What.is.that NOISE???

[Roots]

Ok, I built a new PC from scratch and here are the specs off the top of my head

SiS 655 Max motherboard
2.4GHz P4 w/ 533 FSB
Zalman CNPS 7000Cu
ATI Radeon 9500 Pro
Enermax 435E (I forgot the exact model) 430W
Seagate 120GB Barracuda V

put together in a Cheiftec AX-01 case. First thing I did was replace the three stock fans with 4 Panaflow L1As, and a Coolermaster something (25dbA) LED fan on the side. I've set the FHS on the minimum fan speed, and I thought my system would be good to go but it still sounds REALLY loud to me. The PSU I have is supposed to be really quiet, and I think it is. Its hard for me to tell where the sound is coming from, but last night I think I finally concluded that it might be the fan on my 9500 Pro.

If it is indeed that fan that is causing all the racket, how hard would it be for me to replace it with something quieter? I was thinking that maybe I could just turn off that fan all together, because the way my case is designed the side intake fan blows air directly onto the video card. Does this idea sound too risky? What should I do I really want this thing to run silent and stable. Thanks

 

[NYHoustonman]

My L1A 92mm is very loud to me at full speed, but I have it running at 1300RPM, where it is quiet as hell. I would bet that is your problem.

 

[KenAF]

The Enermax power supplies are not quiet at all. Even their claimed "whisper" power supplies are among the loudest power supplies on the market. In order to address your situation on a reasonable budget, I would recommend the following:

1) Order the Fortran FSP-350-60PN power supply w/ 120mm fan ($55).
2) Order the Sunbeam Rheobus Fan Speed Controller (available in silver and black for $17.99; in stock here)
3) Order the Zalman ZM80A VGA Heatpipe Cooler - $25

If your case has optional holes for mounting fans, also order the elastomer fan isolators (part 5801K6 for 80mm fans) and hard drive grommets from McMaster.com, as mentioned in my Silencing your PC thread (total cost $17.44).

First, replace the power supply. Re-mount your fans and hard drive using the elastomer fan isolators (part 5801K6 from Mcmaster for 80mm fans) and hard drive grommets if your case will accomodate them. Then attach all your case fans to the Sunbeam rheobus and turn the dials down until the noise level is acceptable / pleasing to you. Then replace the screamer on the Radeon 9500 with the passive Zalman passive cooler.

After you've done all that, and if you still want to further improve your noise floor, you might also want to consider removing the the Coolermaster LED fan, and poisslby one L1A as well. Four fans is really overkill. I have one exhaust fan in my system (plus power supply fan) with a P4 2.8 and Radeon 9700 with Zalman passive cooler, and it runs great.

 

[lordbob99]

Originally posted by: KenAF
The Enermax power supplies are not quiet at all. Even their claimed "whisper" power supplies are among the loudest power supplies on the market. In order to address your situation on a reasonable budget, I would recommend the following:

While they're no longer the quietest power supplies out there, the Enermax is far from a loud power supply. The only reason that I imagine an individual unit would be loud is it was either defective or the system temperature was so high that the fans were constantly spinning at a very high rate.

I've persoanlly been running a Whisper in my system for a long time, and I find it to be pretty quiet. Of course, this is being compared to 7 volt modded Panaflo L1A's and the Seagate Barracuda IV. The loudest component I have is the video card fan, so I just ordered the passive Zalman video card cooler. Maybe I'll change my mind and think the Whisper is loud once i get rid of that annoying hum coming from the tiny little video card fan 🙂

LordBob99

 

[lordbob99]

Originally posted by: KenAF
1) Order the Fortran FSP-350-60PN power supply w/ 120mm fan ($55).
2) Order the Sunbeam Rheobus Fan Speed Controller (available in silver and black for $17.99)
3) Order the Zalman ZM80A VGA Heatpipe Cooler - $25

I actually ordered the ZM80A from SVC. It's a buck cheaper before shipping, and SVC is generally very good about shipping costs (I dont know how much directron charges).
http://svc.com/zalfanvgahea.html

Also the Sumbeam Rheobus has been OOS for a while. I considered getting one of those, but I personally find super bright LEDs to be really annoying, so I even disabled the power and hard drive indicators on my case. 7 volting the Panaflo's resulted in them being essentially inaudible. For my CPU fan, I got this adjustable fan, so I can turn it up for extra cooling or turn it down to be silent.
http://svc.com/convarspeedc.html

One last thing to look at is the Northbridge fan on the motherboard.... those lil suckers tend to put out a lot of noise. If you're not overclocking, you can probably just disable/remove the fan, otherwise, you mite want to get yourself one of these Zalman Northbridge Heatsinks.
http://svc.com/zazmnobrhe.html

I know this probably sounds like I'm really promoting SVC, but I've just found their prices to be some of the better ones out there, and the service has been decent too 🙂

Hopefully this is helpful.

