Quiet is in the details

Show off your quiet rig.

Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee

Edward Ng
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 2696
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:53 pm
Location: Scarsdale, NY
Contact:

Post by Edward Ng » Thu Mar 04, 2004 8:49 pm

I've a 4200rpm, dual-platter 2.5" Fujitsu drive of 80GB w/8MB cache (model MHT2080AT) shtuffed inside a SilentDrive and this is how my temps look:

Image

And that's with virtually zero air flow around it; the thing is sitting on top of some foam at the floor my case, and the entire front of the case is sealed with masking tape. The only intake is a side duct higher up that flows cold air directly onto the passiveCPU. There's only two fans in the system: the 120mm fan in the PSU and the 80mm exhaust fan, so they're both out back. I was able to achieve those temps only after completely killing the grills blocking the intake duct and the exhaust grill.

The average temp for my CPU looks particularly higher than normal there because I've had Shareaza running in the background with like 374956 files queued up, so my CPU usage is in an ever-constant load of 15-75%, but those temps include over 3 straight hours of Prime95 heat torture. Keep in mind that that sort of usage (Shareaza with tons of incoming file segments) loads the drive quite heavily, so 38C is very much the highest it'll go. 50C, I'm pretty much 100% positive, is the max temp. the core will ever reach in this setup, as well.

-Ed

xtr4
Posts: 7
Joined: Wed Mar 03, 2004 4:44 pm

Post by xtr4 » Thu Mar 04, 2004 9:56 pm

thanx for the insight ed.....
currently my HDD (seagate 40Gb 7200) runs pretty cool (slightly warm to the touch) on the standard sonata rack.....
coolings via the 12cm exhaust and the PSU fan.....

thus far, the noisiest component in my setup is my stock intel HSF.....

darn it, i wish i was in the US now.......being in malaysia kinda limits my ability to source cool stuff like the smartdrive and rubber spray.....

Edward Ng
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 2696
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:53 pm
Location: Scarsdale, NY
Contact:

Post by Edward Ng » Thu Mar 04, 2004 10:07 pm

I own the same drive: Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 ST340014A. It's easily the quietest drive in the 7200.7 series because it has not only one platter, but only one head (two heads would make the drive a full 80GB drive, since all the 7200.7 series, except for the ST3200822A, are 80GB/platter)! The single head has by far the lowest moving mass of all 7200.7s; have you noticed that seeks are virtually inaudible on that drive? The bad thing is that it kind of gets hot...

The Samsung SpinPoint SP1614N, which I bought to replace the Seagate, is much cooler running. The seeks, however, are more audible (but very low frequency, and thus not very obtrusive; hey, it's got four heads over two platters). The idle sound of the Samsung, however, was far less obtrusive, being nothing more than a mid-low wind whir noise, whereas the Seagate emitted an extremely minor high-pitch whine. It's quite possible that the Samsung's idle volume level was also lower than the Seagate's, even with double the number of platters spinning, but the frequency range of the sound may have been the reason for that perception. I've no professional sound measuring devices to tell for certain.

Neither drive compares in, heat, idle noise or seek noise with the laptop drive, though. Of course, comparing 7200rpm 3.5" drives designed for decent cooling to a 2.5" laptop drive that only does 4200rpm and is designed to be crammed in a notebook is kind of unfair. Not to mention the Fujitsu costs more than the other two combined.

-Ed

PS: BTW, the ST3200822A has 100GB/platter technology (two of them yields the 200GB capacity; unfortunately, it's not yet available, as far as I know, in single-platter form).
Last edited by Edward Ng on Sat Mar 06, 2004 8:47 am, edited 1 time in total.

xtr4
Posts: 7
Joined: Wed Mar 03, 2004 4:44 pm

Post by xtr4 » Thu Mar 04, 2004 10:14 pm

hehe, sorry doug for hijacking your thread.....

and thanx again ed for your experience....and yeah the Seagate has an inaudible seeks of the HDDs i've used....my old quantum fireball is just as quiet except for the seeks....

the fujitsu was the next mod i was planning.....but like you've pointed out, it costs a bomb....so i guess i'll stay with my seagate for the time being ;p

Edward Ng
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 2696
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:53 pm
Location: Scarsdale, NY
Contact:

Post by Edward Ng » Thu Mar 04, 2004 10:28 pm

You're welcome, xtr4!

