My First "Silent" Computer

Show off your quiet rig.

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Lloyd84
Posts: 15
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:26 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

My First "Silent" Computer

Post by Lloyd84 » Fri Aug 25, 2006 8:54 am

This is not my first attempt at obtaining silent nirvana. I previously had an Athlon XP 2500+ (OC'ed to 3200+). Man was that thing loud. Four high speed 80mm fans mounted at the front, and one very loud, hot and generic power supply. (Let's not forget the stock HSF, either.)

After having used that for about eight months I decided my next PC was going to be quiet, dagnabbit!. After much deliberation I ended up with this;

Antec SLK3000B
Athlon 64 3200+ (OC'ed to 2.6Ghz)
Abit AV8 Pro (mmm, passive chipset cooling)
1Gb OCZ Premier
2x Seagate 7200.9 80Gb SATA RAID0
Radeon 9200SE
Thermaltake Big Typhoon
Topower 420w fanless PSU (better known to SPCR readers as E-Power Lion)

This was reasonably quiet, but the resonance created by the HDD's, plus the case fan and Big Typhoon was driving me nuts.

Then news of the Core 2 Duo's imminent release reached my ears, and I started to get that itch. You know the one.

"It wouldn't do to be caught with outdated technology, now would it?" I asked myself. "I can always use more speed". "Whats a few hundred bucks matter anways?!?" Bye bye computer...

Two months and a very empty bank account later I have this;
Core 2 Duo E6300
Gigabyte GA-965P-DS3 (Passive)
1Gb Geil PC6400 (5-5-5-15 @ 1.8v)
2x Seagate 7200.10 250Gb SATA RAID0
Nvidia 128Mb 6200TC (Passive)
Samsung DVDRW
Antec Neo HE 550w
Thermaltake Big Typhoon
Antec SLK3000B
1x Antec TriCool
1x 120mm from an old generic PSU

What a difference. It's cooler, quieter and it's faster.

Here are some preliminary pictures presented for your delectation.



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Yeah, I know, my elite cablegami haxor skillz suck.

Anywho, this was quiet but still not quiet enough. I decided to try suspending the HDD's. It virtually eliminated all case resonance, and reduced the seek noises significantly.

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The BIOS on the DS3 also allows for dynamic fan speed control, which I have enabled. The Typhoon's fan now spins at 585 idle, and around 800-900 under load. Currently the only source of noise left is the generic 120mm fan I pulled out of an old power supply, and most of that is turbulence. With it turned off, the system makes only the slightest of noise. Even the sound of my breathing is louder. Finally! Peace and quiet!!

The best part of all this is I can get this lack of noise even with the CPU overclocked to 3.08Ghz, and undervolted to 1.318v. Truly astonishing.
Idle temps are 27-30C, load 46-48C.

http://i89.photobucket.com/albums/k202/ ... SProof.jpg
Last edited by Lloyd84 on Fri Aug 25, 2006 9:53 pm, edited 2 times in total.

andyb
Patron of SPCR
Posts: 3307
Joined: Wed Dec 15, 2004 12:00 pm
Location: Essex, England

Post by andyb » Fri Aug 25, 2006 9:42 am

Not a bad 1st/2nd effort(s).

If you are lucky and feel that your silencing quest is over (once you replace that noisy generic 120mm fan), if you still have the bug, prepare to become very poor indeed ;)

I will (eventually) post pics of my rig once I have dremmeled my nexuses some more.

Anyway, welcome to SPCR, and thanks for the pictures and concise details of your rigs. BTW there is an error on your 2x Seagate 7200.8 80GB drives, they dont exist, they are either the 7200.7's or 7200.9's.


Andy

Lloyd84
Posts: 15
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:26 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Lloyd84 » Fri Aug 25, 2006 9:48 am

My bad. They were 7200.9's. Next project is to remove the stamped fan grilles. Dremels ahoy!

Dirty-Harry
Posts: 71
Joined: Sat Mar 22, 2003 6:09 am
Location: Wood Dale, IL USA
Contact:

Post by Dirty-Harry » Fri Aug 25, 2006 10:25 am

Good Job Lloyd84

Keep us posted on your progess. :D

Lawrence Lee
SPCR Reviewer
Posts: 1115
Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2005 9:07 pm
Location: Vancouver

Post by Lawrence Lee » Fri Aug 25, 2006 10:28 am

Are the Seagates loud when seeking? Do they vibrate like biotch? I can't imagine having one of them, let alone two.

Lloyd84
Posts: 15
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:26 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Lloyd84 » Fri Aug 25, 2006 6:12 pm

They are a lot better than the 7200.9's were, and now they are suspended the only thing they're vibrating is themselves. Noise wise the only thing I hear is extended seeks, which are fairly muted.

cyberspyder
Posts: 259
Joined: Mon Jun 26, 2006 4:58 pm
Location: Markham, Canada

Post by cyberspyder » Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:22 pm

how's the Antec NeoHE? any stability problems at all?

Brendan

Lloyd84
Posts: 15
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:26 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Lloyd84 » Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:57 pm

So far it's been flawless. The first time I booted I thought there was a problem because it started and stopped a couple of times. Turns out this is just a quirk of the DS3's design. The first time it boots it reads the voltages, and then resets. It will also do this most times you change an option in the BIOS. It is a bit annoying, but it means you don't have to get at the CMOS clear jumper if you push it too far. Just wait 5-10sec and it will automatically reboot with all your previous settings, except the one which caused the problem. That gets set back to default.

BTW, I never thought it was possible to make an 80mm fan silent, but Antec have done it. So far it hasn't ramped up, even at full load.

Lloyd84
Posts: 15
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:26 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Lloyd84 » Sat Aug 26, 2006 1:39 am

Now with advanced CableGami!

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cyberspyder
Posts: 259
Joined: Mon Jun 26, 2006 4:58 pm
Location: Markham, Canada

Post by cyberspyder » Sat Aug 26, 2006 8:57 am

looks much better :D , thanks for the info!

Brendan

Lloyd84
Posts: 15
Joined: Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:26 am
Location: Melbourne, Australia

Post by Lloyd84 » Mon Aug 28, 2006 7:09 am

So I attacked the fan grilles today. They didn't stand a chance, mwahaha!

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I soft mounted both fans using cable ties, and also cut two pieces of foam to the same size as the fan frames to sit in between the fans and the case for extra isolation.

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I also redid the HDD suspension so that the cage doesn't butt up against the side panel.

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Last but not least I pulled off the NB, SB and CPU heatsinks and applied some AS5 to them. Turns out the |---| piece holding down the typhoon was snagged on one of the VRM's. As a result the middle third of the heatsink wasn't making contact with the CPU. Now that it's been fixed the CPU temps have dropped on average 4-5 degrees!

All up I'd say removing the back grille has had the biggest impact, as it has significantly reduced the turbulence noise from that fan. :D

Things to do;
1. Get rounded IDE and floppy cables.
2. Get some of that fancy rubber edging to replace my ghetto-style
electrical tape.
3. Replace all three fans with Nexus 120mm.
4. Bask in the silent glow.

cyberspyder
Posts: 259
Joined: Mon Jun 26, 2006 4:58 pm
Location: Markham, Canada

Post by cyberspyder » Mon Aug 28, 2006 10:51 am

do you have the red or green aviation tin snips? the yellow one is a waste of money IMO, i only use the red and green ones.

Brendan

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