Quiet SFF Gaming System

Show off your quiet rig.

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meansizzler
Posts: 43
Joined: Thu Jul 12, 2007 3:44 am

Quiet SFF Gaming System

Post by meansizzler » Thu Jul 12, 2007 5:39 am

This as as quiet as they come, took me 6 months to get this built, due to components not being available, went through 4 motherboards but finally have the system stable..


Silverstone SG03 S
Asus P5B-VM DO
Enermax Liberty 500W, modded with Nexus 120MM Fan @ 12V
Core2Duo E6600 @ Stock Speeds, Mobo is a realy bad overclocker
Silverstone NT06 Lite
4* 1GB OCZ DDR2800 4-4-4-15
2* Seagate 120GB 7200.2
2* Scythe Quiet Drive SDQ2500
2* Nocuta 120mm Running at 7.5V
Radeon X1950 Pro 512MB fitted with Arctic Cooling Accelero S1
Soundblaster X-Fi Xtreme Music
Terratec 2400idt, Dual DVB-T PCI-E
Pioneer 109XLS "Silver Limited Edition Aluminium Face" + IDE to SATA Convertor

-All cables are placed/tied so they do not obstruct any airflow from the 2 front 120mm fans, the ATX PSU Cable sits between the two fans so it does not block much air.., spending the extra 45 minutes on cable management pays off..

The HDD Power/DATA cables might look messy but it's the neatest I could get them, also they are on the side so they do not block airflow over the hard drive enclosures..

Playing Shadowrun @ 1680*1050 with everything on MAX and AA set to 2x, obviously a faster card would mean better performance, but system runs stable, no longer do I have to tolerate the loud fans and dvd drive from the xbox 360, same performance minus the noise..

Thinking about upgrading to a 8800GTX with HR-03 Plus, but that would mean my PCI slot is blocked and they don't make a PCI-E x1 soundblaster, well not a very good one...

Anyway anyone think they can make a quieter rig?, unless your using 2.5" Laptop Drives, your desktop drives are always going to be louder than the loudest component in my system "Nexus 22DB"

meansizzler
Posts: 43
Joined: Thu Jul 12, 2007 3:44 am

Post by meansizzler » Thu Jul 12, 2007 5:43 am

Pictures using old Foxconn Board


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cyberspyder
Posts: 259
Joined: Mon Jun 26, 2006 4:58 pm
Location: Markham, Canada

Post by cyberspyder » Thu Jul 12, 2007 4:01 pm

Only thing I hate about the case is the plastic side panel thing. It just destroys the look IMO. Nice build :D

Brendan

nightmorph
Posts: 316
Joined: Thu Aug 10, 2006 11:07 am

Post by nightmorph » Thu Jul 12, 2007 10:24 pm

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Last edited by nightmorph on Fri Apr 21, 2023 11:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Moogles
Posts: 315
Joined: Thu Mar 22, 2007 10:28 am

Post by Moogles » Thu Jul 12, 2007 11:57 pm

Bizarre...

I actually ordered 2 2.5" Scythe Quite Drives (a long time ago, shipping is taking forever...) and recently an SG03 to migrate my TJ08 system to. I'm not pleased with harddrive mounting in my TJ08 (basically I have 2 notebook drives resting on foam on the bottom of my case, meaning I can't use any of my PCI slots).

My current system is probably a bit quiter than the SG03 will be, but the SG03 won't be limited in mobility by 2 random laptop drives resting on foam...

My TJ08 only has 3 600RPM Nexus fans, as audible noise producers as I'm using a fanless PSU and GPU (one of my laptop drives occasionally makes an audible clicking noise which is fairly annoying). I'm not convinced I can use the Corsair HX520 I have lying around in the SG03 without a fan swap, as the HX520's fan probably won't be able to adequately cool an E6600. So even though the SG03 will have 1 fewer fan, it'll probably mean I'll need a fan at 12v in the PSU. Oh well...