BTW I apologize to U too, Doug lol! And I also want to thank you also for your ideas; I have a Sonata as well (man, everybody's doin' Sonata nowadays) and decided to follow your steps and cut out the rear exhaust grill and also freed up the air flow up front behind that bezel like you did. And, congratz on being linked; you've already racked up over 7000 reads on this thread!

It's a shame my fan controller in that rig decided to die on me. :evil:

-Ed

Graphite
Posts: 23
Joined: Mon Mar 08, 2004 11:59 pm

Post by Graphite » Tue Mar 09, 2004 12:02 am

how much extra does that thing weigh with all the noise reduction material and silicon? lol

not a joke...i'm seriously wondering. No need to weigh it on scale...is it a bunch heavier than "stock" with everything in it.

great job btw

Douglas Bailey
Friend of SPCR
Posts: 96
Joined: Fri Dec 05, 2003 11:03 am
Location: Seattle, Washington, United States

Post by Douglas Bailey » Tue Mar 09, 2004 2:19 pm

Graphite: The AcoustiPac and silent drive enclosures together added about 7.5 lbs (roughly 3.5Kg) extra weight. That doesn't seem like that much, but since the standard computer weighs in around 25 lbs, (11Kg), this dampening increased the weight by a full one/third.

Add that to the fact the Sonata is a heavy case to begin with, there is no question this computer weighs more than any I've ever had.

Graphite
Posts: 23
Joined: Mon Mar 08, 2004 11:59 pm

Post by Graphite » Tue Mar 09, 2004 2:32 pm

Douglas Bailey wrote:Graphite: The AcoustiPac and silent drive enclosures together added about 7.5 lbs (roughly 3.5Kg) extra weight. That doesn't seem like that much, but since the standard computer weighs in around 25 lbs, (11Kg), this dampening increased the weight by a full one/third.

Add that to the fact the Sonata is a heavy case to begin with, there is no question this computer weighs more than any I've ever had.
granted, my friend has his case packed with that stuff, and the thing ways a ton. It didn't do much for noise dampening either. If a guy really wanted noise dampening, stuff that bed eggshell stuff in the case. It'd look like crap, but it'd be silent and super light.

GNNR |AVault|
Posts: 17
Joined: Tue Jan 20, 2004 10:21 am
Location: NJ
Contact:

Post by GNNR |AVault| » Fri Mar 12, 2004 9:38 pm

Image

Heyas... your case inspired me too, but I went with a Ahanix BlackKnight X195 instead.

For five bucks I found Rust-Oleum Specialty Grip&Guard Textured Rubber Coating. I sprayed the entire inside of the case down after removing the face and taping a few things, including the inside of the side panels. I then applied AcoustiProducts acousti-padding to all flat surfaces... taped off the holes in front too, etc.

I am right now installing a new PSU (SeaSonic Super Tornado 400W AFPC) that should be silent (cross fingers) and I installed that ArticCooling CPU. Hardware is a FX-51, 2x74gb raptors, CDRW/DVD combo drive, floppy w/ 6in1 compact media reader, SB Audigy 2 Platinum with Livedrive, Abit Radeon 9800XT 256MB, 2 x 512mb Corsair PC3200 TwinX ECC. With the previous, and less efficient PSU and the stock cooler I had near complete silence at boot and the CPU never got above 57C under load. The new PSU is more efficient and the new HSF should be approximately the same for cooling only more silent (cross fingers)... all I need now is the Rev3 ArticCooling VGA silencer for 9800Xts (out this month) and I am set.

The fans and PSU are mounted on rubber gasgets. The only thing left, and I am not convinced yet I need too, is to remove the front/rear fan grills for the 120mm fans.

