Shuttle XPC supposedly quiet but isn't?

[terthen]

I recently purchased a Shuttle SK41G, and added:
Athlon XP 1700+
512 MB Crucial PC2100 RAM
40 GB 7200 RPM Maxtor HD
Verbatim 48x16x48 CD-RW

After reading raves about how quiet Shuttle XPCs were, I was expecting a really quiet system, quiet enough that I wouldn't really notice it was on, but I must say this system is about as loud as my old Dell P3 450 (w/ 2 7200 RPM HDs). I was just wondering if the SK41G is louder than other XPCs or if this is considered really quiet, or if maybe I got a defective fan or it's just my 7200 RPM HD making most of the noise?

I check the PC Health in my bios after running the computer for 2 days and restarting--CPU temp is at 44 degrees so fan is only running at 2200 RPM, the manual says the fan will always run at around 2000 RPM if CPU temp is fine, so I guess this is just how it's gonna be?

any opinions would be appreciated--thanks!

 

[0roo0roo]

if your talking those tiny pc's.. i never heard abotu them being quiet, it was all about em being loud. fans had to be in order to keep the tiny things cool.

 

[Armageddon415]

I had a SN41G2 before, the PSU fan was louder then anything in the case and had to be swapped with something quieter.

 

[Bookie]

the shuttles have never been considered quite. The sk41g is one of the quieter ones but still not to be considered "silent".

I have one of the sk41g's on the way to put together for my sister. I will be modifying this as much as I can to make it quiet for her. I would recommend attempting to replace the 80mm fan (panaflo) on the heatpipe and possibly the 60mm fan in the power supply.

From my experience, the harddrive can be the loudest item in your computer. I have recently replaced all of my western digitla7200rpm drives with Seagate Barracuda V 7200 rpm (liquid bearing) harddrives. These drives are completely silent and get rid of that horrible whine that the western digital drives all do (maybe not at first but they all start doing it eventually). I dont have much experience Maxtor but I'm pretty sure they aren't much better than the western digital drives. Nothing is as quiet as the barracuda V's (in 7200rpm flavor).