Absolute Silence: Is It Possible?

[Shimyr]

Hello. I am helping a buddy of mine upgrade his computer to the Core 2 Duo chip to be used mainly in a bedroom recording studio. We've already purchased a E6300 chip and intend to get the Asrock 775Dual-VSTA mobo so that he can keep using his old graphics and RAM. When we discussed cooling options I first recommended the Zalman series due to my own experience with them, being much quieter than stock fans and providing good cooling. As we reviewed the specs of various models for price vs performance, he focused on the noise level of the fans which prompted the question: "Are there any heatsink fans out there that produce no noise?"

As my level of expertise in computers seems to wane on a monthly basis, I told him I'd do what I could to check the validaty of my answer: "probably not."

His dilemma comes from the fact that his purchase of a $1000 microphone has made much less of a positive impact on his music due to his current HSF being so noisy. So I ask: are there any heatsink fans that edge against the barrier that is true silence? And furthermore, if cost is no (or less of a) concern, what existing model comes the closest?

Thanks in advance for your assistance.
-Alex

 

[Madwand1]

There's an expensive passive case from Zalman...

http://episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/77909585/m/388003921831

 

[GalvanizedYankee]

Wrong board OP. Go to http://www.silentpcreview.com/ >forums. Bye-bye!


...Galvanized

 

[Shadowknight]

Originally posted by: Shimyr
Hello. I am helping a buddy of mine upgrade his computer to the Core 2 Duo chip to be used mainly in a bedroom recording studio. We've already purchased a E6300 chip and intend to get the Asrock 775Dual-VSTA mobo so that he can keep using his old graphics and RAM. When we discussed cooling options I first recommended the Zalman series due to my own experience with them, being much quieter than stock fans and providing good cooling. As we reviewed the specs of various models for price vs performance, he focused on the noise level of the fans which prompted the question: "Are there any heatsink fans out there that produce no noise?"

As my level of expertise in computers seems to wane on a monthly basis, I told him I'd do what I could to check the validaty of my answer: "probably not."

His dilemma comes from the fact that his purchase of a $1000 microphone has made much less of a positive impact on his music due to his current HSF being so noisy. So I ask: are there any heatsink fans that edge against the barrier that is true silence? And furthermore, if cost is no (or less of a) concern, what existing model comes the closest?

Thanks in advance for your assistance.
-Alex

While there are many good tower coolers out there, the Scythe Ninja is designed so you can run it fanless. Can't get quieter than that.

 

[gamefreakgcb]

Ninja FTW

just make sure you have airflow in the case.

 

[InlineFive]

Originally posted by: GalvanizedYankee
Wrong board OP. Go to http://www.silentpcreview.com/ >forums. Bye-bye!


...Galvanized

There is no substitute.

 

[Skott]

100% silences as in zero decibels? No. Near silent sound where you cant hear it from a couple feet (outside of case) away? Yes.

 

[Rip the Jacker]

Of course it is. The problem is not the computer, you need to van gogh your ear off.

 

[Howard]

Even without fans, a computer will never produce 0 sound energy. However, with a little thought and research a system can easily be configured to output sound such that it cannot be heard over the ambient noise of the environment.

EDIT: Notice that I said system and not HSF. You usually cannot achieve inaudibility by replacing just one component (fan, in this case).

 

[Shimyr]

Thanks for the info guys (and girls!). Those are valuable resources for my research.

But one thing - I suppose I don't understand the whole fanless thing. I get that you can use the heatsink without a fan and it will cool silently and respectably, but with obvious restriction. Then supposing you need more cooling power, you could attach a fan somehow. But how?

Does it attach directly to the heatsink, or are you just replacing one of the case fans? I've seen people recommend the Yate Loon/Nexus 120mm fan found here but it seems to be just a standard case fan, and I'm a little clueless how it all comes together.

Also, I hadn't really considered the case fans in my noise reduction quest, but, if these 120mm fans are so great, should I replace the other case fans with them as well?

 

[Howard]

Many aftermarket heatsinks allow you to change the fan, which means you can use no fan at all. Sometimes the fan is installed on the heatsink with screws, sometimes with clips.

Aftermarket heatsinks almost always work with regular case fans as long as the sizes are compatible.

You can replace all the case fans with quiet ones, but if the system does not generate much heat, you can remove some fans altogether. For example, for a recording rig you would definitely not need more than 2 case fans (one in the front, one in the back, not including the one on the CPU heatsink or in the power supply), and if you only have one or two hard drives, you don't need the one in the front.

