DIY Acoustic Management Guide! Part 1 *UPDATE* Part 2 in progress!

Talcite

Senior member
Apr 18, 2006
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Hey guys, i've decided to write this before i leave for my trip down to miami.

Acoustic management is mainly comprised of two things: Reducing noise sources and absorbing excess noise. The goal is just to make a PC quieter.

Reader beware. Acoustic management has a slippery slope. Once you quiet down a part, you notice how much noise the others make, and once you silence those, you notice a new one, and it keeps going until you come to the part you silenced in the beginning.

Acoustic management also generally means less performance, especially overclockability, and thermal management. (with exception of water cooling) So the goal of this guide is to make your computer near silent, absolute performance comes second.

Note: In order to notice the effects of acoustic absorption, you have to reduce the amount of noise coming from your components first, hence this primer. If you don't, you'll have wasted alot of money for not much noise dampening.

I've planned out 3 installments, kinda like an easy payment plan XD.

1. Primer
2. Acoustic absorption
3. Hard drive/Optical drive management.

Reducing Noise sources

Noise and Noise

What? Noise and noise? That's right, a computer usually has 2 types of noise, both of which need to be silenced if you want a nice PC. There is Vibrational Noise and well just Regular noise. Each type of noise has a different type of solution. Vibrational noise is huge with hard drives and PSUs and optical drives. Regular noise is really more of a concern with hard drive seeks (the *click) and the rotational noise of an optical drive. Air noise made by the CPU fans and the case fans are actually noticeable once you remove all vibrational noise.

Vibrational noise
All objects which rotate tend to have a slight wobble, especially at high RPMs and if they are heavy i.e. Hard disk Platter. The noise created by this wobble is actually not from the object itself, but from the case. This is normally a very loud noise, typically a rapid *clang. Many cheap cases directly mount the HDD to the case, and make it very easy to transmit vibrations throughout the case. Put your hand up to your case and feel it. There is a very slight vibration right? that's from the hard drive and fans. If your case is poorly constructed, reverberations can be very loud, even hazardous to your components. One way around this is to mount your HDDs in rubber grommets, which absorb all the vibration. This is a very effective way, but suspending your HDD is even more effective. Of course most people, including me, worry about data damage. Many people will not take the risk, and many people will. Neither of them have ever been proven right or wrong.

Optical drives also create a large amount of vibrational noise, well actually just a large amount of noise in general. However, there is little or no way to deal with it. Anyone with a loud optical drive is really out of options. I've considered building a custom external case for the optical drive, but i'll get back to you guys on that.

More on these parts in the actual part of the guide about vibrational noise =p (and you thought THAT was long hahaha)

Regular Noise

On top of vibrational noise, regular noise also exists, albeit its a softer and harder to notice. Its also more tolerable. Regular noise is generally a culprit of the CPU or fans on the system. The hard drive's seek (*clickity clickity) is also one very annoying one. If you don't know what i'm talking about, you either A. have really bad hearing, B. have horrible vibrational noise that's covering it up. C. Already have really quiet components, but then again if you did, you wouldn't be reading this right? =p

There is no solution to a loud part, except for replacement. Don't even try to build your own CPU fan =p. Save yourself the huge time factor and the possibility of ruining your cpu, and just buy the cooler.

Seek noise on the other hand, can be reduced through automatic acoustic management.

HDDs come in two varaieties, ball bearing, and fluid dynamic bearing motors. Ball bearings are a racket, if you have one, sell it or throw it out the window. Avoid these like the plague. FDB motors are quite pleasant, and make very little rotational noise. However in both type of HDDs seek noise, the noise made by the arms moving, are very loud unless automatic acoustic management is enabled. AAM is done through software, using specialized tools with their own boot. One such is from Hitachi/IBM, Feature Tool Download the Feature tool, not the others. Of course this increases seek latency and WILL slow down your PC noticeably. Find a range where you dont' mind the noise, and don't think your pc is that much slower.

