The Official PC building thread -3rd Edition

Believe me Sam if..I can hear that Fan and it's to Loud for me...I change that Fan out Quick you know me the (Modifier)

 

There's at least one fan in my HAF 932 thats a little more audible than I'd like it. But where im staying right now...its discouraging thinking about modifying, building, etc. I just don't have the space, or money right now <-----you can't see the tear, but its there LOL!

 

Mmm, out of interest Will how much power roughly was the PC running that PSU using? Russ' systems are probably around the 120W region tops, and he probably wouldn't hear a PSU fan much over the rest of the case fans in his system. Quieter PCs they become much more apparent, and obviously as the level of power usage grows, so does how loud the PC needs to be to hide the PSU fan.
Omega: The fans in the HAF are remarkably good for quietness, it's airflow they're lacking in, but the only one that ever bugged me is the front one, as it is more obstructed than the top and side fans due to their mesh. The finer dust-filtering mesh and the rather restrictive metal grille on the front make the front 230mm much more obvious due to turbulence.

 

Yes, the front fan is definitely noticeable. But I was wondering about my CPU fan. Its currently pushing 1400Rpm. Which I wouldnt think to be that audible. Its probably like you say, the front 230mm. My desk is currently a disaster, and not a priority LOL!

 

depends what size 1400rpm. 1400rpm on a 120mm is going to be quite noticeable, 1400rpm on a 92mm will be audible but relatively subdued, 1400rpm on an 80mm will still be audible, but not too bad. Overall for a fan to be quiet you need to be below 1100/1250/1400 rpm for each fan size (decreasing), for a fan to be near-silent you need to be below 800/1000/1100 rpm. The 230mm fans in the HAF are already relatively quiet, but to be near-silent they need to be down to about 400-450rpm. The rear 140mm fan is already quiet, and is near-silent around 700rpm, but like most stock coolermaster fans pushes very little air, so is worth replacing.
Remember to cut 10-12% off these figures for 9-bladed fans, and 20-25% off for 11-bladed fans.

Noise (very close, fans with more blades tend to be slightly better than this, but not by much) and rpm-wise, a fan with more blades is typically like having a fan with the following speed:
7 blade: 500/800/1000/1200/1400/1600/2000/2500
9 blade: 640/1030/1290/1550/1800/2060/2570/3210
11 blade: 790/1260/1570/1890/2200/2510/3140/3930

 

This is my 92mm fan
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835185125
I would really like to get a fan controller for the OTHER fans. As I said though, right now isn't practical. I really appreciate your input

 

The freezer 64 fan isn't too bad, but it will be noticeable at 1400rpm. You have to differentiate it from the other fans, 1400rpm will be a higher tone than the case fans of the HAF (an 'E' if you're a musician)

 

The only way to control that one is in the Bios? I remember setting it before. I believe it ran at half that. But when I reset the bios, I didn't reset that setting. No biggie. Its audible, but not quite a nuisance.

 

To be honest, PWM fans like the Freezers are a pain to control as they can only be done via software, which not all motherboards support. Gigabytes often don't support manual control via software, but Asuses often do.

 

So...do you think AMD overdrive has that capability. I've never used that software, because i've always believed OC'ing belongs in the bios. If not PWM, what would you recommend?

 

Not as far as I'm aware. There are only two ways to control fan speed, PWM and voltage. Any typical 3-pin, 2-pin or Molex fan can only be controlled by voltage, these are the fans I use.

 

You control your cpu fan in that manor? What if it were to quit while you were sleeping. Would the bios pick that up, and automatically shut down?

 

No, my CPU fan is a regular case fan so it runs to my fan controller at the front. There are no fan alarms running. Were my CPU fan to fail and my CPU overheat it would shut down anyway, as all motherboards shut down the CPU once they detect the CPU temperature exceeds critical (I think this is usually 100ºC). This does not require the PC to be running any software, or even be responding to work. The PC can have crashed and it will still work.