What is his system like and how much is he willing to spend to make it silent?

 

[Shimyr]

His system would consist of:

Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
Asrock 775Dual-VSTA
1GB Mushkin PC3200
GeForce4MX GPU (not sure about the brand)
M-Audio Audiophile 2496
120GB Seagate HD
120GB Western Digital HD (possible slave, might be skipped)
Lite-On 16x10x16 CD-RW
no-name DVD-ROM

Can't remember what kind of PSU he has, probably something cheap pushing about 350W (We may have to address that fan as well). So going by what you've said, he could probably have 1 fan on the heatsink and 1 in the back and that would be good enough? (Am I interpreting that correctly? Fan clips directly on to heatsink?)

As you might already have gathered from some of the choices, I don't think he wants to spend a lot of money, but he has no problem spending if there is proper value in it. I would say lets first see how far $100 can go, and move on from there.

 

[Howard]

Is there a fan on the video card heatsink? If so, you will want to replace the heatsink with a passive one, or simply unplug the fan. Older video cards should work just fine with their stock heatsinks running fanless.

Hard drives are cheap but not cheap enough to replace with $100. I would start with getting a Scythe Ninja Plus. It can run perfectly fine on the E6300 without the included fan, so you can use that fan as the case exhaust. Second, get some Stretch Magic or clothing elastic and suspend the hard drives so that there is no metal-to-metal contact. You can either suspend from the bottom of the hard drive cage, or suspend inside an empty 5.25" bay. Or anywhere, really. That's the beauty of ghetto-rigging (but in this case it's very effective).

Once you've done that, see if he's satisfied with the noise level. If not, the next loudest component will be either the power supply fan or one of the hard drives. If it's the former, pick up a Seasonic S12-330. If it's the latter, I don't know what you could do with ~$55...

 

[Zap]

It is completely possible to make a computer silent. Pull the power plug.

Okay, that may not work too well when you're trying to use the computer at the same time. Noise is caused by things that have moving parts. Get rid of those and you have silence. Of course you'll also have an overheating computer (in most cases) without a hard drive.

Here's my take on a reasonably quiet computer.

1) Completely passive is a bad idea. It will either be super expensive (Zalman TNN case) or overheat. Just a tiny bit of air flow can make a huge difference in temperatures. You just have to make that airflow so small as to be inaudible from a nominal distance, and make the components take advantage of that airflow.

2) Start with cool running components. Core 2 Duo is a good start - just don't go overclocking it. Get a motherboard that uses a passive chipset cooler. Use a video card that comes stock with a passive cooler (if not gaming, as low end as money can buy).

3) Get a case with "quiet" features, such as use of 120mm fans and heavy/thick construction.

4) Noise becomes attenuated if it has to reflect to reach your ears. This means put the computer under a desk - often a very cheap (free) method to cut noise by a hair. Also, if the moving items (fans) don't have a direct path outside of the case, then noise levels go down. Some people have made baffles behind their computers to do this.

5) Soft mount anything that moves. This means using soft fan mounts and suspending the hard drive. BTW, if a large HDD is not needed, then consider a notebook drive since they are quieter (and still suspend it). Also consider a drive that supports AAM

Here are some suggestions on actual parts to go with the Core 2 Duo and Asrock board to make for an "easy and quiet" build. Note that I did not look for lowest price so don't feel obliged to buy from the linked places. Sure, you can probably make a quieter system but what I suggest are IMO easy to obtain and a reasonable choice for being quiet and cost effective.

Someone else's "quiet" build for inspiration.

Antec Solo case - This case comes with HDD suspension, a front filter and a rear 120mm fan spot. Silent PC Review's review of the Antec P150 case which is exactly like the Solo, but costs more because it comes with a power supply.

Scythe Ninja Plus revision B - IMO among the best for passive or super low airflow use.

Any Seasonic S12 series PSU - Don't just get the highest capacity, but figure out what you need and buy just enough. Even the lowest end 330W will probably be enough to power that non-overclocked Core 2 Duo with a low end video card and a couple of hard drives.

This build should only have two fans, one 120mm in the PSU and a second 120mm as rear exhaust. For exhaust, soft mount the fan. Note that you need to get the right type of mount depending on whether your fan corners are open or closed, and do NOT buy the Sunbeam brand mounts. For the actual exhaust fan, either use one of the included fans (with case & HSF) undervolted, or use a Nexus, or use a Yate Loon undervolted.

