[twilightrevenant]

i strongly recommand the sunbeam fan controller.

it's cheap, efficent, bright LEDs, looks not bad for a 15 dollar ish thing. best of all, moddable if your good with electronics.

 

[pbirkett]

Quote:

Originally posted by fewtch I felt a little better about its SQ after doing that...

 

[eighteen_psi]

Quote:

Originally posted by Geek I recommend against the vantec nexus for fan noise control purposes: the capacitors on the vantec controller create lots of static, hisses, and pops when you turn them down. It's quite a treat if you want to impress your friends but its a pain in the butt to set up and completely useless for noise control purposes as it replaces the constant hum of your fans with a bunch of static popping. Trust me, I use one and I have installed the newer version and it still has noise problems. Cheers, Geek

Curious...mine doesn't seem to introduce anything I can hear through M 24/96 -> Custom Mutiloop -> HD580 (or my sat/sub setup).

It controls (2) Thermaltake smartfan II's and (2) Vantec tornados (all 4 80mm's together slinging around nearly 300 CFM at max speed

) Dead silent at minimum setting unless I get down next to it.

 

[pbirkett]

Quote:

Originally posted by eighteen_psi Curious...mine doesn't seem to introduce anything I can hear through M 24/96 -> Custom Mutiloop -> HD580 (or my sat/sub setup). It controls (2) Thermaltake smartfan II's and (2) Vantec tornados (all 4 80mm's together slinging around nearly 300 CFM at max speed ) Dead silent at minimum setting unless I get down next to it.

Indeed, same here. Not only that, but the poster claimed I'd be harming my computer. Well, seeing as I'm usually doing little else when listening to music, then its not really putting the computer under strain. When I am pushing the computer hard, then I'm free to turn it up when needed.

 

[eighteen_psi]

Quote:

Originally posted by pbirkett Indeed, same here. Not only that, but the poster claimed I'd be harming my computer. Well, seeing as I'm usually doing little else when listening to music, then its not really putting the computer under strain. When I am pushing the computer hard, then I'm free to turn it up when needed.

Its usually beyond the scope of this forum but I'm a pretty serious hardware guy myself and as long as your temps are ok (or if you have a P4 it doesn't really matter as they clock throttle) you're fine.

With all fans idling the following system runs around 45C idle (cpus) and 50C full load on the hottest days:

MSI K7D Master
Dual AMD Athlon XP 1700+ @ MP 2600+, 1.65V
1GB Reg. ECC PC2100
ATI FireGL X1 (HOT!)
18GB 15K SCSI
Dual 120GB WD 7200RPM disk
3 Optical Drives

Etc.
Etc.

Yeah...check your temps with motherboard monitor or the like and report back but I vote you're almost certainly fine.

EDIT: I didn't mention said CPUS are packing Thermalright SLK-800A's on them...about as serious as a dual cpu board can take (surpassed by very few for any application) so your mileage may vary (with smaller/lesser heatsinks)

 

[Joe Bloggs]

Quote:

Originally posted by Kalanen What should i do? Making the computer more quiet would cost too much i think..

What CPU are you using? If you're using a Pentium 4, how about taking away all the fans except a wimpy CPU fan and the PSU fan... that should make it quiet enough and if the CPU overheats it'll slow down by itself

 

[Chipko]

Quote:

Originally posted by Adso I think it is important to note here that (I think) Chipko meant to state that these items are listed in order from LEAST important to MOST important. Northbridge cooling is a last fraction of a percent kind of tweak, a lot of people think this doesn't have any effect on case temp or performance at all.

We're not discussing cooling here, we're discussing noise and those pesky little 40mm fans produces the most obnoxious sound of all fans. So no, my list isn't backwards, it was written with noise and not cooling in mind.
Quote:

Originally posted by Adso If your card fits it, the only card cooler to look at is the Arctic Cooling VGA silencer. The Zalman heatpipe is decent, but it is expensive...

Again, we're not overclocking, we're reducing noise, the price difference is only about USD10 here and you get rid of a fan. The VGA silencer seems to be hella loud as well, 27/39dB according to the first site google found. The loudest thing in my case is the PSU at 19dB so it doesn't fall in the quiet category for me.

Quote:

Originally posted by Adso I would add Thermaltake heatsinks to Chipko's other excellent suggestions. And good call on the Papst fans, if I didn't have access to Panaflo's, that's the only thing I would use.

Are you sure you don't mean Thermalright? I have no experience of either but from what I read Thermalright is the way to go. Left it out on purpose, people tend to get them mixed up and get Thermaltake since they're more readily available around here.
Not having access to Panaflo's is somewhat costly

Netrunner The Zalman NB cooler comes with thermal cement, no need for mounting holes.

For those that enjoy DIY here's a Fan controller that is cheap and reliable and can handle a lof of current: http://www.cpemma.co.uk/sdiodes.html

 

[herbie]

@Kalanen:

I own a somewhat "silent pc", HD600s and x-can v2, tried Corda HA1 before.

IMHO making your PC less noisy is a very good idea. But it might be hard if you did not chose components especially after the noise they make (harddrive, graphics adapter, mainboard fan?).
I do not notice my PC at all when listening to music, even at low volume levels. (I listen at pretty low levels most of the time.)

Regarding HD600 and Corda HA1: Test it with your setup before buying it. I found the sound to be pretty cold and "without emotion", especially at lower volume levels. Very detailed, but also very boring.

The bad thing about the HD600s is probably the amp thing. The phones did not sound that bad connected directly to my soundcard. But after listening to it on a integrated NAD amp, I thought I needed an amp to get more powerful sound.

The x-can v2 amp was nice for a time but is very far from perfect. I'd love to get a *really* good amp for the HD600 - which would make things pretty expensive.
Plus, my sound source (envy24 based exw24/96) turns out to be maybe not as good/excellent as I thought it is (in the upper frequencies). But I am not sure about that.

Herbie

 

[bdormer]

I diagree that replacing fans would be too expensive. I have Antec fans (6 of 'em) in my main machine. The machine sits under my desk and unless the monitor is on, you just about can't tell the system is powered up. Good (quiet) fans run about $10 a piece.

If you like your phones, try replacing the fans first.

Here's some places to start looking:

www.cyberguys.com
www.antec.com
www.ahanix.com

Good Luck!

bd

 

[Iron_Dreamer]

Quote:

Originally posted by herbie Regarding HD600 and Corda HA1: Test it with your setup before buying it. I found the sound to be pretty cold and "without emotion", especially at lower volume levels. Very detailed, but also very boring.

I have the same impression of the HA1, albiet with different cans. All the sound is there, but is doesn't have much life, snap, or sizzle. Also the treble is on the harsh side if using a can with boosted highs.

 

[NetRunner]

Quote:

Originally posted by Chipko The Zalman NB cooler comes with thermal cement, no need for mounting holes.

Somehow I don't trust leaving a 54g heatsink dangling with just some sticky/gluey thermal stuff.. Besides the mfg. says it can't be used on boards that don't have the holes.