Replacing case fans
pheasant16
It's not terribly loud, but noticeable. Can an average human ear
detect enough difference between 20 and 10 dba fans to make this a swap
I should do?
Don't have any type of cpu temp monitor and a stock AMD cooling fan also.
Don't overclock or game, so no intense use of cpu.
Just would like it a bit quieter while sitting here reading.
Thanks
Jan Alter
news:i6ie5f$grn$1...@news.eternal-september.org...
I believe one could tell the difference between 10 and 20 dba at that low
level. There are aftermarket fans (ie Zalman, among others) that provide cpu
cooling fans that are much quieter than stock. Some esoteric varieties even
provide liquid cooling without a fan. I remember about ten years ago when
Zalman came into the picture and offered a very quiet fan for cpu cooling.
For the Athlon II cpu I was running with an AMD stock 80 mm fan Zalman
offered a 120mm fan that gave even better cooling, and was barely audible,
as it was able to run at about 1200-1500 rpm. I was ecstatic over the drop
in noise after purchasing one.
--
Jan Alter
bea...@verizon.net
Paul
I think changing fans, is a waste of time. But go right ahead and
test this for yourself.
If you significantly change the CFM (cubic feet per minute) rating
of the fan, you can make it quiet. But, you'll also be allowing
the case air temperature to rise inside the computer. If you
expect to get significant noise reduction, it will be at the
expense of operating temperature. There is undoubtedly room
in your computer design to do that, so there is room for
you to play. But don't ask me for an economic analysis, of
what a 10C rise in temperature means to you in the long term :-)
On my computer, I'm mainly concerned with the temperature of the
hard drives (you can measure that with HDTune). Which is why the
only case fan on my current computer, is an intake fan blowing air
over the hard drives. Right now, the two hard drives are
registering 29C (room temp is low right now).
I'm less concerned with the rest of the computer. The CPU fan,
which blows down onto the motherboard, keeps both the CPU and the
chipset cool. And the video card, has been neutered so that the fan
runs at a constant 20 percent. I did that, because if you booted Linux,
the stupid Nvidia video card would ramp the fan to 100% for the entire
session, which is unnecessary. After some study, I determined 20% covered
all requirements (gaming or not), and so I've rigged the fan for constant
speed, to make it less annoying.
But I'm not going to waste my time, trying to make the computer
"silent". For $500 to $1000, you used to be able to buy Zalman TNN
computer cases, which cool the hardware with heatpipes, but they
don't sell those any more. And I'm not aware of any competitor
attempting to enter that "noiseless" market. The power supply
in that computer was fanless, as far as I know, but you
would not be able to use a significant amount of the 400W
rating of the supply. You wouldn't be able to stick a "gamer"
video card in such a system, and expect the system to remain fanless.
So by using a $1000 computer case, and a relatively low power
computer setup (65W dual core, built-in graphics), you could make
the computer "silent". Is that really a good tradeoff ? For a
recording studio, the answer is yes. For everyone else, it might
be easier to move the computer to another room, and run long monitor
and keyboard cables etc.
Liquid cooling is another way to do this, but it means anyone else
in your household, would have to be happy about tubes of colored
liquid running from one room to another. Some people put their
"radiator" on a liquid cooled system, in another room, so that
the noise from the fans on the "radiator" cannot be heard. And
that is another way to do cooling. Leaks are less of an
issue than in the past, at least, as long as nothing "bites"
the plastic tubing.
You could easily waste the rest of your life, trying to make the
computer quiet :-) I find the next best alternative, is to
make sure all the fans run at constant speed, as that
is easier for me to ignore.
Paul
pheasant16
> I think changing fans, is a waste of time. But go right ahead and
> test this for yourself.
>
> If you significantly change the CFM (cubic feet per minute) rating
> of the fan, you can make it quiet. But, you'll also be allowing
> the case air temperature to rise inside the computer. If you
> expect to get significant noise reduction, it will be at the
> expense of operating temperature. There is undoubtedly room
> in your computer design to do that, so there is room for
> you to play. But don't ask me for an economic analysis, of
> what a 10C rise in temperature means to you in the long term :-)
>
Fans are cheap, and the need to tinker still lingers, so will probably
do this anyway. Just didn't know if normal ears would be able to tell
any difference. The idea to replace the stock CPU fan I really liked,
so will oder one of those also.
This box replaced an 8 year old Dell which was pretty much silent, and
didn't realize even this small amount of noise would be annoying, so the
need to tinker kicked in. ;)
Bob
Take a look at the Akasa Apache 120x25mm 16 dB(A) / 57 CFM fan at
http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/ak12ap57cfmi.html
-- Bob Day
http://bobday.vze.com