LordBob99

 

[Roots]

Thanks for the help. I've actually put my freaking ear up next to my L1A's, and they were so quiet I could barely hear them. The PSU isn't the quietest but it's quiet enough for me. Replacing the PSU is out of the question; I don't have all the money in the world. And I see no reason to replace the panaflo's (80mm) since they are already so quiet. I'm mainly looking to replace the fan on my 9500 Pro. If I unplugged the power cable to the card (since I think that that power cable is just for the fan on the card?) to see the difference in noise in my system, would that be alright? I'm a little afraid to unplug that fan because I don't want the thing to freaking melt on me, but I just want to try a test. Is it safe?

 

[lordbob99]

Originally posted by: Roots
Thanks for the help. I've actually put my freaking ear up next to my L1A's, and they were so quiet I could barely hear them. The PSU isn't the quietest but it's quiet enough for me. Replacing the PSU is out of the question; I don't have all the money in the world. And I see no reason to replace the panaflo's (80mm) since they are already so quiet. I'm mainly looking to replace the fan on my 9500 Pro. If I unplugged the power cable to the card (since I think that that power cable is just for the fan on the card?) to see the difference in noise in my system, would that be alright? I'm a little afraid to unplug that fan because I don't want the thing to freaking melt on me, but I just want to try a test. Is it safe?

I believe if you unplug the power cable to the card, it automatically clocks the card way down because it doesn't get enough power to run at full speed. If you're going to run it like that, you may as well just go buy a different card that comes stock with passive cooling. Seems like a waste to run your nice new card at speeds that much older cards could beat...

Personally I wouldn't feel comfortable running a video card that doesn't come passively cooled with the stock heat sink and no fan directly mounted. If you can swing the $25 I say the Zalman ZM80-A is the way to go.

LordBob99

 

[KenAF]

lord,

It's all relative. A Panaflo at 12v is loud compared to a Panaflo at 5v. I owned three different Enermax "whisper" power supplies before I "saw the light." The Enermax power supplies run about 8dB louder at their lowest setting than the one I mentioned. However, the Enermax whisper PSUs I owned often increased their fan speed after a few seconds or a few minutes, and always during intense work or gaming, making them on the order of 18dB louder.

The quiet power supplies available today put out noise comparable to a 7v Panaflo L1A, and some less. The 120mm fan on the Fortran runs at 5v all the time for me; my case (with no intake fan) has never gotten hot enough for it to enter a higher voltage mode. I understand the Nexus 400w PSU makes even less noise in low rpm mode, around 3dB less.

The Sunbeam Rheobus was in stock in silver at SVC last week, as I ordered another. It's been about two weeks since they've had the black one, though. The Sunbeam is available for sale elsewhere at about $25. It takes about 30 seconds of effort to dim the LEDS, as instructed in this review.

 

[lordbob99]

It's all relative. A Panaflo at 12v is loud compared to a Panaflo at 5v. I owned three different Enermax "whisper" power supplies before I "saw the light." The Enermax power supplies run about 8dB louder at their lowest setting than the one I mentioned. However, the Enermax whisper PSUs I owned often increased their fan speed after a few seconds or a few minutes, and always during intense work or gaming, making them on the order of 18dB louder.

I definately agree with you on it all being relative. I'm pretty sure once I'm done quieting down my video card, I'll start noticing my power supply. But until I get my order with the ZM80-A, I can't even hear it over the video card 🙂

It takes about 30 seconds of effort to dim the LEDS, as instructed in this review.

Good find... I read about these units when they first came out, but I never actually saw anywhere that mentioned that they were easily removed. At least now I know the Sunbeam can actually fit my needs if I ever decide to get a rheobus =).

