[Ra97oR]

Still dunno why I haven't posted here yet. A silent centric build, with ample performance. Mostly used for music, hence silence but do play quite a bit of games on it too.
 
Internals:
 
Processor
Intel Core i7-2600K CPU @ 4.50GHz

CPU cooler
TRUE with single Akasa Venom 120
 
RAM
Corsair Vengeance 1600Mhz CL-9 DDR3 (4x4GB)

Motherboard
ASUS P8P67 Pro
 
Hard Drives
2 x Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB RAID 0, Samsung Spinpoint F4 2TB
 
Video Card
ASUS DirectCU II GTX 660 Ti
 
Soundcard
ASUS Xonar Essence ST
 
PSU
Antec Signature 650
 
 
External:
 
Case
Fractal Design, Define R3 with 4 Noctua fans at 700 rpm (3 x NF-P12 intake, 1 x NF-S12 exhaust)
 
Monitor
LG IPS225
 
Keyboard    
Steelseries 6GV2
 
Mouse
Steelseries Sensei
    
Mouse Surface
Steelseries 4HD
 
 
 
 

 
MechWarrior: Living Legends is still my most played game/mod so far.

 

[El_Doug]

You clearly haven't been bitten by the silence bug yet   You have a long way to go.  Thankfully I outgrew that phase of my computing life. 
 
It struck me in 2005, when I ended up cooling my entire rig with a single 5v 120mm fan.  Zalman passive water cooling on the processor and graphics card, fanless power supply... all made possible by undervolting the cpu and gpu, insane wire management, and a massive northbridge headsink   Suspension-mounted HDDs, rubber-mounted fan... when you hit the power button, you could never be sure the computer actually turned on until you saw the monitor display the POST screen! 

 

[Tangster]

Quote:

You clearly haven't been bitten by the silence bug yet   You have a long way to go.  Thankfully I outgrew that phase of my computing life. 
 
It struck me in 2005, when I ended up cooling my entire rig with a single 5v 120mm fan.  Zalman passive water cooling on the processor and graphics card, fanless power supply... all made possible by undervolting the cpu and gpu, insane wire management, and a massive northbridge headsink   Suspension-mounted HDDs, rubber-mounted fan... when you hit the power button, you could never be sure the computer actually turned on until you saw the monitor display the POST screen! 

I have. My entire setup can be passively cooled by the 60mm, 240 radiator if I'm not gaming or running the CPU at higher than 70%. The hard drives are all in the process of being swapped out for SSD(3/5 down) and I'll never install a CD/DVD drive because they're too loud. Pump undervoltd to 8V and suspension mounted. Haven't gotten to fanless PSUs. My previous builds were an entirely passive media PC and a silentish build for a friend based on the Fractal R3-the loudest thing in his PC is the blu-ray drive and hard discs. Can't hear anything else.

 

[Ra97oR]

Quote:

You clearly haven't been bitten by the silence bug yet   You have a long way to go.  Thankfully I outgrew that phase of my computing life. 
 
It struck me in 2005, when I ended up cooling my entire rig with a single 5v 120mm fan.  Zalman passive water cooling on the processor and graphics card, fanless power supply... all made possible by undervolting the cpu and gpu, insane wire management, and a massive northbridge headsink   Suspension-mounted HDDs, rubber-mounted fan... when you hit the power button, you could never be sure the computer actually turned on until you saw the monitor display the POST screen! 

You have underestimated how far I went with the fan speed, 700rpm is norm to fans running on 5v. All fans are rubber mounted, fully dust filtered to save me time, case is fully dampened, damped HDD mount, PSU that is as loud as passive one.
 
I have bitten with the silence bug, and this was my answer with speed left. That Fractal Design case is the best dampen case I have ever had, extremely thick and heavy side panel helps to bring it to nothingness, I always sleep with PC on.

 

[Tangster]

Quote:

You have underestimated how far I went with the fan speed, 700rpm is norm to fans running on 5v. All fans are rubber mounted, fully dust filtered to save me time, case is fully dampened, damped HDD mount, PSU that is as loud as passive one.
 
I have bitten with the silence bug, and this was my answer with speed left. That Fractal Design case is the best dampen case I have ever had, extremely thick and heavy side panel helps to bring it to nothingness, I always sleep with PC on.

I'll have to dig out my 38mm thick 5500rpm Delta PFC1212DE when I got home next weekend. Turning that on sounded like a jet engine starting up and drew up t 4.8A. I used those once for an air overclocking competition withe the old i7950.

 

[hifimanrookie]

Quote:

You have underestimated how far I went with the fan speed, 700rpm is norm to fans running on 5v. All fans are rubber mounted, fully dust filtered to save me time, case is fully dampened, damped HDD mount, PSU that is as loud as passive one.
 
I have bitten with the silence bug, and this was my answer with speed left. That Fractal Design case is the best dampen case I have ever had, extremely thick and heavy side panel helps to bring it to nothingness, I always sleep with PC on.

In my honest opinion watercooling is the way to go silent..i use extreme low rpm fans, u cant hear them..only so now and then bubbling water.. 

 

[bowei006]

I want silent for my next one

 

[Ra97oR]

Sad truth is, the only noticeable noise source is the HDD. They are louder than fans at silly low rpm.

 

[gopanthersgo1]

I'm going silent next too!

 

[Kukuk]

Man, I totally forgot Bioware has the best scenery designers in the industry...
 

 

 

 
Mass Effect 2, 3 and Dragon Age 2 had pretty average scenery design, but this is totally KOTOR/Mass Effect 1 level design. Really makes all the headaches of limited features worth it.

 

[hifimanrookie]

Quote:

Sad truth is, the only noticeable noise source is the HDD. They are louder than fans at silly low rpm.

I read bout a supplier of watercooling parts who actually made a watercooled closed and dampered box in which u fix 4 drives in..silent! I think that would be best way to quiet the sound op spinning hdd's who sometimes sound like a departing airplane when spinning up..lolz

 

[Tangster]

Quote:

I read bout a supplier of watercooling parts who actually made a watercooled closed and dampered box in which u fix 4 drives in..silent! I think that would be best way to quiet the sound op spinning hdd's who sometimes sound like a departing airplane when spinning up..lolz

For someone with your budget I'd just have the main rig on 2 SSDs, one for system and one for programs. The storage data would be via a networked mini server in some other part of the house.

 

[hifimanrookie]

Quote:

For someone with your budget I'd just have the main rig on 2 SSDs, one for system and one for programs. The storage data would be via a networked mini server in some other part of the house.

I already have a ssd with 120gb and one with 60gb and as extra 4 normal hdd's in a vibration proof mini rack in my pc..u can see the tubes on my pics coming from the minirack. The rest of the hdd's are on the floor in a wooden closset in hdd docking stations..i think i have 12 hdd's with switchable usb hub..when not needed i switch them off by the hub and they go to sleep mode.
but thanks for the tip anyway..i apreciate any tips 

 

[bowei006]

Just played some more C3 MP. Pretty nice.

 

[El_Doug]

rubber gromets for HDD mounting will not cut it - you have to suspend them in elastic. 
 
the "quiet" HDDs are actually very nice, you don't hear the motor at all.  however, unless you suspend them, you will still hear the actuator during read/write (which bothers me more, since it's not a constant regular sound that can be ignored)
 
Quote:

Sad truth is, the only noticeable noise source is the HDD. They are louder than fans at silly low rpm.