Silencing Individual Parts

The blowers
The loudest individual part of your computer are the fans. Hands down, its the fans. Well, unless you have a 15k scsi drive. Power supplies and case fans are the usual culprits, but video card and CPU fans can be quite a racket as well. If possible, get silent parts, heatsink it all (passive cooling). While this is possible for low wattage power supplies and video cards, CPUs are almost unheard of, and well, i've never seen a passive fan =p.

Fans are divided into several categories: fluid bearing, single ball bearing, and double ballbearing. You want fans with double ball bearings. They last the longest and are the quietest. Panflo and Adda have advanced fluid bearing designs on the fans, which are actually quieter than ball bearing fans. (credit: operandi)

Generally speaking, fans with larger diameters are quieter, because they can spin slower to move the same amount of air as a fast small fan. The result is less noise in a large fan. 40mm fans are outrageously loud, avoid at all costs, 80mm are tolerable, but 120mm are the real kings there. I suppose you could get a 200mm fan, but they're not standard computer equipment.

The cpu fan is one of those inevitable parts which will make a racket. Scythe Ninjas are very quiet HSF, and provide pretty good thermal performance as well. You should seriously consider getting one of these, of course they're pretty expensive. But silence comes at a price. Zalman all-copper cpu coolers are pretty good too, but take a back seat to the Ninja. Larger fan means lower rotational speed and less noise, providing it fits into your system =p. (Have you seen some of the zalmans?!) Thermalright XP/SI-90, XP/SI-120 and Ultra90/120 are supposed to be very good aswell when paired with the right fans. (thx operandi) Always try for the 120mm fans, as they need to spin slower than their 90mm counterparts.

I'm not too familiar with modding active chipset cooling into passive. However, i know generally if possible, go with passive cooling. burnt chipset fans are a pain to replace. There are probably mod kits out there for changing to passive cooling.

Video card fans can be very annoying. Many stock ATI and Nvidia fans are hell. Get an aftermarket solution to cool them, that's probably the best way. Zalman has a few, but i'm not too familiar with these. Make sure its designed to fit your specific card, there is NO standardized mounting hole on a video card. Arctic cooling is also very popular around this area with their NV and Ati silencers. (thx 992gt2) I don't know how quiet they are though.

Case fans are very annoying if they're loud and whiney. Panaflo are generally regarded as the quiestest fans. Yate Loon are also quite quiet, but only if you find a good one. Their QC is horrible aparently. Try softmounting the fans to reduce vibrational noise if possible.

PSUs are an eternal source of headache for people. I will say this only once. I work at a computer store, i see people try to save a few bucks on a PSU and pay for it with a burnt MB and ram. DON'T CHEAP OUT ON A PSU. Don't cheap out on a case either, but that's slightly less important. Antec and Enermax PSUs are regarded as quality performance, with the most accurate voltage regulation. Seasonic however, is regarded as the quiestest. Check out their S12 line of PSUs. They're supposed to be very quiet. The voltage is also supposed to be very well moderated, not as well as antec or enermax though. Toms hardware has a few very good guides on this.

The spinners

I'm going to dedicate a third installment of this guide to HDDs and Optical drives specifically.

HDD and optical drives are horrificly loud if not properly dealt with. Samsung's Spinpoint P120 series is supposedly the quietest out there. There's a whole crap load of stuff about individual drives not being quiet, and some being very quiet. Keep your fingers crossed if you buy one. Or get one from a store where you can exchange it =p. AAM was already talked about previously. Vibrational noise was too, i'll cover more of it later.

Optical drives are generally loud, there really is no solution to this without taking a HUGE hit to performance. Slow it down. That's right, slow the thing's RPM down. This seems like a very heavy statement, and it is. But there is no other solution other than enclosing it in a sound proof case. I'm currently trying that, need $$$ first =p.

Fan controls

Operandi has pointed out fan controls are very useful, and they are. I myself have a fanmate2 that came with my zalman. I don't usually fiddle with the controls though, it really doesn't make a difference with my system, cause the cpu HSF is the quietest part anyways =p

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Anyyyways... that's pretty much everything you need to know about sound reduction. Its expensive, so either save it for your next upgrade, or wait till something burns out.

check out SPCR for much more detailed information and reviews about this topic. Theres another site that independently benchmarked all the HDDs out there(acousticly). Storage Review I think it needs registration.

