Cooling Silent It Up

Hey

I am looking for advice on cooling my computer, im pretty bad at this kind of thing too, so bear with me

Currently my cooling setup is a bit rubbish tbh. I need one side of the case off otherwise it overheats, the CPU temp is usually around 50-60 and is an athlon xp 2100+ (palomino). Fans i have running are...

2 x PSU fan in a generic Ebuyer PSU.
1 X Arctic cooling CPU Fan
1 x Abit NF7-S Northbridge Cooler

The ebuyer fans are quite quiet, but the CPU fan isnt (despite what the box tells me). Needless to say 2 fans dont get much airflow going, and if i turn the other fans on (bog standard case fans) then the noise just gets silly.

So i was wondering if someone could inform me of what i should do to make my case SILENT, and have it so the side of the case didnt need to be taken off. Here below is some info you may need to know...

Fan space's on case
- One external, 80mm
- One top, 80mm
- There may be one 80mm on the front too, but there is no hole on the plastic front to accomodate this. Im not great with a dremel!

Other details
- Motherboard doesnt have holes to accomodate LARGE heatsink, i.e. ZIFF only heatsinks!
- Assume i know nothing about this (except for course how to replace stuff), so dont assume i know any special cooling linquo.

Rememeber, i want it as SILENT as possible, so could anything suggested be accompanied by some kind of decription of how much it quietens your computer.

Thanks alot
Bogo

 

Replace the NB fan with a Zalman passive heatsink.
Replace the CPU sink with a Zalman CNPS6000 "Flower" heatsink. Then ditch the accomanying Zalman 92mm fan and replace with a 120mm fan. Throttle it down in Speedfan as low as it will go without the CPU overheating.
See if you can get a silent PSU (not fanless, they are not that robust, but something with a single 120mm fan).

A picture of your case will help us advise you on a clear air pathway. Also clean up your cabling as much as possible.

 

The red arrows indictae a fan/fan hole (the is 2 on the PSU).
The blue bits on the right indicate a spare 5 1/4" bay

edit: btw, the radiator isnt turned on
edit2: btw, shoudl the 120mm fan be "said" to be silent in the description ? is there any particular brand i shoudl go for ?
edit3: oh... and btw, how DO i take off thew northbridge ? it seems pretty well stuck in there! does it just require pressure ? will it damage my mobo ?

http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/prod...2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X3Jldmlld3M=&product_uid=35884
how about that for apSU - Its sual fan, but reviews say its very quiet!

Ta

edit4: btw, any case modifications which would make place for new fans can be suggested, i am considering modding it while i have nothing to do!

 

You could always get a different case? The chieftec dragons have excellent provisions for cooling and only cost around £30.

Which direction are your fans going? If the top and rear fan are both blowing out and you have nothing drawing air in then your not going to get much air movement. Also at the moment the air pressure in the case will be lower than the room which will suck a lot of dust into your case. Talking of which your CPU heatsink is looking rather dusty so giving it a hoover would help. You could also change the top fan so its blowing in instead of out.

 

theres a description of what the fans are doing at the top - my side fan isnt turned on, its too noisy.

 

It doesn't tell me which direction the fans are blowing.

You need to have balanced airflow through your case otherwise it is bound to get hot. If all your fans are extracting air with none blowing inwards then they have to work harder and therefore get louder. If the fans are too loud then buy some quiet ones. Check out dorothybradbury.co.uk. Other than that you can buy sound deadening foam to line your case with which will help a lot.

 

well, the fans which arent turned on are drawing air, neither way. The fan ont he back of the psu pushes air out, the fan on the inside of the pus (inside the case, opposite the cd drives) draws air into the PSU from the case. The CPU Fan draws air away from the heatsink...

where can i get sound deadening foam from ? is it expensive ?

 

Looks like you may have a fair amount of dust built up on the fins of the cpu hs? that would really affect your temps. A bit of wire management might help clear a path to the cpu fan.

 

"Quiet" fans are anything with a dB rating of 25 or below. "Silent" fans have a dB rating below 20. Keeping in mind that they are not as powerful, a Low-Flow 24dB Panaflo still shifts a remarkable amount of air.

Tidy up your wiring a bit. Also I would put the Zalman CNPS6000 on the CPU, then have a 120mm quiet fan in the side panel blow air onto it. Cut out the perforated holes in the case for the 80mm outlet fan in the back (of replace with a 120mm fan if you have space).

