Is it bad to use the PSU that came with the case?

[trains are bad]

I'm out to build a multipurpose PC that must be nearly silent or silent. My budget is flexible.

I'm looking at cases and seeing that you can spend hundreds of dollars or as little as 40, and some of them come with power supplies.

If my thinking is correct, I'm going to need to replace the PSU with a quiet one anyway, so it's pointless to buy a case with one right?

Any recommendations for a nice looking, small/trim case that facilitates quietness, and is as cheap as possible?

 

[technobarbie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by trains are bad If my thinking is correct, I'm going to need to replace the PSU with a quiet one anyway, so it's pointless to buy a case with one right? Any recommendations for a nice looking, small/trim case that facilitates quietness, and is as cheap as possible?

Your thinking is correct about the power supply. I use Lian Li so I can't help with the case. But If you didn't already know, newegg.com has some groovy cases.

 

[Eagle_Driver]

"Cheap" and "quiet" do not go together, in this case. Cheap cases are generally built poorly, and will vibrate and flex excessively, causing excessive noise. And cheap PSU's are either just plain crappy or are relatively noisy. Moreover, most PSU's which come with cases are too weak on the +12V rail(s) to power a modern P4 or A64 system.

 

[trains are bad]

Note I said my budget is flexible, and as cheap as possible/necessary. I just don't need bells and whistles, fancy lighting or integrated coffee machines

 

[Razoramus]

Moderately cheap and pretty quiet DO go together. Examples are some offerings from Antec including the Sonata, Sonata II, SLK3700-BQE. You can get these with a decent power supply included for about $100.

 

[jerb]

I currently Have a thermaltake xaser III.... I hate it. I wouldnt buy thermaltake again.

If I was in your situation I would go as follows:

Extreme: http://www.xoxide.com/zalman6.html
Its the zalman quiet case @ $1300

Moderate: http://www.xoxide.com/lianlipc61.html
Lian Li case and buy a seasonic PSU
http://www.xoxide.com/comaprcab.html
also paired with a seeasonic PSU

or the sonata mentioned before

 

[Firam]

Check out

http://www.silentpcreview.com/

This christmas I got a Evercase ECE4252 and a Sparkle FSP350-60PN. They are about $50 each. Plus 3 $8 case fans. I also got a SILVERSTONE SST-FP52 at $30 because I like the pretty blue light.

 

[cire]

Quote:

Originally Posted by trains are bad If my thinking is correct, I'm going to need to replace the PSU with a quiet one anyway, so it's pointless to buy a case with one right?

it really depends on the make of the case. Antec case/PSU combos are generally very good deals.

 

[Sycraft]

I'll join in on the "get an Antec" boat. It's good stuff. There are quieter powersupplies out there, but I'd be wary. The thing is they tend not to build them, but remanufactuer them. Well this leads to some of them being dodgy.

If you want something that's not hard to find, not too expensive and fairly quiet get one of their Truepower or Smartpower lines. Of those I think the Truepower makes less noise but both are good.

If you want something that's real quiet and don't mind dropping cash on it, get a Phantom. They have no fans, and thus make no noise. ONly thing is they are ike $200 and you have to consider cooling. Most cases count on the PSU to expell heat. If doesn't have to, but if it's not going to, you'll need to design around that. Have an air guide for the CPU straight to a large fan on the back, and use a lower-power video card like an X600 or something.

Now, as for cases, small and quiet are rather contradictory. The problem is that the smaller a fan is, the more noise it makes. Also the less fans you have, the faster they must spin, and thus the more noise they make. For a quiet system the best bet is a large case, with a number of slow spinning fans form someone like SilenX or Papst. 80mms will work, 100mms are beter.

The other option is, of course, lower power. Simply lower your heat output, you need less cooling, and have less noise.

More or less it's a triad of size, noise and power. You can do well on two of them, but not really on all three. If you want a Pentium D, GeForce 7800GT, RAID 0, and so on you can have all that, and have it make less noise than you'd think, but you'll need large case for it to hold all the fans, larger heatsinks (the bigger the sink, the less airflow needed), and dampening material. If you want to pack all that in a a small box, it's doabole, but you'll need fans that could lift a 777 to keep it from overheating.

Also if you want total silence, that's doable, but be prepared to open your wallet. If numbers like $5000 don't scare you, let me know and I'll help you with options.

 

[Eagle_Driver]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sycraft Now, as for cases, small and quiet are rather contradictory. The problem is that the smaller a fan is, the more noise it makes. Also the less fans you have, the faster they must spin, and thus the more noise they make. For a quiet system the best bet is a large case, with a number of slow spinning fans form someone like SilenX or Papst. 80mms will work, 100mms are beter. The other option is, of course, lower power. Simply lower your heat output, you need less cooling, and have less noise. More or less it's a triad of size, noise and power. You can do well on two of them, but not really on all three. If you want a Pentium D, GeForce 7800GT, RAID 0, and so on you can have all that, and have it make less noise than you'd think, but you'll need large case for it to hold all the fans, larger heatsinks (the bigger the sink, the less airflow needed), and dampening material. If you want to pack all that in a a small box, it's doabole, but you'll need fans that could lift a 777 to keep it from overheating.

This assumes average airflow in all cases. But not all large cases are created equal: Some very large cases are so poorly designed that airflow is either very poor to begin with or all too easy to obstruct no matter what you do. In fact, my extremely large case needs a much louder, noisier and vibration-inducing fan just to even barely cool a middle-of-the-road configuration than my medium-sized case does to cool a high-end configuration. In fact, that large case cannot accomodate fans any larger than 80mm without severe modifications - and it needs all four such noisy fans just to avoid gaping holes where fans would have normally gone onto. (Whereas my medium-sized case cools adequately with only two low-speed 120mm fans.)

 

[hekoman]

Any decent computer need a good PSU to back it up. About 2 years ago I bout an expensive Enermax PSU (Noisetaker 350W). It ran great for the longest time. I started having problem with my computer and I thought it was the PSU aty first so I replaced it with some generic POS. Well needless to say the PSU was not my problem when my computer kept dying. I eventually fixed the probem, but I left the cheap PSU in the case, bad mistake.

One day I come home from work and my computer is off (I leave it on all the time) and it would not come on. I ended up having to replace half the componet in my computer because the cheap PSU went bad. Once all the problem components were replaced (Motherboard, network controller, firewire card, DVD reader, and video card) I stuck my old Enermax back in my computer and it has worked great ever since.

So moral of the story.... don't buy a cheap PSU.

 

[iSleipnir]

I had the same thing happen to a friend of mine. Fried his comp along with a new video card.

 

[eugenius]

I'll rank the options from high to low:

Antec P180 + Antec Phantom 500W - 300$, best option, fits even the most powerfull pc's, 3 year warranty - with nexus 12cm fans instead of the default ones.

Antec P150 (with silent Antec NeoHE PSU) - 150$ - best price / performance ratio, has elastic suspension for HDD's in the box, PSU almost as quiet as a seasonic, 3 year warranty - I highly recommend this!!!

There is another option, an (aluminium) HTPC SFX case and a Seasonic SS-300 SFD 80plus PSU - this one is hard to find but worth if if you must have a system for the living room. The budget is from cheap black plastic to aluminium with a touchscreen LCD control panel - from 100$ to 400$. A Sempron Mobile 2800+/3100+ 25W, to lower the heat, and an aopen 6600 ddr3 low profile card are recommended options.


If you just want to make your current rig silent, get a fortron psu with as higah efficiency as you can afford, swap the fan with a 12cm nexus and be happy.