Advice on making the PC i just ordered quiet (*not silent*)

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vrokolos
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Advice on making the PC i just ordered quiet (*not silent*)

Post by vrokolos » Sun Feb 14, 2010 4:23 am

CASE: SUGO SG04
MOBO: GIGABYTE UD2
PSU: ST50F
CPU: I7 860
GPU: 5850
HDD: intel 80gb SSD + 500gb sata + 350gb IDE

I will never overclock it.

So I was reading about the NT06 cooler and how it can be used to cool the CPU passively. Will this work for my setup or is the 860 too much for it? I just want to know if there's anything I can replace my stock coolers for, both the gpu and the cpu so i can make them quieter. Also is there anything i can do to the case itself to make it quieter?

jessekopelman
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Post by jessekopelman » Sun Feb 14, 2010 1:46 pm

Look into software for controlling fan speed, both CPU and GPU. On the CPU end, have you explored your BIOS options? If so, and you're not satisfied, try SpeedFan. For GPU there is ATI Overdrive and other such software. If you try all of these and aren't satisfied, then it is time to explore aftermarket heatsinks. Remember that before you become obsessed with passive, very slow fan is just as perceptually silent and far easier to achieve.

RoGuE
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Post by RoGuE » Sun Feb 14, 2010 3:09 pm

dont even think about going fanless on that CPU. Its more or less, ridiculous. You can achieve inaudible performance by altering the heatsink and fan assembly. It's much better to run a fan slow and inaudible than not at all (moving air cools far better than stagnant air).

My first advise to you is open up the bios as you turn on your system. (this is usually done by tapping DEL key durring posting). Make your way over to the hardware section, and see if you can find some settings for CPU fan speed. Many mobo's now have a quiet/medium/powerful setting. Pop it on quiet and see what kind of temps you see.

If that doesn't do it for you, the next step is to buy an aftermarket heatsink. Oh, and don't think you need to blow 100$ to get something quieter. In my case, a 25$ HSF allowed me to near-sliently overclock my C2D. Expect to pay around 40-50 for a decent heatsink for your socket. This may or may not include a fan as well.

The final step to silence is picking a top of the line fan. I swear by scythe, but many people here will also stand behind Noctua or Nexus fans. I like the 1200RPM 120mm Scythe slipstream for the task. Its a very well built fan that moves a lot of air quietly.

good luck in your endeavor. You'll achieve silence sooner or later, but my advice to you is forget the fanless idea. It's just not practical

ces
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CPU Heatsink

Post by ces » Sun Feb 14, 2010 6:57 pm

You are going to have problems fitting a good heatsink in there.

I have a similar problem on another case. The PSU limits the height of the CPU cooler. The NT06 cooler is not a good choice, even for a smaller heat load. I think somewhere SilentPCReview has looked at it.

I went looking for an external PSU to just remove the PSU from the equation, but I couldn't find anything.

Please let us know how you end up solving the CPU heat sing problem.

Also don't forget, as a general rule if you have a 25mm thick fan, you want to give it 25mm of unobstructed clearance. So if you have a 100mm high top down cooler, you want to leave an extra 25mm to permit it to breath.

How much clearance do you have above your board? Can you mount the PSU so that it's fan is facing away from your motherboard?

vrokolos
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Post by vrokolos » Tue Feb 16, 2010 9:48 am

The PC is not here yet.. So you're all advising for software solutions since hardware is pretty tight in that case

lm
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Post by lm » Tue Feb 16, 2010 11:57 am

Sell those 2 small drives and buy one large storage drive from the SPCR recommended list.

RoGuE
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Post by RoGuE » Tue Feb 16, 2010 2:19 pm

lm wrote:Sell those 2 small drives and buy one large storage drive from the SPCR recommended list.
by smaller drives he means the hard drives, not the SSD. The SSD is fine for your OS, but you ideally want a nice quiet, slow spinning 1TB drive for data storage. This is preferable over the 2 smaller drives (it cuts down on some excess noise)

vrokolos
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Post by vrokolos » Wed Feb 17, 2010 1:22 am

since i won't be using those disks 99% of the time the noise won't disturb me

JamieG
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Post by JamieG » Wed Feb 17, 2010 2:05 pm

In the Sugo 04, with the PSU mounted over the CPU heatsink, something like the Corsair H50 integrated CPU watercooling system might work well.

The part of the H50 that sits directly on top of the CPU should fit under the PSU in that case. The only question would be whether the coolant lines to the radiator would be long enough to allow the radiator part of the H50 to be mounted on one of the front intake fan slots.

You might want to consider swapping the Corsair fan for something quieter and possibly undervolting the pump on the H50 (apparently it is possible) as well if you do go down this route.

RoGuE
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Post by RoGuE » Wed Feb 17, 2010 11:55 pm

vrokolos wrote:since i won't be using those disks 99% of the time the noise won't disturb me
even if you're not accessing then, they still make noise. Just spinning alone, (no seek noise) can be very much audible on some drives. When I installed my second drive, the two started producing "hummmm......hummmmmm" sound as the vibrations went in and out of harmonic frequencies. This was solved when I suspended them (see signature), but my point is, you're setting yourself up for un-necisary sources of noise. If you are serious about silencing this thing, choosing the quietest hard drive configuration is a huge step.

vrokolos
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Post by vrokolos » Thu Feb 18, 2010 12:31 am

If you are serious about silencing this thing, choosing the quietest hard drive configuration is a huge step
At the moment I can't hear my HDDs at all. What I can hear is the i7 stock fan spinning at around 2500-3100 rpm and sounding louder than anything else thus instantly making anything else 'silent'.

vrokolos
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Post by vrokolos » Fri Feb 19, 2010 11:50 am

Ok after some tests here are my results from my new PC

It's kind of quiet now. I reversed the PSU so that the fan points towards the case. That made the CPU fan drop around 1000 rpms!!!!! About the HDDs you mentioned you were right. They do make some noise even if they're not getting used but my windows 7 power management control panel allowed me to shutdown the HDDs after 5 minutes of inactivity. Since i'm only using the SSD 99% of the time I can say that my HDDs are completely silent!

I'm looking for the next step in making the system more quiet.
I should probably replace the case default 120mm fan with 2 silent ones and next step is the CPU heatsink which i'm kinda limited cause of the height. I'm afraid to insert any watercooled one in there since i will be moving the pc alot and i'm scared of leaks. The only two aftermarket heatsinks I found that can fit in there are the scythe big shuriken and the nexus low 7000. I'm not so sure the second one can fit in there or that either of them can handle the i7 and be quieter than the stock one.

So what's your advice o great silentpcreviewgurus? What should I do now?

oh btw I used this program to shut down my HDD to see how much noise it does: http://revosleep.realspooky.de/ great proggy!!

Redzo
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Post by Redzo » Fri Feb 19, 2010 1:51 pm

RoGuE wrote:
vrokolos wrote:since i won't be using those disks 99% of the time the noise won't disturb me
even if you're not accessing then, they still make noise. Just spinning alone, (no seek noise) can be very much audible on some drives. When I installed my second drive, the two started producing "hummmm......hummmmmm" sound as the vibrations went in and out of harmonic frequencies. This was solved when I suspended them (see signature), but my point is, you're setting yourself up for un-necisary sources of noise. If you are serious about silencing this thing, choosing the quietest hard drive configuration is a huge step.
Just use Power Plan options and spinn down those drives after x minutes of iddling and problem and noise are gone.

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