Do you happen to know if XFX's 7950GT (fanless) will fit in the SG03? Here's a picture: http://www.pc-infopratique.com/images/b ... gt-570.jpg

Also, do you experience any vibration issues having your enclosed 2.5" drives mounted in such a way? I'm using a 7200RPM 2.5" and it probably vibrates a bit more than your average 2.5"er.

meansizzler
Posts: 43
Joined: Thu Jul 12, 2007 3:44 am

Post by meansizzler » Fri Jul 13, 2007 3:48 am

No vibration what so ever form the HD's, the front fans are using the acoustic rubber fan mounts, a pain to install, but they do there job, also CPU temb is very high right now sitting at 52 Degrees Idle, so have to change the heatsink, probably for a Zalman CNPS8700 and swap the PSU around...

Moogles
Posts: 315
Joined: Thu Mar 22, 2007 10:28 am

Post by Moogles » Fri Jul 13, 2007 3:59 am

52C even with a 12v Nexus fan in your PSU? That does seem really high. I guess the 8700 would work, but it's another (arguably loud) fan. Maybe the SG03/NT06 combo only works with really high RPM PSUs. Would be a real shame...

Maybe you can undervolt the E6600?

[F]bernZ
Posts: 163
Joined: Thu Jan 19, 2006 5:44 pm

Post by [F]bernZ » Fri Jul 13, 2007 8:52 am

This might sound silly, but maybe you can try ziptying a fan underneath the nt-06 lite. The last time I checked, there was enough clearance to do it.

cyberspyder
Posts: 259
Joined: Mon Jun 26, 2006 4:58 pm
Location: Markham, Canada

Post by cyberspyder » Fri Jul 13, 2007 11:34 am

AFAIK, the PSU is not a significant exhaust. It just doesn't pull enough heat from the HSF. BTW, How much clearance do you have to work with for the heatsink?

Brendan

meansizzler
Posts: 43
Joined: Thu Jul 12, 2007 3:44 am

Post by meansizzler » Fri Jul 13, 2007 1:57 pm

Well swapped the CPU Heatsink for the Zalman 8700, temp wise it seems the same, although there is no fan exhausting hot air from the cpu heatsink the zalman fan just circles the air around the case, running it at 5V so not much louder than NT06, PSU was swapped other way round so at least that gets to be cooled down properly. Might have to invest in water cooling system like the corsair nautilus. anyone have any ideas how to cool down the cpu while keeping the system quiet?

Moogles
Posts: 315
Joined: Thu Mar 22, 2007 10:28 am

Post by Moogles » Fri Jul 13, 2007 7:04 pm

Have you figured out a way to cool your CPU adequately yet? I canceled my SG03 because of your post. I don't understand how your E6600 can idle at 52c with a 12v Nexus and an NT06. Unless you're using an extremely high CFM (loud) fan in your PSU, you can't really cool a 65W CPU properly? I find that really odd.

I'm sure you've considered this, but maybe your CPU isn't making good contact with your heatsink?

meansizzler
Posts: 43
Joined: Thu Jul 12, 2007 3:44 am

Post by meansizzler » Tue Jul 17, 2007 2:17 pm

Moogles wrote:
I'm sure you've considered this, but maybe your CPU isn't making good contact with your heatsink?
I have, might try and use stock intel cooler as it has thermal paste pre applied in 3 strips, also a guy with the same CPU/Case is using stock intel in same case with E6600 OC at 3GHZ and iding at 30C load under 50C, obviously a loud cooler but will see if temp wise it makes any difference, might have to spread thermal paste manually on the CPU so it gets better contact with heatsink, but it is all time consuming, already opened the pc 6 or 7 times to change mobo/components..

Anyway last resort is to just buy a P180 mini when they release it, that way I can get a Scythe Ninja and 2 rear case fans in there to exhaust the air...

I really don't think this case is cut out for cooling an Intel Based system, for an AMD setup it is fine as AMD CPU's run much more cooler than Intel ones...

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