Hi Guys,

Firstly - this is a great site, really opened my eyes when I furst stumbled across it as to how to get rid of the Leaf Blower in my PC.

I'd appreciate some advice on how this system might work. I had a go at getting my current PC a bit quieter - all that convinced me of though is the need to go the whole way on the quiet PC with every component if you REALLY want to remove the vacuum cleaner noise

Anyway what I am looking at putting together is:

Case - Antec P150
PSU - Antec Neo HE 430 (as included with P150 case)
CPU - Athlon 64 Venice 3500+ with Zalman CNPS7000B Cu-AL cooler
Fans - included 120mm Triflow at rear plus 96mm extra fan at front (Nexus or Panaflow)
MB - Asus A8N-E, with "screamer" 8000 rpm Northbridge cooler replaced by passive Zalman NB47J
HDD - Samsung SP1213C 120GB
Video - XFX 7800 GT
Mem - 2gb of Corsair PC3200 (or another decent brand)

Some parts are a recycled from my old PC - mostly the Zalman CPU cooler and the HDD

A few notes -

- I know about the Asus / Neo PSU issues, will be making sure I have the latest rev of the Neo
- I bet I will chicken out on the passive northbridge cooling of the motherboard and attach a 40mm fan to the Zalman
- I think the XFX 7800 GT will obviously be far and away the major source of noise till I get a better fan on it (Zalman or Arctic Silencer). I am not so worried about doing this as I construct the system though, as it is heaps easier to get the GPU card out later for modding, than it is to have to re-affix the CPU heatsink or get the motherboard chipset cooler off.

Now for the advice part

- Is the front 96mm fan really needed? Perhaps a fan zip tied to the HDD cage would be better?
- This is a pretty "done to death" topic, but perhaps the case airflow + the passive Zalman Northbridge cooler will be enough?

So hopefully this will turn out as a nice quiet PC. Does anyone think I could be running into any problems here? Or any advice on what could be done better on a similar budget?

Thanks

PS The PSU duct mod as done by Ralf Hutter is definitely my first DIY task for this computer once running!

http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=26066&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=120

Opt for the Abit AN8-Ultra Motherboard. It has a passively cooled chipset utilizing a heatpipe running to the back of the case. Very effective and always cold to the touch.

This motherboard also has a multitude of fan headers which are completely programmable. There are two headers (called OTES1&2) at the back of the board which can vary their voltage between 6~12VDC which would be perfect for your rear mounted 120mm fan. On my system, I have a top mount and rear mount 120MM Vantec Stealth hooked to the OTES headers and they dont even run for the first 15 minutes or so. Then they tend to hover around the 600~900RPM range. Additional fan headers include a SYS, AUX, CPU and NF4 headers. I utilize the NF4 header for my VF700 on the video card.


As for the front fan. I would definately ditch it. It is nearly impossible to have a front mounted fan remain inaudible.

Thanks for the advice!

I had briefly looked at the Abit AN8-Ultra - its just a bit harder to get in Australia than the Asus (and thus slightly more expensive). I wasnt 100% sure about their heatpipe either - I wasnt sure if it would mess up the case airflow.

All the fan headers sound very useful though - I think I might go for it over the Asus. Not having to void the warranty to get passive cooling is a bonus as well.

The heatpipe is rather unobtrusive actually. Here is a shot I just took to give you an idea....




Be sure to install memory before installing the cpu heatsink. Don't get in a hurry and mount your motherboard until the you've replaced the cpu retention module with the one provided by Zalman. I was intimidated by this process at first until I realized it was only held in by a couple screws.

Also, be sure when you apply the heatsink compound to the cpu that you only use a very thin layer. I usually just put on a dot about 6mm in diameter and spread it nice and even. If you watch the installation video at http://www.zalman.co.kr/ it will give you a pretty good idea about what I mean.


Good luck to you, enjoy that new machine!

Fantastic Pic, thanks depravedone!

I can see it will all "fit" nicely now - thanks for your help