Well they claim to do in in a anechoic chamber but who knows if thats true or not. I apologize if I'm coming off sounding like a dick, but when I said put their "specs to the test" I meant a basic SPCR style review of the fans.

It takes more than an Anechoic chamber to get those measurements. I want to know what tool they used to get those measurements. And where do you get one? Even SPCR's SLM has a lower limit and I think that this site is actually very close TO that limit. I don't know for certain, but I'd guess that the lower limit for SPCR's tool is somewhere around 10-15dBA.

I wouldn't trust any measurement below 20 dBA (SPCR's included). The theoretical limit of the SPCR SLM is 10 dBA (no settings below that), but in practical use I believe the lower limit is 16 dBA. This is the lowest level I've ever seen it measure, and inconsistencies between measurments taken at two different locations where the ambient measured 16 dBA suggest to me that these locations had different ambient levels ... but the SLM was incapable of noticing.

I'm building myself a case from scratch and I want to use standard fan headers so that I can use any regular fan.

Would anybody happen to know the exact Molex model number for the Fan headers?

I found this one, but I'm not sure if it's the right one :
3.96mm (.156") Pitch Wire-to-Board Header, Vertical, Low Profile, 2 Circuits, White

From an earlier thread:
Hopefully that'll help.

=> Dead on my firend! Thank you very much!

can you guys do a review of the Scythe S-Flex fans please? Have heard some reports that they are very quiet with fluid dynamic bearings and are comparable to Nexus, if not better. Would a full review be possible? Would love to read SPR analysis...

There have been several user reviews of the Scythe S-Flex in the Fans and Controllers forum, of course they are not formal SPCR-endorsed reviews but generally they report much the same thing, ie they are good quiet fans.

Thanks jaganath. Thing is, and at the risk of sounding very demanding, I get the impression from people's comments and some reviews that these fans might best the Nexus ones. Given that this site specialises in Silent component reviews, is probably the most prestigious one on the net in this regard, and has the Nexus fans listed as (amongst) the best fans with respect to noise, one would think that a decent and potential challenger to their no 1 position would deserve a full and prompt review.

Sorry to sound like a whinging and demanding bugger SPR but it's just how much I respect this site and would like to see it!

I reported on the S-Flex E in "Six exhaust fans at 1028RPM" or whatever the title is. [Linky - Mod] The Arctic-Cooling fan was clearly outclassed and, in my opinion, did not belong in a collection of quiet fans. The S-Flex was next worst! Its motor noise at 1028RPM was clearly greater, by a good margin, than any of the other 4 fans I tested.

Of course, there's the question of variance. I might have a bad S-Flex E.

Thanks for the link Felger. Though I am a little surprised by the results, I appreciate the trouble you went to get them and consider them serious objective information.

I was just wondering since a sales rep tried to sell me those as the quietest 80mm fan out there.

Sales reps usually have no hands-on (ears open) experience with fans. Not many folks do. They repeat what they are told about fans, mostly. Ditto quiet products, in general.

Hey, I need a good low-profile 80mm fan (15-20mm) for the dreaded vga duct in my p180. They seem very hard to find and there are none in the recommended list. Does anyone have one they can recommend?

Same old list of recommended fans....

I still don't understand all this effort to create and describe in detail such a good test bed without testing new fans. 4-5 months and still no review of Scythe S-Flex

Apologies for complaint - just think that time spent updating the test bed write up would have been better spent reviewing new products.

Would love a review of Noctua's latest fans: NF-S12 800rpm and NF-S12 1,200rpm. They have advanced oil based fluid dynamic bearings and based on fluid dynamic modelling for lower speed fans, have specially modelled fan blades to lower noise. In addition, they believe that noise degradation over time is much improved over ball bearing, sleeve fans and have v interesting associated graphs. Check Noctua's website, there is v detailed info and they have clearly done a *lot* of research in this area. Some v positive web reviews out there too. They ain't cheap but I would be really surprised if they are at least not a contender for quietest/most efficient 120mm fan ever made...

