New PC too LOUD

  • Thread starter Thread starter badmotorvision
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badmotorvision

Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.

Based on what you see here what can I do?
 
Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.
Click to expand...

What's the temps? If the case insides are too hot, the cpu cant'
keep itself cool, it will have to run the fan faster. I'd assume
anything over about 40c is too hot. If this is the case, adding a
cooling fan may actually make the machine quieter. Buying a decent
case that uses 120mm fans may also be required. Bad news is that I've
never managed to make a system be quieter than the ones you can buy
these days.
 
Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.

Based on what you see here what can I do?
Click to expand...

The most frequent sources of noise are disk drives (older ones), cheap
flimsy cases and case fans. Sounds like you already knew the solution.

Greg
 
badmotorvision said:
Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.

Based on what you see here what can I do?
Click to expand...

First thing is to replace the power supply for TWO reasons. The MAIN one is
that it's likely to fail on you soon and take other expensive components
down with it. Second reason is, if it's silent you want, then it's Seasonic
you need. You don't need 500W, anything over 400 will do, in the Seasonic
line. Example:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817151023

The next noisy component would be the fan on the video card, if the video
card is actively cooled. I don't know about the 7900 chipset, but in the
nvidia line the 7600 chipset cards are available passively cooled. Example:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16814150212

So if you have an actively cooled video card, exchange it for a passively
cooled one. You might even save some money by doing this, that you can
throw at the power supply you should have purchased for this system.

Third source of noise is case fans. Remove ALL current case fans and throw
them away. Add ONE case fan to the front of the system, sucking air into
the system. It will need to be silent, and preferably 120mm, or 80mm if
that's all that the case will support. Example:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835185028
expensive, but worth it, if it makes the pc quiet enough to sleep in the
same room with

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835119072
This one will do also, but use 120mm if you can

Not much you can do about the CPU fan. The one you got is darned near
silent, the only way to improve would be to water-cool, but that would be
major expense, as you'd have to water-cool the whole system, and you'd still
need a new case fan. (water-cooling doesn't prevent stale air from heating
up)

That's as close to silent as you are going to get with that rig, without
water-cooling AND investing in a passively cooled power supply, which I do
not recommend (and it's damned expensive anyway)

Those improvements should be done, even if the computer system is eventually
moved out of the bedroom. But it's the best chance you have of keeping the
system in the bedroom, also. (without investing TONS of money in
) -Dave
 
badmotorvision said:
Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.

Based on what you see here what can I do?
Click to expand...

Tell the wife to go sleep on the couch.
 
badmotorvision said:
Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.

Based on what you see here what can I do?
Click to expand...

Are you leaving it run 24/7?

My wife comes from a long line of baby makers.....no TV and especially no computers in the
bedroom.
 
badmotorvision said:
Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.

Based on what you see here what can I do?
Click to expand...

Could you put the computer in another room, and run cables for the
interface bits ?

You can waste a ton of money buying aftermarket cooling
solutions, passively cooled power supplies, water blocks
and extension plumbing, running to fans/radiator in another
room. There are even solid state (flash) drives, for storage,
to eliminate drive noise.

But I'd try extending just the bits that need to be
in the bedroom first, and try to leave the noisy bits
in another room. Could well be cheaper to do that
way.

This is another approach, but this one is only fanless, if
you keep the system power down. If it gets too hot, you
may still need to move some air through the case, with an
optional fan. Zalman makes a couple different models, and
there is a bigger one than this one, somewhere in the $1000
range. I think this one only takes a microATX board.

ZALMAN TNN 300 Black Steel MicroATX Mid Tower $640
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811235003

In terms of power:

E6600 processor - 65W

7900GT - 48.4W in 3D mode
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/display/power-noise_4.html

Your system is not too bad, in terms of total power consumption.
Maybe 195W total or so. But sticking it in another room, is
better than starting all over again. If you want to build a
quiet system, you have to plan each component purchase, with
that in mind. Plenty of high end video cards, are noisier
than they have to be.

Maybe you could just stick the computer, on the other side of
the bedroom wall, and knock a couple holes out to run cables :-)

Paul
 
Paul said:
badmotorvision wrote:

You can waste a ton of money buying aftermarket cooling
solutions, passively cooled power supplies, water blocks
and extension plumbing, running to fans/radiator in another
room.
Click to expand...

Has anyone ever done this - run water cooling into another room? ...or know
of information about it.

I was wondering if this is possible/practical.

Jeff
 
Jeff said:
Has anyone ever done this - run water cooling into another room? ...or
know of information about it.

I was wondering if this is possible/practical.

Jeff
Click to expand...

I've read of more than one account of people doing that.
(But I certainly didn't bookmark the accounts. It's not something
I'd want to try. Imagine the mess it could make.)

Don't ask me how you'd get away with it, if you had a wife :-)

Have a look on http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/ in the
liquid cooling section, and maybe you can find an example.

Paul
 
badmotorvision said:
Hi, I just built a new pc.
abit ab9 pro
Intel Core 2 duo e6600 (Thermaltake Golden Orb II Cooler)
4 gig corsair ram
nvidia GF7900GT
CTX 500 watt PS

Cheap flimsy case

This rig is running vista home premium with a tv tuner hooked to a 22
inch wide screen
dell monitor.

It's also in the bed room. Wife say's make it silent or be gone.

Based on what you see here what can I do?
Click to expand...

If you have the money...

http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/quietpc.html

http://www.acousticpc.com/quiet_pc_cases.html

http://www.xoxide.com/


-Ed
 
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