The value of case damping?

[JJ]

I'm wondering if it's worth the extra expense (and fairly narrow choices) to use a commercially damped case instead of simply choosing components and fans wisely.

To sidestep the problem of how few factory-damped cases there are on the market, you can applying damping to a case yourself, but the materials are expensive and the process can be something of a PITA. There are other problem with this approach, too. The biggest one is that most cases aren't designed to hold the additional thicknesses of the damping material, so there are often clearance issues for CPU heatsinks, cable management and door closure.

Opinion?

[ces]

Here is my opinion:
viewtopic.php?p=556784#p556784

See also:
viewtopic.php?p=539399#p539399
viewtopic.php?p=539359#p539359

[SoulWager]

Not sure, I think it's very very hard to damp low pitched noise, and relatively easy to damp ultra high pitched noise.

[JJ]

Here is my opinion:
viewtopic.php?p=556784#p556784

Thanks. Yes, it seems to me that the primary value of case damping may be one of damping vibrational resonances rather than actually muffling or absorbing fan noise.