Damn, makes me want one of these cases now.

 

[Zap]

Whoops, had the window open and then made my long post w/o refreshing thread. Ah well.

 

[deeznuts]

I've made my computers pretty damn quiet where no discernable noise occurs when hitting the power button, except if your ear is next to the fans.

What kind of case does he have? A good starting point is to figure out what kind of fans we can put on the case. Ideal is 120mm, but you can still do it with 80mm fans.

A bunch of silent fans are better then one or two noisy ones. So if there is one 80mm intake and two 80mm exhausts, you can drop in some quiet fans. You can actually save some money and get some cheap fans and undervolt them to 7v, and run them off the power supply instead of motherboard fan headers. You can mod them if they are molex connector fans, or buy these if they are 3-pin fans:
7 Volt Adapter for 3-Pin Fans

If the case is 120mm (more desirable) then you can definitely get away with one 120mm in the back for exhaust, but I like one in front on silent just to cool the harddrives a bit.

And for the PSU, the Seasonics have a great rep, but for your system, I think any quality 400-500w will do. There is nothing there that screams power draw. Buy a decent PSU, and replace the fans. Sounds scary but just be very f'in careful. I've done it many many times. Usually you unscrew the fans from the outside. Just don't touch anything inside. This is the cheapest way to quiet a PSU, and I do it to every PSU I get for myself. YOu don't even have to use the internal plugs for the fans, you can actually route the fan's molex or 3 pin plug with the rest of the PSU wires, and plug it into itself outside the case.

As for the video card, as mentioned earlier, if there is a little space below the agp slot, you can use something like a passive Zalman Zalman ZM-NB47J

For the cpu you can use the ninja, designed for passive applications. and if cooling is not adequate, use a very quiet fan. I say a yate loon run at 7volts will be cheap and save money over a nexus.

Jab-Tech 120mm Fans
SVC Silent 80mm Fans

 

[Bobthelost]

Quiet is easy, inaudible takes a bit of planning and work, silent is near impossible and very hard.

 

[Shadowknight]

My rig is really really quiet, see here: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=24308 though I've since replaced the 9800 Pro with a Built By ATI x800 xt platinum edition.

Here's something I wrote to help get you started on quiet computing in general (note: get started): http://www.silentpcreview.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=21152

 

[Navid]

Just a thought:

Get a wireless mouse and wireless keyboard. Get a long (25-foot?) DVI cable for the graphics card.
Put the PC inside a walk-in closet.

If I spend $1000 on a microphone, I must be really serious about music and I wouldn't want to compromise on sound quality.

 

[Tiamat]

Complete silence is possible but very tough.

Soild State Harddrives
All passive cooling
well behaved coils so you dont get coil whine. Coil Whine will probably be the last step in silencing the computer.

Then you will realize that your LCD monitors emit coil whine at certain brightness settings.

Then you will hear your refrigerator.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Tiamat
Then you will hear your refrigerator.

Sounds like someone's been through this before.

I usually get to the point where my HDDs are the noisiest part, and sometimes beyond (rubber grommets). By then unless I'm actively trying to hear it, I don't notice.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

i agree, once your pc is quiet enough, you'll end up hearing another noise, like the fridge, or the heat radiator.. etc. don't waste your time, just get the best quiet heatsinks/aftermarket cooling that you can afford then leave it at that

 

[Vikendios]

It's very simple. Drill a 40 mm diameter hole in the wall and put the case in the next room. Thread every cable thru and you can plug with cotton if needed. I had a closet built by a carpenter friend of mine and it's all dandy. Total silence. Nothing else really works.

Added benefit : no one is going to see your case so any old skeleton chassis will do.

 

[imported_Imp]

Again, go to silentpcreview, they rock at this. They even have an article about silence and audibility. Getting it too quiet may not be that good. I recently replaced a noisy case fan and patched a case grill hole with cardboard, It is a lot quieter, but the new fan gas an audible hum, but can be drowned out easily. All this came at a cost of an old game box, $13, a return/exchange run and +3 degrees Celsius idle on my VC. However, now I can hear a strobing hum from my receiver (fan or amplifier?), which is a screwy sound. So be careful silence is an addiction that might drive you crazy...

 

[Ayah]

Once your compy is quiet, you'll start trying to quiet everything else in your house.