My Silent Silentium T2 Rig

Show off your quiet rig.

Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee

Post Reply
sanse
Posts: 399
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:48 am
Location: Netherlands

My Silent Silentium T2 Rig

Post by sanse » Fri Feb 10, 2006 7:48 am

Yes, a silent system afterall!

I did the psu-mod to the silentium t2. That is to say i cut the wires from the psu to the psu-fans and the case-fans and soldered new connectors to
them. Male-connectors to the fans; female connectors to the psu-feedwires.

It's not necessary to dismount the psu completely. Only pulling the outside rubber-bands of the harddisc-silencer gives enough room to cut the wires to the psu-fans and put new connectors on them.

As a second step i placed a 3.5' fan-controller in the middle 3.5' bay. It's an enermax 2-channel controller with 2 fan-wires and 2 temp-sensors.

One of the sensors i stuck inside the psu to feel it's outstream airtemp. The other tempsensor was mounted above the motherboard and measures the temp of the air flowing into the top silentium case-fans.

The third step was the final silencing of the second harddrive, that is mounted in the lower 3.5' bay. I fixed rubberstrips to the bottom-edges of
the drive and to the sides and then placed the drive in the bay. I secured the drive with a piece of 'button-elastic' and a zip-tie.

As a last step i paid much more attention to cable-management now. I managed to get the main 20-lead power cable out of the airflow to the
psu-fans. Additional power-lines are now routed differently to the right of the t2-silencer-box. The sata-cables are zip-tied together and are also
for the most part not in the direct airflow-path. The wide ide-cables to the dvd-writer and the floppy-drive were mainly hidden behind the 3.5' bay and on top of the dvd-writer.

At the moment the silentium psu- and case-fans are connected to the fan-controller through wires containing 3 diodes (you can see them in the last
picture) giving a voltage-drop of about 1.8 volts on top of the voltage-drop the fan-controller provides. Both fan-speeds are turned down; the
case-fans at the lowest speed. The psu-fans a bit higher. The silentium fans don't give a tach-signal, but i estimate the psu-fans are running now
at about 800 rpm at the most and the case-fans at about 600 rpm. The 2 push-fans also run at about 800 rpm.

The machine is silent now; not quiet, just silent. On a distance of 3 metres away the computer can no longer be heard. These mods had a big
influence on the temps of the various components.

Idle at intake-temp 15c:

case top: 25
psu out: 35
cpu: 35
mobo: 34
gpu: 60
discs: 40

Both the gpu and the harddrives run hotter now as compared to the default silentium setup. The gpu 10C and the drives about 6 to 7 C. Should be no problem. The psu also is running hotter than before. One can feel pretty warm air coming out of the vents at the bottom of the case. I did a test with 2 instances of cpu-burn for 30 minutes and that gave the following temps:

case top: 30
psu out: 40
cpu: 54
gpu: 63
discs: 40

I'm not sure if the machine is thermally stable during heavy gaming, but i don't do that. If i would do that occasionally i could turn up the
fanspeeds. For the time being i'm going to see how the machine behaves during different loads and different intake (room) temps. Maybe i'll
replace the 2 push-fans by larger 92 mm ones and have them controlled by the fan-controller too. They are now controlled by the mobo on fan-header cha1. Another setup might be connecting the fans to the psu again through the diode-wires to get some sort of automatic temp-dependent behaviour back. The soldered fan-connectors give all freedom now to experiment.

The second harddisc in the lower bay is completely silent now. No more hum; not even with the vastly reduced fanspeeds.

Curious about any comments and suggestions!

And now for the pictures:

Silentium harddrive silencer partly dismounted
Image

New connectors to silentium fans and psu-wires (male for fans; female for psu-feedwires
Image

Rubber strips to be mounted on harddrive
Image

Rubber strips stuck to harddrive
Image

Harddrive with rubberstrips mounted in lower 3.5' silentium bay with elastic and zip-tie
Image

Temp-sensor of fan-controller stuck into psu to feel psu-out-temp
Image

Enermax 2-channel fan-controller between floppy and silenced harddrive
Image

Total view of system; fanwires still a bit messy and experimental; improved cablemanagement
Image
Last edited by sanse on Fri Feb 10, 2006 1:59 pm, edited 1 time in total.

epiphane
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Jul 19, 2005 12:50 pm
Location: No.Calif, USA

Post by epiphane » Fri Feb 10, 2006 10:33 am

Can u direct some light into u'r puter either with a flash or lamp & retake the pics? It would help in viewing what u've done.

Cheers
peter

sanse
Posts: 399
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:48 am
Location: Netherlands

Post by sanse » Fri Feb 10, 2006 11:06 am

epiphane wrote:Can u direct some light into u'r puter either with a flash or lamp & retake the pics? It would help in viewing what u've done.

Cheers
peter
hmmm, the pictures were taken with a flash. what kind of lamp should i use? i thought the essence of what i did was visible. ;-)

while thinking about a way to better better pictures can you tell me what is not clear so i could explain?
Last edited by sanse on Wed Feb 15, 2006 2:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.

epiphane
Posts: 60
Joined: Tue Jul 19, 2005 12:50 pm
Location: No.Calif, USA

Post by epiphane » Fri Feb 10, 2006 11:18 am

Sometimes there's a adjustment on the flash or camera that might direct more light deeper into the system...even just a desk/table pointing into the puter would help.

No biggie...if u'r happy w/ 'em leave it be.

Cheers

sanse
Posts: 399
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:48 am
Location: Netherlands

Post by sanse » Mon Feb 13, 2006 3:44 am

now, after a few days of silent use, it's become clear how silent the stock amd x2 4400+ cooler actually is. when stressing the system with 2 instances of cpu-burn the system is still silent despite the fact the cpu-cooler fan runs at about 2500rpm then. the cpu-cooler can not be heard at this rpm with the case closed. the ramp-up i heard before must have been solely caused by the silentium psu- and case-fans.

so, no need to replace the stock amd heatpipe-cooler. it's silent and efficient enough.

sanse
Posts: 399
Joined: Thu Dec 22, 2005 9:48 am
Location: Netherlands

Post by sanse » Wed Feb 15, 2006 2:32 pm

i measured the rpm's of the silentium fans. it shows that they run at 500 rpm, when the fan-controller is turned all the way down. between the fans and the controller are 3 diodes giving a voltage-drop of about 2 volts.

so the fans are now running on a voltage near 4 volt; just like the adda-fan in the neohe psu of the p150.

the passively cooled videocard is next. when this thing gets a ac silencer on it, then all the heat of this gets blown out of the case. should give lower temps for the case itself, the mobo, the cpu and the harddrives.

Post Reply