Quieting my PC

[mmganga]

Hi, currently I have a Lian Li PC-6070b case, which is supposed to be quieter than average.

I have an Antec TruPower 430W power supply which is also supposed to be quieter than average.

The CPU is an AMD overclocked slightly (it's Barton 2500+ overclocked to 2.2 GHz, so it's not way overclocked).

I also have two SCSI drives, which are pretty loud in themselves, but not at idle, rather when they are running...

What is killing me is the idle noise of the overall system, it's really loud (like the fans resonate inside the case or something like this). I'd like to upgrade soon to an Opteron 165 dual, while keeping the hard drives/etc.

What can I do to this system to quiet it down? I thought of getting a passive-cooled video card (no fan, just heatsink) and also maybe a Zalman CPU cooler, and maybe a new power supply.

Any other suggestions?

THANKS!

 

[hardcandy2]

1. What size fans is the case using? If they are 80 mm, perhaps see if they can be replaced by some quiet 92 or 120 mm fans.
2. On my harddrives, I found some thin plastic washers, I use them to cushion the hard drives from the drive cage. The mounting pins go through them into the hard drive screw holes.
3. A more efficient heatsink with a larger fan for the cpu will quiet it down and keep it cooler.

 

[Tu13erhead]

The best way to quiet your system is to figure out the loudest component and quiet that down. Then repeat until your system is quiet enough.

 

[Shadowknight]

Always good to go to spcr. I made a FAQ that gives a general overview, though is not completely comprehensive: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=21152
But you'll need to stop each component to find out which is/are your loudest, then start replacing and/or modifying equipment from there. If you have one of the old 6070s, you'll probably have really restrictive grills, and would benefit from cutting them out. Fan controller is also good for a quickfix; in a nutshell, noise is caused by moving parts, fans and vibration from hard drives.

 

[potato28]

More specs needed, types of fans needed, link to pics of case needed... Its all needed. The more info, the more that we can help you...

 

[Operandi]

I have that exact case for my main system, stock it is quieter then average but I've made several modifications to take it far beyond stock and practically dead silent. To start though I would look at the more common culprits...

If you are running stock cooling on your Athlon XP that should be the first to go as they are far from anything I would consider quiet. Since you plan to moving to an Opteron system I would recommend the Thermalright SI-97A since it's compatible with both socket A and socket 754/939/940. If you want ultra low noise I would pair it with this NMB, if you plan to push your overclock then something like this Delta would be better. Regardless of what fan you choose you can also use BIOS fan controls or SpeedFan to lower fan speeds at idle for much lower noise levels.

Beyond the CPU HS/F I would also look at the chipset cooling on your MB, if it uses active cooling it's probably loud and should be replaced with a passive solution, like the Zalman ZM-NB47J The video card could also be a pretty big source depending on what card you have. If you want to move to something quieter now the best option would be the Zalman VF-700; it's the quietest active heatsink out there and will fit just about every card out there. For PSU the Antec shouldn't be too bad as far as noise goes but it's far from the quietest. If you decide to replace it Seasonic is by far the best choice; the 380 watt S12 should be enough for just about anything you could put together.

 

[mmganga]

Originally posted by: Operandi
I have that exact case for my main system, stock it is quieter then average but I've made several modifications to take it far beyond stock and practically dead silent. To start though I would look at the more common culprits...

If you are running stock cooling on your Athlon XP that should be the first to go as they are far from anything I would consider quiet. Since you plan to moving to an Opteron system I would recommend the Thermalright SI-97A since it's compatible with both socket A and socket 754/939/940. If you want ultra low noise I would pair it with this NMB, if you plan to push your overclock then something like this Delta would be better. Regardless of what fan you choose you can also use BIOS fan controls or SpeedFan to lower fan speeds at idle for much lower noise levels.

Beyond the CPU HS/F I would also look at the chipset cooling on your MB, if it uses active cooling it's probably loud and should be replaced with a passive solution, like the Zalman ZM-NB47J The video card could also be a pretty big source depending on what card you have. If you want to move to something quieter now the best option would be the Zalman VF-700; it's the quietest active heatsink out there and will fit just about every card out there. For PSU the Antec shouldn't be too bad as far as noise goes but it's far from the quietest. If you decide to replace it Seasonic is by far the best choice; the 380 watt S12 should be enough for just about anything you could put together.

Sir, I am highly indebted to you -- this post is 'gold' -- since you've had this case and went to these lengths to quiet down the system -- I'll follow through and see what I can do to isolate the source of the noise/etc.

For the upgrade I will definitely go to a passive cooling video card and/or motherboard chipset, and have a very quiet active cooling for the CPU! and we'll see where that goes...

BTW, I know this doesn't go into the discussion here, but the TruePower 380 or 430 power supplies are not compatible with the 939 motherboards, am I correct?

