Hi guys, I had a LAN party and put my case on top of my desk instead of underneath where it usually sits, it made me realise how loud the thing is. At stock speeds, the 480GTX, despite its reputation, isn’t that loud, so most of the sounds are down to the case fans. I have a NZXT M59, with 1x stock fan (side), 1x Scythe gentle Typhoon (top) and 1x Scythe Kaze ultra thin fan. (top). I also have a fan on the Corsair H50 (rear). The Kaze ultra thin doesn’t move much air but at least it is silent. The side fan is pretty noisy, and so is the H50 fan, temps on the cpu are fine, and I’ve hoovered out the dust that inevitably builds up on the radiator. I also have a NZXT Sentry II fan controller, I’m going to get rid of that, since I want something with a little less ‘bling’. Anyhow, after looking through Bit Techs guide to fans, I thought about getting another two gentle typhoon to replace the stock fan on the side, and the H50’s stock fan, and then running them at a very low rpm. However, I then realised that I might get about £20 for my fan controller, and then spend another £25 on fans, I could just buy a new (less blingy), more silent case. Oh what a pickle. Any ideas?
This comes in handy: http://www.quietpc.com/gb-en-gbp/products/120mmfans Just get the best match of db V airflow. Two choices normally either make less noise to begin with, or get a case that will hide the noise you make.
Cheers for that, the Noctua NF-S12B FLX look great, but my god they are ugly! Also @ £17 each, it'd cost me £34 +p&p for two fans! Thats a bitter pill to swallow!
Sharkoon Silent Eagles are known for being quiet while providing nice cooling and are just over £10. I don't think they are ideal for a rad, but I've read of tons of people using them on h50/h70 with decent results. Other then that you could always opt for a Fractal R3 which would help with the noise a fair bit I imagine, or even better, both.
Parge, quiet sleeve bearing fans will cost quite a bit more than their ball bearing breathren. I still recommend Nexus D12SL-12 120mm fans, which when combined with a fan controller will quieten down your machine significantly.
Or go cheaper and pick up the identical Yate Loon D12SL-12 (low speed) or D12SM-12 (medium speed). Yate Loon is the OEM who manufactures the Nexus fans, but in my experience Nexus fans run about $10 while Yate Loons can be had for $3-6.
Personally I've beenusing Yate Loon fans for years and just run them at 5v/7v and it works perfectly well. I'm a big fan of noise dampening materials like used in car audio installs... work very well to reduce case noise but the good stuff isn't overly cheap. If you look to swap case you can do a lot worse than a Fracal Designs R3. I wanted to get one but ended up with a R2 due to stock but i've been very happy with it (although i need something smaller now so i'm gonna sell it) - runs very quiet with a air cooled server in it.
I have the 1850rpm flavour of the Sycthe GT's, and im afraid they are not quiet. They have a kind of whine to them. Have you tried benchmarking your current temps when under full load, then changing the fan config around? For example, i would hedge a bet that the side fan doesnt really do that much in terms of cooling your system. Try switching it off. Then benchmark the temps again.. I did this with my Antec 300 and i went from running 5 fans in total to 3 (1x intake, 2 exhaust). My temps never go above 57c on full load, and the case is much quieter.
Personally I have used Noctuas and have found them to be higly over rated. they barely move any air. I would suggest you change over to GT's the 1450 rpm ones if you like. That would reduce sound from your case by a whole lot. Also for the side panel, I would suggest you use rubber fan holders rather than metal screws, that reduces resonance quite a bit, specially if your case panel is thin. hope this helps.
I use Zalman F3 fans on scan just because they're cheap. They come with vibration free mounting kits too. I recommend either using the motherboard to control the speed or putting on the enclosed 7v mod that comes with it. On a 2000rpm 120mm fan there is only so much you can do without impacting airflow to reduce the noise, so in most cases its far cheaper to just run normal fans at a lower speed (or, if you match it to GPU temperature by plugging it onto your motherboard - run it at the necessary speed for a given temperature), as you're getting the same noise / airflow reduction you would have got anyway. I have a fan controller to do it manually, but that's because when benchmarking or going to a LAN party I like to whack everything up to max, when just at home, my fans sit at around 800-900rpm and are -extremely- quiet.