Check
http://www.quietpc.com/gb-en-gbp/products/120mmfans
also shows interesting list. Have heard the Xilence fans are very quiet too.

This article is the prelude; SPCR wouldn't release the results without explaining how they were produced, so this had to come first. Expect to see a roundup packed with data in the near future.

One of my biggest PC complaints is how cheap and noisy most fans are. In my experience with PCs to date, I've had the following failures:

1 hard drive failure, circa 1995
1 motherboard failure circa 2002
about 50,000 fan failures, most common among case fans and video card fans.

In my quest to find high quality quiet fans, I've pretty much failed. It seems I'm about the only person in the world willing to pay a rediculous premium for quality fans (as all of them seem to be the same cheap garbage). However, I did purchase some of the SilenX fans about a year ago, and they have more than lived up to my expectations (albeit, my expectations for fans are rather low). They have been very quiet with sufficient airflow and no failures yet. They have a pleasing appearance and the packaging was nice for a small company. The company was also prompt to reply in an inquiry I sent them. I can't speak for present day, but they also had several thickness options which was an added plus. Their screwless grommet things are nice too.

Regardless of their marketing tactics, I think they deserve to be in any reviews. They probably just reduce the speed and paint common fans from a decent bulk supplier, but in the world of fans, I guess that's as good as it gets.

Do you work as a tech for Google or something?

More SilenX spam I know of a company that you could offload those 50,000 duffers to. They'll stick a shiney label on the fan motor, and offload them to the unsuspecting

So many dirty things about this post. First of all, who posts such a long positive rant about SilenX for their first post on this forum? Second, how can you state X(exaggerated) number of fan failures without pointing out any specific ones and immediately jumping to "SilenX" did it right! Third you act like only SilenX has premium fans. THERE ARE TONS OF GOOD PREMIUM FANS OUT THERE, See a) Noctua b) Nexus c) Scythe on and on. Also to note these fans will tend to be quieter than the so-called SilenX premium. And there's nothing special about fan thickness or screwless grommets.

I especially love how you generalize that all other fan makers just get cheap fans and decorate them. I'd love to see what some of the better fan makers think of your completely incorrect comment. Overall I'm rather disgusted someone(who may or may not be related to SilenX) is still posting completely bs marketing pretending to be a real poster.

Hello,

Some of the S****X fans are just remarked Globe fans...and then sold for a ridiculous amount of money.

In the (just) 6 years that I have a PC, I never had a fan failure.
The oldest are Thermaltake case fans (5 of them) that came with the case: nothing special about them but they still work (had to solder the wires on 1 of them because I tore them apart by accident).

A fan from SilenX was included in the 80mm fan round-up.

Obviously, I do. And the reason I did is because there seemed to be a lot of anti-SilenX talk when, to me, SilenX seems to be as good as any other out there.



I'm not trying to say SilenX is the best. I'm just not sure they deserve such hate. Most of the fans I've had fail were fans that came as part of some other purchase, including fans that came with some of the cases I've used, as well as several stock video card fans from both ATI and nVidia vendors.



I disagree on the TONS OF GOOD PREMIUM FANS OUT THERE piece. They are all pretty sad, due to the markets emphasis on cost above all. Though technically, I haven't tried Noctua or Nexus fans. I'll check them out on my next upgrade.



I disagree on this to an extent as well. The last time I was looking for a thin fan to fit in a tight space, the options were severly limited. And I rarely ever see fans sold with the screwless grommets, though perhaps if I searched harder, I could find the screwless grommets sold separately?



If you read it again, you'll see that I'm suggesting that's probably what SilenX does.



Whatever. When I bought from SilenX, I was specifically looking for quiet fans, and SilenX appeared to be the only company with a line focusing on quiet operation. I tried them out, buying several fans from them, and they didn't disappoint. Perhaps there is nothing special about SilenX either, but I don't see why people interested in this site would throw so much hate towards a PC fan company that at least is *trying* to cater to the needs of the silent PC community. No one else is.

