Mike wrote:
Maybe you were busy with all this
No Mike, lots of other nuttin' much going on. I won't be too scarce around here though.
Answers:
2. Green was supposed to be a soothing color, it's actually a copy/paste holdover from the farm page: hint taken. Thanks for the background color.
1. The system went from very annoying, to very pleasantly quiet. My BarracudaIV is still hard mounted: I like to hear a little activity, and a little is all I can hear if I try. As for fan noise, it's down low enough I don't mind any more than the fridge, freezer, or furnace. Only at 3am out here in the country when it gets silent, I'd like my whole house to be truly silent too. Otherwise I guess I'm an easy customer. The PSU fan being farther inside does help some, but the biggest gains were from vibration damping in the felt (esp. on the PSU), and loosing the stupid screaming thin 70mm Arkua fan. The Oriental fan (quietest thing I had laying around) that I put on the PSU will get swapped for a Panaflo next, but I won't undervolt the CPU fan until I get an AX7, and then it's 7v volts for shure. The last and most annoying noise source left is in the Sony Multiscan100sf monitor, which isn't loud, but is an ultra high frequency that makes me feel like I have tinnitus. That 18" flat panel will have to wait until I'm rich and famous. All in all I'm quite pleased with the results. From such an absolutely trivial investment in parts and time, my pathetic system went from
very irritating to
very quiet.
As for temps, the CPU went up a wee bit but it's still only 46°c at the mobo, so I figure I'm doing OK. The rest of the system went up a few degrees too, but it's not bad. Certainly no less stable than before.
Thanks go to SPCR for being the place that let me know what to do.