This is probably going to be everything that i'll be writing for 2 weeks. I have to pack for my trip soon. If you guys crave pictures because the sight of words hurt, give a shout and i'll add them. And if someone could point me to an affordable but good sound meter, please tell me. Its crucial for the acoustic absorption section.

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dBTelos

Golden Member
Apr 17, 2006
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Good guide, and as for the Clicks that you think come from the HDDs.... I don't get them and I don't think it is a good sign :D
 

Talcite

Senior member
Apr 18, 2006
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lol, uhh everyone gets them. I actually never knew i had them until i quieted down everything else, then i started noticing the clicks. That's what i meant by the slippery slope of acoustic management =p the clicks are always there, some are just louder than others, listen really closely when you open a big file
 

Operandi

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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Pretty long but good information.

A few things I noticed however...

Yate Loon quality control?, I've never heard of anyone having issues with them. They are also the OEM for Nexus so you may want to mention that.

Seasonic vs. Antec vs. Enermax; Seasonic is the better PSU hands down as well as being quieter.

I didn't see much information on chipset cooling. Some boards come passive which is great. Some come with active cooling but can be relatively easily modified to passive which is good. Other boards have active cooling and due to board designs can not be modified to passive which is bad.

I also didn't see anything about active fan controls, specifically fan controls through the BIOS and/or SpeedFan. In my experience dynamic fan control has been crucial in building higher-end machines that run cool under load and are also dead quiet at idle.
 

Operandi

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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A few more points...

All of the major HD players are using fluid bearings now and all of them sound pretty much the same idling (not seeking) once they are soft mounted or suspended.

Fan types; sleeve bearings are typically the quietest type of fan but the least reliable. In my opinion they are ok for case cooling but I wouldn't trust them in a PSU or on my CPU. Heat can also shorten the life of a sleeve fan, another reason why they are not the best choice for a CPU heatsink or in a PSU. Panaflo and (some) Adda fans have advanced fluid bearing designs that over come the limitations of typical sleeve bearing fans in terms of life span and reliability.

You neglected the Thermalright XP/SI-90, XP/SI-120 and Ultra 90/120. With the right fan these are some of the best heatsinks for low noise performance.
 

Bluefront

Golden Member
Apr 20, 2002
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You're wasting your energy here with noise control.....SPCR would be a better place to post. Around here......more fans, more bling=a better computer. Usually......
 

Operandi

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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Originally posted by: Bluefront
You're wasting your energy here with noise control.....SPCR would be a better place to post. Around here......more fans, more bling=a better computer. Usually......

I think these forums are just a bit bigger then SPCRs, besides you have to start somewhere.
 

Ika

Lifer
Mar 22, 2006
14,264
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good guide, got some interesting info.

you should add some more case-oriented info, such as case windows, insulation, etc.
 

996GT2

Diamond Member
Jun 23, 2005
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Good guide...but you left out a major player in the quiet products category: Arctic Cooling. Their fans and HSFs offer excellent performance at very low noise level.
 

Talcite

Senior member
Apr 18, 2006
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Yup, i'll put all of these suggestions into the revision. i'm leaving tmr for miami though, so its going to be 2 weeks before i can write it. Also, yes yate loons are the OEM for nexus, but nexus tends to pick the better yate loons =p. The insulations and stuff come in when i write part 2, sound absorption. Yup, and you guys are right, i forgot artic cooling, they make some really good videocard hsf and cpu hsf, although not as quiet as scythe, they offer really amazing cooling capacity. The case mods will actually be a part of another DIY guide. I'm planning to redo the door on my case, and replace it with a plexiglass window. The entire door of the case. I don't expect it to look great =p but its more for the experience. And i guess you could consider my upcoming project a "case mod" I'm planning to soundproof an optical drive. I havn't seen anyone do it yet, so i guess i'll be first to try 0.o.
 