 

I would suggest getting a thermalright SI-97 heatsink then getting a panaflo 92mm fan for it, thats the CPU taken care of, now to the back of the case, get a couple of quiet 80mm fans, antec tri-cools are good as you can adjust the flow rate (and hence the noise).

Have the one at the front of the case sucking in (if there are no holes you might want to drill a few in the underside of the front panel or leave out any front connectors you have to allow some flow. For the rear have the fan sucking air out of the case.

 

hmmm, nexco - them heatsinks that you suggested dont support my CPU!

I have a new GFX Card btw, which is a radeon 9600xt, however it doesnt have a fan on, just a huge 2 sided heatsink, so no noise there

As far as airflow goes, is it "in at the bottom/front, out at the back/top" ? Im thinking of getting a 120mm for the front, and 1 silent 80mm for the back and 1 for the top.

And also, for the top. I have a place to put the fan, there is the nomral circle of holes i assume i have to cut out. But there is one of them on the top PANEL of my PC as well, which slides over the top of that. It also has the holes in, do i cut them out too ? If so, how do imake it all look very neat ?

Thanks!

 

Ok then, because i am a total noob, and really dont want to buy the wrong things anymore, can you take a look at these please and tell me what you think...

120mm Fan - http://www.tekheads.co.uk/s/product?product=602872
80mm Fan - http://www.tekheads.co.uk/s/product?product=602871
480W PSU - http://www.tekheads.co.uk/s/product?product=602960

Now i dunno what to do about the heatsink. Nexco says "Zalman Flower CNPS6000-CU", but that may not accomodate my CPU (up to 2000+ palomino apparantly). Tank Raider says the thermalright which i cant find on ebuyer or tekheads, so have no idea of weight or ZIFF capabilities.

3 more questions for this post
- Is there any way of using the Heatsinks which require extra bolting on motherboards which dont have the bolts ?
- Where can i get the stuff to quieten my pc from ?
- I have read that washing line wire is good for hard drive silencing. Is this as well as screws ? does it need to go in the 5 1/2" bays to do this ? Are they suspecnded ? And if so what kind of precautions should be taken so the dont fall out

Thanks!
Bogo

 

why not get a evercool system? They cost about 80-90bux if you look around in the us and you get a 5 1/4 unit with lcd and fan controler witch is also a res pump and rad. you also get a second rad (80mm) and two water blocks. One for gpu and one for cpu. The system can be quiet and performs decently well compared to the price and performance. If your vid card fan dosent bother you, you can put the gpu block on your chipset.

My buddy owns one and its actualy a very nice unit. And the level of skill required to install it is minimalistic.

Hope that helps.

 

Has anyone ever tried greasing their fans? Or are they already greased? Or is it realy pointless?

 

I don't have holes in my mobo, and my PC is really quiet.

I have a SLK-900A with a 92mm fan @ 5V.
PSU with a 120mm x 38mm fan @ 4V
HDD with aluminum bars.
Front intake with 92mm fan that also cools the HDD when we're in summer.
Side intake with a 120mm x 38mm fan @ 4V, I only turn it on when I'm playing or when we're in summer.
Rear exhaust, I rarely turn it on, since the PSU's fan takes care of that.



What I would do.
120 x 38 front intake
HDDs on the case's floor, just in front of the intake.
Get a good heatsink and fan.
Put a 120 x 38 on that PSU.
Take away the rear exhaust.
You could maybe replace the CPU's fan with a 120 x 38 side intake.

 

Please check the specs again. The Zalman CNPS-S6000-Cu (full copper version) supports all Palominos. The Zalman CNPS-S6000-AlCu (part aluminium, part copper) goes up to the Palomino 2000+.

It is really pointless. Fans already have pretty good long lasting self-lubricating sleeve/ball bearings that really cannot be improved upon by an enthusiastic modder with a jar of vaseline. All it does is collect dust and turn into a mess. Moreover the main noise a fan generates is not by its spinning axis, but by the turbulence of its blades as they displace the air.

 

For less than the price of that PSU you could buy a new case with decent airflow and solve your problems. Have you tried removing the dust from your current heatsink and see what effect that has?

 

ya, i have, its still unstable.

The PSU is silent you have to remember, my current one isnt silent (or close to it). Also, my current case is ok, i quite like it!

 

apart from its noisy, overheats and you have to run it with the side off?

 

have you read what this thread is all about ? its about changing that. It isnt like i have very good stuff in there anyway, whatever fans i have except what is stated isnt turned on.

If i buy a new case it isnt goign to make my PSU or CPU fans anymore quiet, and it isnt going to stop it overheating if i have no fans blowing air in or out.