LordBob99

 

[BeauJangles]

Originally posted by: Roots
Thanks for the help. I've actually put my freaking ear up next to my L1A's, and they were so quiet I could barely hear them. The PSU isn't the quietest but it's quiet enough for me. Replacing the PSU is out of the question; I don't have all the money in the world. And I see no reason to replace the panaflo's (80mm) since they are already so quiet. I'm mainly looking to replace the fan on my 9500 Pro. If I unplugged the power cable to the card (since I think that that power cable is just for the fan on the card?) to see the difference in noise in my system, would that be alright? I'm a little afraid to unplug that fan because I don't want the thing to freaking melt on me, but I just want to try a test. Is it safe?

I know people will yell at me, but take a pencil and just stop the freakin fan for a few seconds and listen to the difference. If it's noticable, change the fan.

 

[0roo0roo]

Originally posted by: BlinderBomber

Originally posted by: Roots
Thanks for the help. I've actually put my freaking ear up next to my L1A's, and they were so quiet I could barely hear them. The PSU isn't the quietest but it's quiet enough for me. Replacing the PSU is out of the question; I don't have all the money in the world. And I see no reason to replace the panaflo's (80mm) since they are already so quiet. I'm mainly looking to replace the fan on my 9500 Pro. If I unplugged the power cable to the card (since I think that that power cable is just for the fan on the card?) to see the difference in noise in my system, would that be alright? I'm a little afraid to unplug that fan because I don't want the thing to freaking melt on me, but I just want to try a test. Is it safe?

I know people will yell at me, but take a pencil and just stop the freakin fan for a few seconds and listen to the difference. If it's noticable, change the fan.

bingo

 

[KenAF]

Or take out the video card temporarily...you don't need a video card to hear the noise in your system.

 

[Tripitz]

Originally posted by: KenAF
lord,

It's all relative. A Panaflo at 12v is loud compared to a Panaflo at 5v. I owned three different Enermax "whisper" power supplies before I "saw the light." The Enermax power supplies run about 8dB louder at their lowest setting than the one I mentioned. However, the Enermax whisper PSUs I owned often increased their fan speed after a few seconds or a few minutes, and always during intense work or gaming, making them on the order of 18dB louder.

The quiet power supplies available today put out noise comparable to a 7v Panaflo L1A, and some less. The 120mm fan on the Fortran runs at 5v all the time for me; my case (with no intake fan) has never gotten hot enough for it to enter a higher voltage mode. I understand the Nexus 400w PSU makes even less noise in low rpm mode, around 3dB less.

The Sunbeam Rheobus was in stock in silver at SVC last week, as I ordered another. It's been about two weeks since they've had the black one, though. The Sunbeam is available for sale elsewhere at about $25. It takes about 30 seconds of effort to dim the LEDS, as instructed in this review.

Interesting comments about the Nexus and the Fortron. I am awaiting delivery of my 350w Fortron because I can't stand my Nexus 400w. I have the 300w version of the Nexus and it is reasonably quiet. On my wc'ed rig, the Nexus 400w just starts to crank up as I use the system. I was very disappointed as my case temps dropped by about 5C once I switched to water cooling, so I know its not the case temps but rather the load that is causing the nexus to spin up its fan. I'm hoping for better performance from the Fortron under load.

 

[KenAF]

Trip,

I haven't used the Nexus, but the guy who runs the SilentPCReview site said (on the message boards) that the Fortran puts out about 3dB more than the lowest setting on the Nexus. So if you are happy with the lowest setting on the Nexus (but not the fact that the fan spins up faster), then you should be happy with the Fortran. Please report your experience as soon as you can.

 

[Tripitz]

I will definitely let you know. I'm getting the unit on Thursday and I'm trying to pick out a nice case as I need to rip my wc'ing rig apart to have my pump rma'd. Hopefully this will all get done this week and I get back to people here about how the Fortron compares to the Nexus.

I would say only during the first 20-30 minutes of idling or with little activity is the Nexus 400w considered by me to be reasonably quiet. If I do anything that taxes the system, such as gaming, the noise from the fan is pretty amazing. I would say that it is louder than an Antec True 380 I replaced. It also takes a very long time to come down. My mobo temp after 2 hours of gaming is at 30C which I think is very acceptable. When I had the antec and a slk900 copper hs on my cpu, case temps were 35C.