Can I silence my case further?

Mr. K6 · Post by **Mr. K6** » Sat Feb 19, 2005 8:27 am

Hey guys,

This is my first post, but I've been cruising these forums for awhile, and have alredy used much of what I've learned here

. I think I've finally gotten my system at it's prime for performance, but now I want to quiet it as much as I can. My full system specs are in the sig. Here's some pics of my case showing the mods that I've done:

Here's the outside. I've cut off the louvers and the stamped steel grills in the front and back to open up airflow and decrease turbulence. The case is resting on 4 layers of shelf foam to silence vibrations and to protect it from bass vibrations.

Here's the side panel off. THe black strips are sound proofing, and the pink stuff is mobo foam to stop the 92mm stealth from vibrating the side-panel

Finally, my 9CM CAT on a Silent Boost HS, and wire-management (sorry about angle, only way I could get it all in).

The case has 2 120mm fans (1 stealth, the other a low-speed antec), 1 92mm stealth, the PSU fans (which are silent), and the CAT fan turned down to 2000RPM (silent). What can you guys suggest to make it more silent? I don't mind spending some cash, but I dont wanna go way overboard

Thanks!

sthayashi · Post by **sthayashi** » Sat Feb 19, 2005 11:03 am

Look into finding a way to suspend your hard drive(s). i.e. don't hard mount them or even use grommit. Get some sort of elastic material, attach the hard drive to that, remove the drive cage, and attach your elastic material to where the drive cage WAS attached. That's usually cheap, easy, and sometimes even effective depending on the hard drive you have.

The other suggestion you'll get here is to replace your fans. People make faces when you say Vantec Stealth around here. The fan of choice around here is the Nexus. Try replacing your Stealth and Antec fans with them.

Actually, here's a better suggestion. Try just removing your side and front fans and seeing if it makes a difference. Usually, side fans don't, and often front fans don't help much (though they do help with hard drives, so YMMV).

I'm not exactly sure what to suggest with the Silent Boost, whether you should either a) just attempt to get an even quieter fan, or b) get a new heatsink fan combo. The SilentBoost fan is a Panaflo FBL09A12M1BX fan (M1BX series). M1As are actually respectable fans, but the FBL series wasn't as quiet as the FBA series (the normal looking ones). I don't think I ever would have considered it silent at 2000RPM, so I'm not sure what the best suggestion is.

Mr. K6 · Post by **Mr. K6** » Sat Feb 19, 2005 2:55 pm

Hmm...

Well the 9CM CAT is much quieter at 2000RPM, and it's inaudible over the other fans with the case side on. What are these nexus fans? I did a search and the only results I keep getting are the Vantec fan controllers. Where do you guys get them? The side fan was mainly used to cool my 9800Pro, but I've been thinking of making a ducting mod for the VGA silencer and therefore eliminate the fan (which does make noise). Right now the hardrive is in a cage that has rubber grommets on all 4 screws. I'll look around for some small bungy cords of some sort to suspend it and see if that makes a difference. Thanks for the reply!

sthayashi · Post by **sthayashi** » Sat Feb 19, 2005 3:40 pm

Nexus fans can be found at Silicon Acoustics among other places.

Their website is Nexustek.

Really, the best thing you can do is to stop the fans one by one and see which one is making the most noise. Nothing will die if you stop the fan for 30 seconds or so.

Do this with the hard drive unplugged, as that way you can hear what it sounds like without the hard drive noise.

Mr. K6 · Post by **Mr. K6** » Sat Feb 19, 2005 7:03 pm

The nexus fans just seem to run at lower RPM's and less CFM, they don't really have a different design; if my stealth's cause any problems (which they arent) I'll just undervolt them. I took the stealth out of the side of my case and put it on my heat sink, which helped alot with noise (wow, that CAT really was loud

). Temps in the case didnt change much, but noise is lower. However, the CPU temp rose 2C at load, so I'm thinking of getting an XP-90 and using a the 92mm stealth on that. I tried suspending the HDD, didn't change noise a bit, but with out the cage in their the case seemed weaker, so I put it back in.

ckolivas · Post by **ckolivas** » Sat Feb 19, 2005 7:11 pm

Mr. K6 wrote:The nexus fans just seem to run at lower RPM's and less CFM, they don't really have a different design

That's not correct. Fans running at the same CFM can produce very different sound patterns, with less well designed fans often whining and clicking. Furthermore, if a fan is designed to run at low rpms at full voltage then they are usually quieter than a fan designed for higher rpms undervolted to the same rpms, and the low rpm design can be undervolted usually to much much lower rpms without simply stopping. All things being the same, when a nexus fan is producing the same CFM as a Vantec fan, it is significanly quieter.

Chris`I · Post by **Chris`I** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 1:24 am

ckolivas wrote:
Mr. K6 wrote:The nexus fans just seem to run at lower RPM's and less CFM, they don't really have a different design
That's not correct. Fans running at the same CFM can produce very different sound patterns, with less well designed fans often whining and clicking. Furthermore, if a fan is designed to run at low rpms at full voltage then they are usually quieter than a fan designed for higher rpms undervolted to the same rpms, and the low rpm design can be undervolted usually to much much lower rpms without simply stopping. All things being the same, when a nexus fan is producing the same CFM as a Vantec fan, it is significanly quieter.

Agreed, my "Stealth" fan that I used to replace the Antec stock fan in my TruePower PSU had nasty clicking when it was undervolted. Eventually I replaced it with an ancient Evercool fan which undervolts very very nicely, supprising for how old it is!

Mr. K6 · Post by **Mr. K6** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 7:21 am

ckolivas wrote:
Mr. K6 wrote:The nexus fans just seem to run at lower RPM's and less CFM, they don't really have a different design
That's not correct. Fans running at the same CFM can produce very different sound patterns, with less well designed fans often whining and clicking. Furthermore, if a fan is designed to run at low rpms at full voltage then they are usually quieter than a fan designed for higher rpms undervolted to the same rpms, and the low rpm design can be undervolted usually to much much lower rpms without simply stopping. All things being the same, when a nexus fan is producing the same CFM as a Vantec fan, it is significanly quieter.

Apparently I just got lucky then

. As opposed to the 120mm stealths, which I've had alot of problems with, the 92mm stealth undervolts very nicely, but since it is my heatsink fan atm, I really won't be undervolting it. I ordered an XP-90, which I think will more than make up for the slow RPM fan

.

Resulting from all this, I now have that huge hole where the 92mm on the side was. Would cutting another hole and making a duct right over the CPU fan lower temps anymore? How would I plug up the old hole? Right now it's about 2 1/2 inches down and an inch left from the CPU fan center.