SSS rig design: Please comment!

[E M F]

I have read quite a bit about silencing PCs, but have never undertaken a truly quiet PC rig as a project.

Well, that's just changed; I've got it in writing from my wife ( ::winces at the whipcrack sounds:: ) that I'm allowed to blow my bonus on whatever I want--- and what I want is the best of all worlds: a rig that is Stable, Silent, and Speedy (SSS for short.)

Here's what I have planned, complete with links for those items I can link: Please feel free to add suggestions!

Hardware:
Case: Antec Performance-One P-180
That is, if it should it become available in the next thirty days--- Elsewise likely a 3700 from the recommendations I've seen.

Power Supply: Antec Phantom 500
See Case--- otherwise, taking recommendations for a quiet 400w+ P/S.

Motherboard: MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum
nForce 4 Ultra, since SLI won't work with the ATI video card; Couldn't find a vendor for the Gigabyte K8NXP-9 (Neil, where'd you get yours?)

CPU: AMD Athlon64 3500+ S-939 Winchester
Not an AMD fanboy--- The A64 simply runs cooler than the equivalent-priced 3.4Ghz P4. I'm not going to wait for dual-core at this point as much as I'd like to have it.... because she might change her mind.

Memory: Corsair TWINX1024-3200XLPT
Two 512MB super-low-latency (2-2-2-5) DDR400 RAM sticks for dual-channel operation.

Storage: 2x Seagate ST3200826AS
200GB 7200rpm SATA/NCQ drives, for a RAID-1 array. I've heard recommendations for the Samsungs, but couldn't find them in this size.

Optical: Looking for recommendations
Quiet is a must, speed much less so: looking for a good DVD-ROM and a dual-layer DVD +/- R/W.

Audio: Creative Labs Audigy4 Pro... Maybe.
I may use the money on an M-Audio Delta 66 instead, depending on the embedded audio on the motherboard.

Video: Sapphire ATI Radeon X850XT PCIe 256MB
Single most expensive part of the rig, whose warranty will be immediately voided as I rip the fan off it for the installation of...

Cooling: Zalman Reserator 1
Won't be the first time I've installed a watercooling solution. I plan on watercooling the CPU and the video card (and perhaps the northbridge) with the Reserator, and air-cooling the rest of the box with the 120mm fan mount in the top of the P-180.

I'm a fair hand with a Dremel and jigsaw, so some minor tweaks to the case will be forthcoming. I've got some ideas for possibly ducting the (admittedly warmer than ambient) 120mm exhaust over the Reserator for airflow without an additional fan.

I'm hoping the resilient mounts for the hard drives will keep them relatively quiet, though I may instead have to hang them inside the 5 1/4" bays underneath the DVD drives.

I will not be overclocking. Yes, I could probably eke some more performance out of the box, but I'm trying to keep the thing quiet so I can record acoustic/classical guitar in the room.

This case will also not be traveling. It's going to be set up and stay there.

Begin flam^H^H^H^Hconstructive criticism.

[GrahamGarside]

Case Have you considered the Silverstone Temjin TJ06, the way it keeps the cpu and psu away from ech other would probably be good for a passive psu

Power Supply A passive unit may not be the best idea, with water cooling and good air flow you should be able to keep a seasonic or modded enermax quiet enough

Motherboard the problem with the msi board is the position of the northbridge, if your watercooling this and the gpu then hopefully it shouldn't be a problem, otherwise it's a very good board, though a dfi lan party may be a better choice

CPU nothing wrong here, just make sure you do get a winchester. As wel as running cooler than a P4 it is also faster in games and none media based stuff

Memory Corsair ram is quite good, but most people agree that samsung tccd based memory is the best choice, I believe patriot and pqi use these chips

Storage It's true samsungs only currently go up to 160gb but are much quieter. There are new drives due soon. Seagates aren't bad, but they don't support AAM and so it seems pot luck as to if you get a quiet drive or not. Personally I own both seagates ide 7200.7's and a maxtor 10, my seagates do seem to be on quiet mode but I still find the maxtor 10 quieter.

Optical go for an NEC3520 for the writer, they are quiet, fast and highly compatable, for the reader it's a tough one, most drives are pretty much the same, no drive is quiet when reading at 16x so using something like Nero's drivespeed to set the drive to silent should do it. My drives a cheap Artec 16x drive and it's only quiet when doing this.