Bluefront

Golden Member
Apr 20, 2002
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Supposedly optical drives don't like soft mounting......return write errors. I'd suggest a slower drive or the use of software like DriveSpeed. It's hard to quiet noisy optical drives.
 

Talcite

Senior member
Apr 18, 2006
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Actually, blue you're absolutely right. But that's why i don't plan to soft mount =p I'm going to custom construct a case and line it with sound absorbing materials. The drive will physically be mounted securely, but completely surrounded by artists's rubber most likely. (its supposed to be the most efficient at absorbing sound, 50 dB =o) Ontop of that, i'll put the case on some silicon feet. And the entire project will be well documented =p.

I've already tried programs like drivespeed, and they work, but i want to present a solution to people who want silent pcs without running the penalty of hampered performance.

Ontop of that, i've come up with an idea on putting my plexiglass window in. Have such a window would really defeat the purpose of sound proofing a computer, and most people would agree. However, i'm planing to experiment with a double pane case door. I'm going to line the panes with some kind of rubber sealant, and probably remove the air inbetween if possible, or atleast lower the air pressure inbetween. I don't know, i just got the idea. I'll be borrowing techniques from the construction industry, as i've been reading about some sound proofing techniques in homes. I got the idea from a piano studio's acoustic dampening.

I'm not sure, but i might also try silencing the fans and vents on my computer. I have a feeling its going to make my system look horrible though >.>'

Guys, please leave some feedback as to which project you'd like me to try first, the silent optical drive, or the double pane case window. These both will be after i line the case with acoustic foam of course.
 

Bluefront

Golden Member
Apr 20, 2002
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Ok....most of the noise from an optical drive comes right out the front, and that is a place very difficult to noise-dampen. Your best bet is to find/use the quietest drive you can acquire.

I tried the double-pane idea you propose several years ago. It does work to quiet the case panel....but. You end up with some nasty reflections (assuming you use lighting), that spoil the view into the case. It works better to just stack two glass panes right on top of each other, or to use a single pane of double thickness.

As I stated SPCR will appreciate your quieting efforts better than these forums....plus SPCR has the true experts in the quieting field.....myself included. ;)
 

zagood

Diamond Member
Mar 28, 2005
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Since many of your guides get sticky, thought I'd help with the red pen:

"The cpu fan is one of those unevitable parts..."

- inevitable

It's too bad you haven't personally used any of the Zalman GPU coolers. The vf700 AlCu and Cu versions are great all-around performers, very quiet and they cool remarkably well. The Cu gave me a 10c drop from stock 6800nu cooling, and about 8c from 6600GT stock. Their main drawback is that if you don't have adequate case airflow, they'll choke on their own exhaust and lose the majority of their cooling power.

Another benefit in the past was that if you bought a new video card, you could move the vf700 to the new one, whereas you generally needed to buy a different model Silencer to fit your new card. However, many of the new gen of video cards get even hotter, so instead you might want to upgrade to the vf900. I haven't owned one of these, so can't give you personal experience, but the overall reviews are fantastic. They don't suffer as much from the "choking" as the vf700 because of the heatpipe, and temps are up to 5c lower than the vf700. However, they're quite expensive, anywhere from $40-$50, whereas the vf700 Cu has been seen as low as $23 (normally around $25-$30).

-z
 

Talcite

Senior member
Apr 18, 2006
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theres actually a vf900 out now i believe. The cu version is really much better from what i've heard.

In terms of the optical drive silencing. I plan to completely enclose the drive, including the front lol. Basically i'm planning to build a case that is sealed when the drive is closed. I'll post dimensions and blueprints when i get back home.

SPCR really is more hardcore about cooling, but most people there already know much more than i do about the topic, so i'm really just teaching about it here.

The double pane window is probably one of the harder things i'm going to do. Its not actually going to be double pane. Its going to be quad pane lol. Two are the actual walls, while two inside are staggered. This technique is often used in house building, and usually produces great acoustic dampening, i don't know how to deal with it though. I don't expect plexiglass to have amazing acoustic dampening skills =p I'm trying to avoid glueing two panels together, sound transmission is really much lower if you keep a space of air inbetween the two. Perhaps i'll find some anti-reflective plastic to build the windows with. I'm really not sure, i have to actually sit down, plan it out, and see what materials i can get my hands on.

