92mm fan recommendation

[DinoChop]

Hey there. I just have a quick question. I have a Antec p150 case. I want to put a quiet 92mm fan in the front, but I don't know which brand is the quietest. Any suggestions?

 

[Harvey]

The most important thing is, get a fan with double ball bearings. They're usually the best quality and the quietest.

 

[DinoChop]

any specific brand that tends to be quieter than the others?

 

[Harvey]

Sorry. I know noise is related to rotation speed so, if it's that important, you could get a variable speed fan, but it would cost more.

The other factors in fan noise are the bearings, the blade design and balance and the shape of the opening in the case that the airflow hits. If you're not using a larger fan with a lower rotation speed for your CPU or vid card, they'll probably contribute much more noise than a basic case fan.

 

[GalvanizedYankee]

I'd want to know, what's in there now and are your cooling needs being met at present.?

I think this is about the lowest dBA fan for the cfm, the specs are very close to the truth.

http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/ak92amseulqu.html

If you want more cfm than this Akasa offers, look at the Delta Triple Blade fans at this linked
site. Look only at the low speed types in 92x25 and 92x38. I have two of the 92x25s and they are
sweet heart fans at 40cfm.


...Galvanized

 

[zagood]

I have the Akasa Amber 92mm in the bottom mount, and the DTB lowspeed 92x38mm in the top mount. 2 HD's in lower two suspension mounts so the 38mm depth doesn't interfere with them. Akasa is running at 12v and DTB at 7v.

I had some problems with re-mounting the swing out door that the fans are mounted to because of the DTB being on top. I cut about 1mm off the little metal tabs that insert into the door mount with some tinsnips, no problems now.

Check the SPCR Recommended Fans for good ideas on popular fans and their loudness vs. CFM. Unfortunately, poor information on 92mm fans.

http://www.silentpcreview.com/article63-page1.html

If using a fan controller or undervolting, I'd recommend the DTB. A little loud at 12v.
http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/de92trbllows.html

Good Panaflo:
http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/pa92ulqu.html

The Akasa if you want to check it out.
http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/ak92amseulqu.html

Very low airflow though for an intake fan, I've got it there so I can have one fan at 12v that's silent that I don't have to monitor. I don't think that fan nor the Nexus low speed (that someone's for sure going to mention) would be effective enough by themselves, I could be wrong.

I'll be doing some testing with the Akasa next week. I've been putting off finishing my machine, it's so pathetic with it's side open...just waiting for me to get some time.

EDIT: lol...wierd how most of my advice sounds like galvanized...wonder where I learned?

-z

 

[DinoChop]

thx for the suggestions. i might just go with the akasa, but i noticed they didn't have it at newegg🙁 But please, do let me know how the testing went for the akasa, zagood.
the fan is mainly to keep my harddrives cool. I'm probably going to add a graphics card later too. In the mean time, i found this one. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811999603
it seems pretty good to me, but im not too familiar with fans.

 

[zagood]

Stay away from those 92mm Stealths. They have a wierd growl to them. 80mm ones are ok.

Other fans to stay away from and reasons:

Thermaltake: They flat out lie on their specs.

Zalman: They only make one 92mm fan, and it's average at best noisewise. So lame since their heatsinks are so good.

iXtrema: Jury's still out on these. I haven't seen one in person, but from everything I've heard, they a) overrate their CFM and underrate the dBa, b) motors are too small and heat up.

Newegg in general doesn't have a good fan selection. Good sites for fans:

http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/
http://www.svc.com/
http://www.ncix.com/ (but it's a pain to go through their list)
http://www.xoxide.com/

I've ordered from all of these except NCIX and had no problems.

-z

 

[ElFenix]

i've got an arctic cooling Pro2L fan, pretty silent with the integrated fan speed controller. it's 80x38 though, so it may not fit your application.

 

[bcoupland]

A Nexus 92mm will fit the bill. It's the most quiet fan on the market currently. Go to SPCR and read the review.

 

[dunkster]

Ditto on the Nexus 92mm fan. It provides a nice combination of adequate airflow and minimal noise on my XP90 cooler at 12V. Very low vibration - adding latex strips for vibration-decoupling resulted in no perceptible change.

Hope this helps!

 

[WobbleWobble]

Nexus is probably your best bet and is faily easy to find.