Silencing on a budget, my slightly modified case

Show off your quiet rig.

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Ashex
Posts: 185
Joined: Thu Oct 25, 2007 11:51 am
Location: Seattle, WA
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Silencing on a budget, my slightly modified case

Post by Ashex » Wed Nov 14, 2007 12:54 am

Hey Guys,

I've only been here for just a few weeks, but I've gained quite a bit of knowledge from spcr :) and this is what I have done so far.

I've modified my case a little bit, and replaced all the noisy parts.

The specs of the computer are such:
  • Antec Neo HE-500 (I got this one when I sent in my SP500 for RMA, there's thread in the power supply forum about it)
  • ASUS M2n32-SLI (This board is a bit problematic for me, but it may have been due to the ram, which I just replaced)
  • 2GB A-Data DDR2-800 ram
  • AMD Athlon64 X2 5000+ 2.6Ghz w/Scythe Ninja Mini
  • Nvidia 7800GT (Replaced the stock fan/heatsink with an Accelero X1)
  • 3xSeagate (2x160GB 1x200GB) Sata disk
  • 1xWD 300GB Sata disk
  • IDE DVD-burner (really need to replace this with a sata drive, the ribbon cable is impossible to hide)
Anyways, here are the pictures I managed to get (my camera sucks, I'll be using my girlfriends to get better ones tomorrow)

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The front is pretty generic, Complete with cheesy light tubes on the sides.

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As you can kinda see, the back has two 80mm Cooler Master fans that are almost silent. I placed the Sycthe fan on the front of the heatsink so that it will pull air through it and have the case fans do the rest for me.

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I did my best to keep the cables nice and tidy, I pulled it all into the back behind the drive bays, it's a bit stuffy back there. You can see where I layed down some sound dampening fabric, It's made by Balink, and looks to be doing its job. I tried covering all the led's with it (the feet are lit by led's) but I may just end up adding some slits for the light to leak through.

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I cut out the stamped fan vents to improve airflow, grinding the rough edges took forever, but I'm happy with the results

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The temperatures of the system?
Idle
CPU: ~40C
System: 42C
Video Card: 47C
Power Consumption: 140Watts.
CPU Load (Using Folding@Home, running one on each core)
CPU: ~54C
System: 43C
Video Card: 47C
Power Consumption: 198 Watts

System Load (Played the Crysis Demo for 15 minutes)
CPU: ~50C
System: 44C
Video Card: 57C
Power Consumption: 238 Watts

The Chassic/CPU fans run at about 2000rpm, so I'll need to get a fan controller for the chassis fans and get an air duct to make the heatsink passive.


I got the sound-dampening adhesive pads off newegg and put it on the bottom and top of the case. I only put it on one of the side doors, since one kinda has a window. I have that chunk leftover so I'm going to cut it up and cover the open spaces of the case.
I used tin snips and a dremel to remove the stamped fan vents, and put a grill over the holes so my kitten doesn't play with the fans.


Let me know what you guys think and if you have any advice :D

SilentShoe
Posts: 46
Joined: Tue Oct 10, 2006 5:26 pm
Location: Canada

Post by SilentShoe » Wed Nov 14, 2007 8:36 pm

looks very clean for a generic case!
why the mini ninja and not the regular ninja though?

for ide cables i seen ppl fold them so that they are flat against the side panel of the case until it goes up a little and folded again to plug into the connector.
try that :D

Ashex
Posts: 185
Joined: Thu Oct 25, 2007 11:51 am
Location: Seattle, WA
Contact:

Post by Ashex » Wed Nov 14, 2007 9:30 pm

SilentShoe wrote:looks very clean for a generic case!
why the mini ninja and not the regular ninja though?

for ide cables i seen ppl fold them so that they are flat against the side panel of the case until it goes up a little and folded again to plug into the connector.
try that :D
I went with the Mini since I wasn't entirely sure how it would fit in the case. I figured I would just play it safe and go with a mini and duct it to a fan. I have a fan on it right now until I get around to making a duct for it.

I tried doing what you mentioned with the IDE cable. it's kinda setup like that but the distance between the connectors is a bit too much for me to tuck it all back there.

I also took a few more pictures. Instead of completely skimping on putting the padding on the window panel, I cut it up a bit a laid it down along it, and also closed up the holes around the window fan and then disconnected it since it created a bit of noise. I used speedfan to drop the speeds on all the fines to 50% and the system is almost silent. I'll probably need to replace the fans with nexus or some other silent fan solution.


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Ashex
Posts: 185
Joined: Thu Oct 25, 2007 11:51 am
Location: Seattle, WA
Contact:

Post by Ashex » Sun Oct 26, 2008 2:20 pm

I ended up removing the fan on the door, and then swapped the side panels, to compensate for the gaping hole left there.

I also replaced the other case fans I had in there with larger 120mm fans. Specifically the Thermaltake A2329. I had to get an 80mm to 120mm adapter to get them to fit.

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Unfortunately, the disadvantage of using two 120mm in that case, is that there's only one spot for a 120mm, in the front. So the adapter went in the back. I still wanted to use my filters, so I ended up using zip ties to secure it to the case properly, this took me awhile to get on but it works.

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I've also put in a 2.5" sata drive to run my system off of, that helped to reduce the vibration caused by all the hard drives. Unfortunately, because of the case design, it's going to be difficult to get rid of all the vibration, I'll hopefully put in some sort of suspended drive design.

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Things have gotten a bit messy due to adding some things in and also moving stuff around. I'll hopefully have a drive or two removed from there. I'm considering using external enclosures for them and running the sata cable straight to the board, but haven't a clue as to what kinda of cage to look for.

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