The case is a BlackKnight X195 from Ahanix, a relatively affordable, front and back 120mm case with a built in fan controller and temp monitoring that works. The only other mod I made so far was to enlarge the bottom vent area in the front bezel that lets the front 120mm fan breath... doing that shaved 2C off the ambient easy. Case temps have not gotten above 30C (room ambient is about 75F, so that's only a 11 degree rise under load, not bad if you ask me). Mobo is sitting at 32C idle.

Edit

Okay, it's up and running... wiring isn't perfect yet. After 30 minutes in the bios the CPU has settled on 59C idle with the artic cooling HSF... higher than I really want, but it's quiet... a good 14 buck experiment, may go back to stock or something. The stock cooler was idling at 52-53C for comparison sake, but is 'louder' (again, not a ton). Pretty limited selection out there, Zalman is the only other one that comes to mind.

The new PSU, a SuperTornado 400W with APFC, is generally quieter and providing more voltage than the SilverStone SST350W that it replaced. I am a bit shocked as this one is only producing 11.43V on the +12V rail... the silverstone SST350W that the SeaSonic replaced was hitting 11.136V or so, yet it ran an all night loop of 3DMark03 with audio at high res without a hiccup. I am wondering if the onboard V sensor for the SK8N is off a smidge as I am pretty sure that the SilverStone PSU shouldn't have been stable and this new SuperTornado PSU should be more than enough to hit 11.8V or so on the 12V rail I would think.

Going to let it sit ad idle all night for some break in on the new ArticSilver5 application to see if it improves - I suspect the temp will drop to 57 or 56C. If not, I may have to find something else... the stock cooler is not bad, but for the noise it isn't doing a good job either.

Maybe someone knows... The PSU fan, a 120 with pretty good thermal control from what I am seeing... would it perhaps be more efficient if I had it setup to draw outside air from the back and blow into the case versus using case air to cool itself? I would think it would run cooler and provide more air in the case. As it is now, the PSU has now ramped up to a quiet but distincly audible level... my goal is near silence if possible. I did buy a Thermaltake 120mm fan with 3-way control and could replace the existing fan with it, running the rheobus knob on the PCI plate in back for adjusting it. Any ideas or thoughts about either switching the fan blow direction or replacing it?

Edward Ng
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 2696
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:53 pm
Location: Scarsdale, NY
Contact:

Post by Edward Ng » Fri Mar 12, 2004 10:28 pm

:shock: :shock: :shock: 59C idle OMG!!! :shock: :shock: :shock:

Douglas Bailey
Friend of SPCR
Posts: 96
Joined: Fri Dec 05, 2003 11:03 am
Location: Seattle, Washington, United States

Post by Douglas Bailey » Sat Mar 13, 2004 11:15 am

GNNR |AVault|, that is a sweet looking box for sure. Nice job. But it does seem like something is a little off with your CPU temps. I joined the SPCR Folding Team a couple of weeks back so my computer has been cranking out the math non-stop ever since, and at full extended load my CPU never gets over 52c. Perhaps you want to switch that HSF out for one that moves a little more air? I'd watch it really carefully when you push the system hard or your CPU temp could get to the dangerous level.

I left my PSU fan blowing out since it's a key part of the convection system - air in at the bottom front, air out at the top through the PSU. If you leave your case 120mm blowing out and turn your PSU 120mm blowing in, I would be concerned about short circuiting the cooling air to everything else in your case - like the hard drives for sure.

Glad to see my funny rubber paint and Extreme dampening inspired someone. Maybe I'm not nuts......(na.. I'm nuts, :wink: ).

Hound
Posts: 3
Joined: Wed Feb 25, 2004 7:28 pm

Feet

Post by Hound » Sat Mar 13, 2004 12:26 pm

Doug,

Where did you get those long feet for your case?

Or what did you make them out of?

I just ordered a BQE and it iwll be sitting on a carpet, so I'd like to have some longer feet for it.

Any info you could give me would be appreciated.