The silenx fan in the review was an old model just like the papst and nmb samples. It's pointless to mix new samples and junk, but when you depend on manufacturers to submit samples, the candidates are not often representative of the best products on the market.

Manufactures will no doubt take advantage of this fact, if they haven't already, by sending their best product samples for review. Consumers will discover what the reviews did not; sample variation is a problem. Hasn't this already happened with the western digital caviar 500gb hard drive? The irony is spcr now builds systems based on their own testing.

Hi,

at first I'd like give you a pat on back for the job you're doing here. SPCR seem to be trying, unlike many other H/W sites. Makes me engineering heart feel all warm and fuzzy..

However, if I might venture some suggestions:
- you might want to consider acquiring samples from different sources, say importers, distributors and the manufacturer to avoid sample rigging. I understand it can be costly, but just as a thought
- at least I would be interest to read about OEM fans, even though they might not be available in retail outlets, it might send some signal to component retailers, and it would at least act as a reference point in assessing whether the branded versions are worth the price
- on the contrary to some opinions, do not change the reference fans, as their results can be used as a yardstick when comparing results, which I guess you have already figured
- as long as you're doing multiple runs with different samples, you might want to consider providing some stats reflecting sample variance, might give the readers a clue about the quality of manufacturing
- MTBF could be given more attention, if it's in any reasonable way possible verify the manufacturers claims. Many users such as myself have workstations running 24/7, and they may be running hot doing some computations, fan reliability is a big issue in these situations
- you could add a little detail to the recommended fans list, especially now when you've done some fresh testing, as I pick a fan the list is quick to glance at instead of reading the reviews. But also when I pick a fan, I have certain amount of energy to dissipate, and I want to do it efficiently and quietly, so I need to know the basic variables: airflow (to judge the cooling properties) and the noise level/quality score, fan wattage and MTBF, and maybe a variance figure (to judge the manufacturing quality. These parameters would allow more educated compromises.

Lastly, I don't know if the suggestions push the focus from quiet home computing to somewhere else, but this was my perspective. I don't want to tell you how to do your job, especially as you seem to do a strapping job anyway, but here was my feedback on the subject.

cheers

for quiet computing,the focus has shifted from the 80's to 120 mm fans,and I'd like to see the few 140's included too,as they are legit options,especially as case fans,and Aerocool even uses theirs as a HS fan.

A hand test. Take a plain case with a rear mount exhaust at a given distance from a reflecting wall,say 2 ft,and run it at stock speed,at 800 rpm,and when possible,500 rpm. Take a few steps back and give the distance at which the fan is inaudible. Simple. Requires no interpretation,a practical and relevant base of comparison that accounts for all sound emitted.

Now,except for the overclock/gamer extremes,we have the CPU's able to run reasonably cool. Whether a fan is on the CPU,exhaust,PSU,the target is low rpms and virtual silence at an indirect 3-4 ft distance.

I'd tend to think that most 120's if they will run at 500 rpm,will push similar air,give or take maybe 10%,and the noise level,at that rpm,is probably pretty close. A big factor may be,then,those fans that can be easily made to run at 500 rpm,and are reliable at that speed. a fan that is 1800 rpm at 12 v probably can't be made to do 500 rpm reliably,if at all.

So far,Aerocool's 140's are fairly available,Yate Loons are harder to get.
I'd like to see an Aerocool 140 and a nexus 120 have a low rpm shootout to see which can provide usable low rpm airflow at a certain level with the least noise.

Yet another idea.... Coolermaster has a fan,a 120 with a 12 v speed of 700 rpm. It would seem that undervolted it could do 400 rpm or less?
Might a good comparison test to do be to see how slow different fans can be made to spin on a consistant basis?

The downside of >120mm fans is that they fit in only a few cases while 120mm and smaller fans fit in most cases. In fact, those big fans usually come premounted in the few cases that allow big fans to be used.

Your spam is about as believable as your dB claims.