[autoteleology]

 

 
This is pretty awesome. Love pretty much everything here.

 

[jackskelly]

So many great pics. This thread really makes we want to get a desktop set-up again. I enjoy my MacBook Pro but it's the only computer I've had for the past 2 1/2 years or so and now I'm looking for something different.

 

[Fuzziekiwi]

So, does anyone know any good keyboards and mouses under $50? 

 

[Tom Yum Goong]

  So, does anyone know any good keyboards and mouses under $50? 

WMO for life.
http://www.amazon.com/Microsoft-D66-00029-Wheel-Mouse-Optical/dp/B00006B7HB

 

[Astropin]

  So, does anyone know any good keyboards and mouses under $50? 

 
The Logitech K740 illuminated! (keyboard)

 

[VeerK]

How are you guys orienting your desktop speakers? I'm not sure to keep my bookshelfs straight forward or curved inward at an angle.

 

[Tom Yum Goong]

  How are you guys orienting your desktop speakers? I'm not sure to keep my bookshelfs straight forward or curved inward at an angle.

Angled, of course

 

[VeerK]

  Angled, of course

Just as I thought, I noticed some set ups with the speakers straight forward, confused me if distance and orientation should be different in desks versus HT. Thanks 

 

[calipilot227]

It depends on the speaker. Some can sound a bit too bright when they're toed in (my JBLs come to mind). It's best to experiment with placement and toe-in to find what works best for your setup.

 

[MooTaters]

  I'm running the stock Silence Series R2 fans (with another one added to the front) and the thing is basically silent. Running the fans as low as they can go of a BitFenix Recon. The loudest thing in my system when idling is my PSU (which should have some 0dB magic-mode, though i call BS on that).
 

Really?  I mean I don't have the RM series, but I do have an AX760 which I've never heard over anything else.  The RM series should be better silence optimized though, seeing as the fan should be hybrid where it only spins up under a certain amount of load, and internals are picked to reduce coil whine and other noise.  Don't know the orientation you have it in, mine's fan facing down.  It's in a 600t with the front fan replaced with a 200mm Spectre pro(pretty quiet, but spits air out to the side in a horrible way, very disappointing).  Can't really tell what's the loudest(on low), probably either the front or top 200mm fan, which is mostly from the grills by them causing noise from airflow over them.  Under load probably the loudest thing in my case would be the EVGA ACX cooler on my GTX770. 

 

[SunTanScanMan]

   It's in a 600t with the front fan replaced with a 200mm Spectre pro(pretty quiet, but spits air out to the side in a horrible way, very disappointing).  

As long as it sucked in a lot of air into the case, which it does much better than the stock corsair 200mm, and probably other 200mm fans out there, I didn't see it much of an issue with the Bitfenix when I had them.
 
Its main issue for me was the build quality. I must have refunded and exchanged the fans at least 5 times over the course of a year. It would start whirring and the noise would be just unbearable for me. The last replacement did not work at all out of the box. 
 
If they insist on selling cases with 200mm fan intakes, I think corsair should at least provide higher performing 200mm fans than the ones they currently have.

 

[MooTaters]

  As long as it sucked in a lot of air into the case, which it does much better than the stock corsair 200mm, and probably other 200mm fans out there, I didn't see it much of an issue with the Bitfenix when I had them.
 
Its main issue for me was the build quality. I must have refunded and exchanged the fans at least 5 times over the course of a year. It would start whirring and the noise would be just unbearable for me. The last replacement did not work at all out of the box. 
 
If they insist on selling cases with 200mm fan intakes, I think corsair should at least provide higher performing 200mm fans than the ones they currently have.

Well I might be a bit more nit picky than most, a fan with more directional airflow should get more fresh air to parts faster.  If I recall correctly NF-F12 boxes should have a little visual of what I'm talking about.  A fan can push a lot of air but if the air doesn't move to the parts and almost stagnates then it's not doing as much.  Another good example can be fan smoke tests.
 
Anyways I do completely agree, if they want to use very large diameter fans they should be of decent quality.  Though the only problem I had with the stock fan was how loud they are, and a sticker covering the rubber plug for the bearing was loose and would flutter making noise so I just removed it.  I guess I also didn't like that they were only 20mm thick, again nit picking, but that was part of the reason I got the spectre pro...which fits fine in the front so not much reason for a thicker fan to not be included.

 

[SunTanScanMan]

^
nah I get the fact about the thickness of the fans. They are pretty thin. If the fan blades themselves were also solid rather than so flexible it would probably have helped with the noise and airflow too. 
 
However, the 650D were designed with the thin fans in mind. You could fit the thicker spectre pros but the HDD trays would touch the fan, and you'd actually had to wedge them in. I didn't think much of it at the time, but obviously as the fan spins, vibrations are passed to the HDD which is spinning at 7200rpm. You can imagine the disk is not going to last long in those circumstances. One day it started clicking and knocking... I should have realised the consequences from the beginning, but too late, and had to replace what was a perfectly functioning HDD. 

 

[skalkman]

  Really?  I mean I don't have the RM series, but I do have an AX760 which I've never heard over anything else.  The RM series should be better silence optimized though, seeing as the fan should be hybrid where it only spins up under a certain amount of load, and internals are picked to reduce coil whine and other noise.  Don't know the orientation you have it in, mine's fan facing down.  It's in a 600t with the front fan replaced with a 200mm Spectre pro(pretty quiet, but spits air out to the side in a horrible way, very disappointing).  Can't really tell what's the loudest(on low), probably either the front or top 200mm fan, which is mostly from the grills by them causing noise from airflow over them.  Under load probably the loudest thing in my case would be the EVGA ACX cooler on my GTX770. 

 
Yes, the rest of the components are that quiet. The loudest thing in general is my R9 270X CUII, though i can control the fans and they are running at about 30% when idling. The thing is that I'm running a Core2Quad Q8200 and the sleep-states on that thing are rather horrible, i guess it is whats keeping my PSU from spinning down fully.
 

 
Found this video of someone putting the Q8200 against a 3770K, just for ****s and giggles.

 

[drez]

VGA cooling in general is noisy, even suppposedly quiet coolers from asus etc. i did have a msi card which ran very quiet, but they have since changed to noiser fans in the new models. the only solution is something like mk23 from Prolimatech which can run inaudibly on my 680 (using pwm noctua nfs12a) and doesn't spin up, ever. As far as case fans, unless you need a child or pet friendly solution open case works best. If the vga and cpu cooling is inaudible, there is no noise and you save money and noise on case fans.

I never had much luck with larger fans, 12cm is a sweet spot for silent fans, save for some 200mm fans I haven't used.