it be quiet??

Or am i better off getting something else..

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Post by Tibors » Wed Dec 15, 2004 7:47 pm

This case is by no means a fast and easy solution to all silencing problems. But I am still convinced you could easily build a quiet system with this case. It all depends on how hot the components are you put inside. If you put in a Prescott chip on a mobo with a 40mm fan and two WD Raptors, then it is going to be loud. But a moderate hot system should work fine.

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Post by Trip » Wed Dec 15, 2004 9:58 pm

I was also considering this case. The fanless XP-120 is positioned right to benefit from the 12cm PSU fan. Put a suspended Raptor over the intake fan, undervolt the CPU (AMD 64) , put in a weak/passive graphics card, and open up the bottom vent around the intake fan and it ought to be a very quiet, medium speed system.

@ $179.95, this case isn't cheap though and NX-3500 isn't as efficient as the newer PSUs. I have my doubts about the Nexus insulation, though I doubt it'd be needed for such a low power system.

I considered this route, but I want a faster system. It's for my father and his current Dell is too slow (and unstable). He needs a fast bootup, minimal studders, and Y2.01K proof (will last 5 yrs.) system.

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Post by MainframeGuy » Thu Dec 16, 2004 2:12 am

this from another thread but on the same topic -

I would not go so far as to say loud, more disappointing because I have another "stock" case that I spent money quieting (I actually spent about what a nexus costs) and I got far better results from my quieting than from my Nexus Breeze build. Having said that a LOT of the noise source from the Nexus is from the rear - so there is scope for damping and baffling there. At least it is directing most of it's noise in one direction. Be aware also it has no doors or anything on the front though.

Overall I found it overpriced and not up to the job in any way as good as a custom build - it does not live up to it's own hype.

Feel free to ask me anything you like or discuss - since I actually have this case running under my desk now!

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Post by Trip » Thu Dec 16, 2004 2:39 am

How open is that intake vent (where the bottom intake fan is)? Is there a grill or just a big fan hole?

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Post by Tibors » Thu Dec 16, 2004 12:21 pm

This thread has pics: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=17706
Big hole with a wire grille.

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Post by Trip » Thu Dec 16, 2004 10:52 pm

Oh wow, that's really open.

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