THANKS A LOT

 

[Operandi]

Originally posted by: mmganga

Originally posted by: Operandi
I have that exact case for my main system, stock it is quieter then average but I've made several modifications to take it far beyond stock and practically dead silent. To start though I would look at the more common culprits...

If you are running stock cooling on your Athlon XP that should be the first to go as they are far from anything I would consider quiet. Since you plan to moving to an Opteron system I would recommend the Thermalright SI-97A since it's compatible with both socket A and socket 754/939/940. If you want ultra low noise I would pair it with this NMB, if you plan to push your overclock then something like this Delta would be better. Regardless of what fan you choose you can also use BIOS fan controls or SpeedFan to lower fan speeds at idle for much lower noise levels.

Beyond the CPU HS/F I would also look at the chipset cooling on your MB, if it uses active cooling it's probably loud and should be replaced with a passive solution, like the Zalman ZM-NB47J The video card could also be a pretty big source depending on what card you have. If you want to move to something quieter now the best option would be the Zalman VF-700; it's the quietest active heatsink out there and will fit just about every card out there. For PSU the Antec shouldn't be too bad as far as noise goes but it's far from the quietest. If you decide to replace it Seasonic is by far the best choice; the 380 watt S12 should be enough for just about anything you could put together.

Sir, I am highly indebted to you -- this post is 'gold' -- since you've had this case and went to these lengths to quiet down the system -- I'll follow through and see what I can do to isolate the source of the noise/etc.

For the upgrade I will definitely go to a passive cooling video card and/or motherboard chipset, and have a very quiet active cooling for the CPU! and we'll see where that goes...

BTW, I know this doesn't go into the discussion here, but the TruePower 380 or 430 power supplies are not compatible with the 939 motherboards, am I correct?

THANKS A LOT

NP....

Something to keep in mind with passive video card cooling; you need keep it to moderately low powered cards, no X1900 XTs or 7800 GTs. You?re also probably right about the Antec PSU. Most/all socket 939 boards feature 24 pin ATX power connectors so it's best to have a PSU the 24 pin connector vs. the older 20 pin.

 

[0roo0roo]

silentpcreview.com is your friend
zalman resorator?
get a case made for silence in the first place like a p180/150 or whatever.
trying to mod a case into equivalent of those two is not worth the effort/cost. i don't think a case with 3 80mm fans is really going for silence as advertised me thinks the moneys going towards looks and the cost of aluminum heh

 

[mmganga]

Originally posted by: 0roo0roo
silentpcreview.com is your friend
zalman resorator?
get a case made for silence in the first place like a p180/150 or whatever.
trying to mod a case into equivalent of those two is not worth the effort/cost. i don't think a case with 3 80mm fans is really going for silence as advertised me thinks the moneys going towards looks and the cost of aluminum heh

Well supposedly the case I have already is a quiet one, but it sure doesn't feel/sound like it...anyway I'll follow the tips posted here to see what's the best that I can do with this beast!

THANKS1

 

[mmganga]

Originally posted by: Operandi
I have that exact case for my main system, stock it is quieter then average but I've made several modifications to take it far beyond stock and practically dead silent. To start though I would look at the more common culprits...

If you are running stock cooling on your Athlon XP that should be the first to go as they are far from anything I would consider quiet. Since you plan to moving to an Opteron system I would recommend the Thermalright SI-97A since it's compatible with both socket A and socket 754/939/940. If you want ultra low noise I would pair it with this NMB, if you plan to push your overclock then something like this Delta would be better. Regardless of what fan you choose you can also use BIOS fan controls or SpeedFan to lower fan speeds at idle for much lower noise levels.

Beyond the CPU HS/F I would also look at the chipset cooling on your MB, if it uses active cooling it's probably loud and should be replaced with a passive solution, like the Zalman ZM-NB47J The video card could also be a pretty big source depending on what card you have. If you want to move to something quieter now the best option would be the Zalman VF-700; it's the quietest active heatsink out there and will fit just about every card out there. For PSU the Antec shouldn't be too bad as far as noise goes but it's far from the quietest. If you decide to replace it Seasonic is by far the best choice; the 380 watt S12 should be enough for just about anything you could put together.

Hey just as an update to this -- today I got my SeaSonic 380 power supply, and it *does* make a difference from the Antec TruPower 430 I had in there before....for sure!

One additional thing which I did was to change the Tornado fan which was running at +5 instead of +12 V (I switched the rails internally since otherwise it's like a jet engine , and I put the case fans (3 total fans, 2 in front one in back, each 8 cm) in sequence from this CPU fan, so they also run at +5 instead of +12 V...

All I can say -- great so far so good, it's much much quieter...the biggest noise source right now is the CPU fan, but eventually I will go to a 12 cm fan on top of a XP-120 type heatsink.

Anyway, if you guys have any comments or suggestions, please suggest!

THANKS!