I'll see how it all turns out i guess. I'm definitely lining the case with an absorpative material, i'm probably doing the optical drive silencing, i'll try the window, and MAYBE i'll try silencing the fans. Its really alot to do, and my exams are coming up real fast. I don't expect to finish till the summer.

 

Tiamat

Lifer
Nov 25, 2003
14,068
5
71
Good guide.

I have gone from the bling days to making my computer as quiet as possible

Current Specs:

Athlon XP 1800+ @ 2000mhz w/ Thermalright SLK 947U w/ 92mm Nexus fan @ 7V
ABIT NF7-S v2.0 w/ Zalman NB passive cooler
Antec P150 w/ 2x 92mm nexus @ 5V, 1x Yateloon D12SL @ 5V
ATI Radeon 9800Pro 256 @ 420/360 w/ Zalman ZM80D and Yateloon D12SL @ 5V
Suspended Raptor 74GB
Suspended Samsung 160GB
Antec Neo 430W

The noise is mostly the power supply, then the Harddrives and CPU fan.
 

Talcite

Senior member
Apr 18, 2006
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tiamat, try changing the antec neo to a seasonic s12. try using the automatic acoustic management tool on the HDs, especially the samsung. The CPU fan can be changed to a panflo if you wanted a slightly quieter fan. I'm not particularly familiar with the SLK947U, but if possible, try mounting the fan with rubber feet, also if adventureous, try seeing if you can mod the thing to a 120mm fan, it'll be quieter. If after all that, the system still is too loud, check back soon cause i'm sound proofing my case. I'll see what kind of difference it actually makes. More of an experiment than a guide
 

Operandi

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
5,508
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Originally posted by: Talcite
theres actually a vf900 out now i believe. The cu version is really much better from what i've heard.

In terms of the optical drive silencing. I plan to completely enclose the drive, including the front lol. Basically i'm planning to build a case that is sealed when the drive is closed. I'll post dimensions and blueprints when i get back home.

SPCR really is more hardcore about cooling, but most people there already know much more than i do about the topic, so i'm really just teaching about it here.

The double pane window is probably one of the harder things i'm going to do. Its not actually going to be double pane. Its going to be quad pane lol. Two are the actual walls, while two inside are staggered. This technique is often used in house building, and usually produces great acoustic dampening, i don't know how to deal with it though. I don't expect plexiglass to have amazing acoustic dampening skills =p I'm trying to avoid glueing two panels together, sound transmission is really much lower if you keep a space of air inbetween the two. Perhaps i'll find some anti-reflective plastic to build the windows with. I'm really not sure, i have to actually sit down, plan it out, and see what materials i can get my hands on.

I'll see how it all turns out i guess. I'm definitely lining the case with an absorpative material, i'm probably doing the optical drive silencing, i'll try the window, and MAYBE i'll try silencing the fans. Its really alot to do, and my exams are coming up real fast. I don't expect to finish till the summer.

I can see what you are trying to accomplish but at a basic level it's inherently flawed. Unless you plan to completely seal the case, meaning no way for air to get in and out all the sound dampening in the world won't make even moderately quiet components silent. Even small openings will let sound waves out.

The best solution really is to start with the quietest parts you can and isolate parts that vibrate and cause resonations (this means soft-mounting) rather then cover them up with absorption materials.

I will say however that case doors do make a significant difference in optical drive noise. My Lian LI PC-6070 has a very thick AL door with a seal around all edges, a double panned door could make an even bigger difference, interesting idea. :cool:
 

Talcite

Senior member
Apr 18, 2006
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oh lol, i plan to let air in and out, but only through the designated vents. and ontop of those vents, i'm going to put a sound absorbing muffler? i don't know. I'll see how it goes heh. I know its doable, just gotta find a good material with NRC of close to 1.