Edward Ng
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 2696
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:53 pm
Location: Scarsdale, NY
Contact:

Post by Edward Ng » Sat Mar 13, 2004 9:08 pm

His feet are inverted shot glasses! 8)

-Ed

Douglas Bailey
Friend of SPCR
Posts: 96
Joined: Fri Dec 05, 2003 11:03 am
Location: Seattle, Washington, United States

Post by Douglas Bailey » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:43 am

No I did not use shot glasses. If you look at my original post you will see a link to a 1 3/4" Tall Case Feet mod that I created to raise the case. That link will take you to another posting where I showed all the parts and explained the process for the leg mod.

Edward Ng
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 2696
Joined: Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:53 pm
Location: Scarsdale, NY
Contact:

Post by Edward Ng » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:45 am

Hmm; I must be thinking of some other person's Sonata... My bad!

EDIT: Found it; it's right here. Sorry for mixing you guys up. :oops:

-Ed

GNNR |AVault|
Posts: 17
Joined: Tue Jan 20, 2004 10:21 am
Location: NJ
Contact:

Post by GNNR |AVault| » Sun Mar 14, 2004 8:41 pm

I flipped the 120mm fan in the PSU and it runs dead silent now, and case ambient dropped 2 C overall. The HSF has to go, I agree... stock is fine in a high air flow case, but no good for this application (small areas, AL fins embedded in a rough copper base with 70mm fan). I will be buying a Thermalright or Zalman this week, should be the last thing I need to do!

wumpus
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 946
Joined: Sat Sep 06, 2003 9:57 pm
Location: Berkeley, CA, USA
Contact:

Post by wumpus » Sun Mar 14, 2004 9:02 pm

Super nice Sonata mod. Congrats Doug!

I also cut the hell out of my Sonata front bezel (and removed those annoying blue LEDs) in the exact same way pictured; great case but it has a serious airflow problem w/r/t that front bezel!

I do have a few observations, mostly nitpicky little stuff.

First, I can't say enough good things about the SmartDrive enclosures. A bit pricey, but they really work wonders at silencing hard drives without risk of heat damage. But. I gotta ask-- what's with the ramsinks glued on the front? For such an otherwise ultra-professional mod, that's kinda.. ghetto.

Second (and this indirectly applies to you, too, GNNR |AVault|), as much cash as you sunk into this, why not go with the all-copper Zalman HSF? I'm a little perplexed why the AlCu was chosen here.. if there's one thing I have learned in the quest for silence, it's to always buy the absolute best HSF I can afford.

Shadowknight
Posts: 1283
Joined: Thu Aug 07, 2003 2:43 pm
Location: Charlotte, NC, USA

Post by Shadowknight » Mon Mar 15, 2004 4:38 am

Wumpus- most people buy the AlCu version because it's significantly lighter than the all copper version. Tests have shown there's maybe a 1 degree difference in performance between the two. The AlCu version is also cheaper.

Douglas Bailey
Friend of SPCR
Posts: 96
Joined: Fri Dec 05, 2003 11:03 am
Location: Seattle, Washington, United States

Post by Douglas Bailey » Fri Mar 19, 2004 2:11 pm

wumpus - Thanks for the compliment. Regarding the extra heat sinks, I figure everyone has their own personal phobia. Building this computer, mine was about frying my fancy new hard drives inside those sealed up SmartDrive enclosures. Of all the things I worried about (and some I didn't but should have), keeping the HDD cool without a front fan was the biggest. So while I'm not sure I totally agree adding some extra heat sinks on the front of the enclosures is ghetto, it was worth it to have a little more cooling surface for the HDD's right in front of the coolest air to enter the case.

Of course now all that concern seems unfounded (guess maybe that is the definition of a phobia) since no matter how hard I push them those drives never get above 40c and in fact rarely get above 35c.

My decision on the HSF was based on weight more than anything. What I read agreed with Shadowknight's observations, so I didn't think it mattered that much. Maybe that is your phobia? :)

Post Reply