Audio Audigys are good for games and have great sound quality in general, M-audio are also very good cards, thanks to m-audio usually being associated with pro gear, they are of excellent quality

Video If voiding the warranty is a problem theres always the HIS Excalibur ATI Radeon X850 XT ICEQII TURBO, which uses an Arctic cooler for cooling, may be worth considering because you are going to be keeping some very hot components cool with just a passive radiator

coolingthe reserator is certainly a quiet cooling device, though the pump will produce noise, but a more pleasant noise than that of fans. A single 120mm fan should suffice for mosfet and hardrive cooling, anexus in place of the standard fan would ensure near silence.

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[E M F]

Case: I hadn't considered the TJ06 a viable option, since I couldn't figure out how a passive power supply would get any airflow in that position behind the 5 1/4" drive bays. The P-180 uses a similar rear-case layout, albeit flipped upside down, to keep the CPU away from the passive power supply, but adds the 120mm blower (which of course would be a silent Nexus or similar) in the center-mount to keep air flowing over the fins. I might consider the TJ06 as a "backup" in place of the 3700, though I'd really prefer to be able to lock away the power button.

Power Supply: Why would a passive supply be a bad idea, if it's rated for the power requirements I need? See "Cooling" below for more on the "why".

Motherboard: Thank you--- I'll go look at the DFI board as a possibility, too!

CPU: The other reason for the A64 is 64-bit Linux, as soon as I'm sure the nF4U chipset's supported.

Memory: Never heard of this... what would the advantage of the Samsung TCCD memory be in comparison to the extra low-latency Corsair RAM?

Storage: I have to admit that I've had horrible experiences with Maxtors and drive failure. This is the first time I've heard them mentioned in the "silent" discussion, though perhaps their Fluid Drive Bearing stuff has improved the racket that the 5400rpm drives I used to have always suffered. I'll look at them again, but I'm going to need the space of 200GB+ drives.

Optical: Thank you for the recommendations.. I was trying to avoid the debacle of my Pioneer A06, which sounded like an overloaded 747 trying to take off using a carrier catapult.

Audio: Exactly. Would that I could have a "games-only" machine, but this one has to serve multiple purposes.. including recording, where the M-Audio Delta kit far outstrips the Audigy.

Video: I had to read your statement a few times to understand what you were recommending, since both cards have large blowers on them. I'll still be voiding the warranty, by ripping off the heatsink. And "passive" isn't necessarily the right word for the Reserator by the time I'll be done with it. See "Cooling". For the record, I want dual-DVI output, and couldn't care less about VIVO. Everything video-wise will be via Firewire-based.

Cooling: I'm hoping to have a whopping two fans inside the case: One in the power supply / hard drive cage, and one in the top rear of the case. I'm possibly going to be ducting the output of this second fan across the Reserator. I may have flow issues, where I might need to replace the pump-- especially if cooling the northbridge as well. I also note that the Reserator sits on a nice little round open base... Just about the right size for an 150mm low-voltage DC fan.

I'm planning on testing to a fare-thee-well, and posting all results and pictures.

[GrahamGarside]

Case there is an 80mm intake fan for case ventilation, plus with there being 5 drive bays you can always sort some kind of duct out from these.

Power Supply It's not so much that they are a bad idea, but you're talking about a lot of heat with a system such as this, so it will still need airflow, and a seasonic super silencer can be practically silent, at least no louder than the harddrives/water pump/case fans

Memory The advantage is just that samsung TCCD chips achieve better results

http://www.rojakpot.com/default.aspx?lo ... 193&var2=0

here you can see with the tightest timings they achieve 436mhz, and 550mhz with more relaxed, but still commendable timings of 2.5-3-3-7

Storage You'll find quite a few posts on here recomending the maxtor 10 range as being very quiet and very fast. I can't comment on reliability, I've owned 2 maxtors, 1 an ancient 6gb drive that is 8 years old and still runs today, and the other my maxtor 10 200gb which is only 4 months old so I can't comment to much on it's reliability. It is quieter than my seagate 7200.7 drives, which in turn are likely quieter than a 7200.8 drive

Video I recomended this card because you could keep it quiet enough without water cooling, but if you are going for water cooling then theres little point in this card for you


Good luck with it all.

[E M F]

Graham, thank you.

I'll take a second look at the parts you recommended, because given my situation (read: pickiness), I'm not sure what I'll actually be able to find when it comes the day of the purchase.

[E M F]

It turns out that the Corsair 3200XLPT RAM modules use the Samsung TCCD chips, too. ;D

[GrahamGarside]

I was actually just about to say that, just read a comparrison of TCCD based modules on hexus

http://www.hexus.net/content/reviews/re ... 9JRD0xMDEw