 

Sam,
Lets see, my CPU is 95w and the video card is 115w, so that's 220w right there. Both are overclocked! How do I make you understand that with all the fans except one running at 1200 rpm, and the other one running at 800 rpm. It's an extremely quiet computer. There is no noise to mask anything. It don't get much quieter than this! It makes about half the noise the E6750 did in the Cavalier case, with one more case fan! The Freezer 64 with it's new designed fan doesn't make a sound below 1600-1700 rpm, and even then it makes no where near the noise the Freezer 7 made on the E6750. Switching to 1200 rpm fans on this build really made a difference, and my E6750 wasn't very loud to begin with! Even the video card, which makes noise until the drivers load, is very quiet. The only reason I can hear anything at all is the fact that two of the exhaust fans are only about 2.5' from my right ear! If I move the console to the other side of my desk, you can't really hear anything at all, just a very quiet rush of air. It's not just quiet by my standards, Anyone except you would consider it a very quiet machine! My old VCR makes more noise than the computer does! I was working on it the other night, and even with the cover back on, it still makes more noise than the computer, and is far more annoying, thanks to the head motor!

Russ

 

now that is some of the best comedy i have seen/heard/read in a long time...ROTFLMFAO!!!!!!! BOMBS AWAY!!!!!!!!!!

 

LOL? A 115W 9500GT? You do realise they're 30W cards right? 95+115 also does not equal 220. The simple fact is Russ, a 1200rpm 9-blade 120mm fan does not make a quiet computer. It's simple fact. Quiet to the average joe, but to someone who cares about noise and wants a genuinely quiet PC, that just won't cut it. No fan design makes a 1700rpm 92mm fan silent either, "it doesn't make sound" is pretty criminal for a PC that will be noisier than my file server, which to me is much too loud! The pair of 1700rpm 80mm fans I can't stand, and that's quieter than your setup!
Good fan, bad fan, quiet case, noisy case, it's a scientific impossibility, if the speeds of those fans are accurate, your PC is NOT near-silent, nowhere near it. This is all disregarding any noise the PSU will make. As I said before, you're looking at around 120W with your PC, as unless loaded up on something like Orthos your CPU will never use the amount of power the TDP claims, so fortunately your PSU *should* be quite quiet with that.

 

Oman7,
The new AMD Overdrive has that feature. You can control or even program the fans plugged into the motherboard. You are actually changing the bios, only the file is loaded from the HDD, not the bios chip! It still reads it as the bios! I have to say that the adjust ability provided, is better than you get in the setup with a lot of motherboards. I'll take a few pics showing all the adjustments available! The only thing I couldn't do with it outside the bios is change the HT link frequency and the NB speed to the 10x multiplier. Both will run at 10x, even with the OD!

This first screen shows all the information.

http://img197.imageshack.us/img197/7030/amdod1.jpg

This next screen shows the adjustmwnts. These are just the basics!

http://img20.imageshack.us/img20/4839/amdodadjust.jpg

This is the fan controller!

http://img33.imageshack.us/img33/5523/amdodfans.jpg

The only real important thing to know about AMD OD, is that the computer needs to be at all stock values except the NB and HT Link multipliers, and the memory set to EPP if you have EPP memory. I know, I want to do some serious playing around with it in the near future. I just need to document all my present settings first! BTW! This version would not run on the UD4H with the latest bios. Works fine on the UD4P!

Best Regards,
Russ

 

russ there is no way its physically possible for the 9500GT to draw 115W unless it has a 6 pin PCIE cable, as the PCIE slot gives it 75W and the 6 pin cable another 75W. if your 9500GT is without a 6pin PCIE conntector, then the max it dars will be 75W but if a card does draw that, they will put a PCIE connector on it as its at the limits, infact if it has no connector then im sure the max will be about 65W draw.

 

At the very most, and the cooler some cards use imply it's no more than 50W. Put it this way, the 9500GT uses 81W less at a.c. than an HD4850, so around 65-70W less at DC. Since an HD4850 uses around 110W, that puts the 9500GT in the forties. 115W, honestly... I know the low-end nvidia cards aren't anywhere near as efficient as the ATIs, but they're not that bad!

 

Sam,
I looked it up last night. It's rated at 115w! Sorry, 210w! I hit the wrong key! You and I probably both hear about the same frequencies. The difference is I am not as sensitive to certain sounds and frequencies the way you are. I can hear them but I have to concentrate on them! You talk about bearing hiss, 9 blade frequencies vs 7 blade frequencies and uber low fan speeds. I frankly doubt that there are two people in this forum that even have an idea of what you are talking about. Think about it! I can hear them, but they are not a presence that bothers me in any way. I have to be actually listening for them. You just happen to be extremely sensitive to what you perceive as harsh noise. Almost no one else can hear them at all! No fault of yours, but your sensitivity to certain sounds is very unusual. It's just the way you hear things.

I had the same thing with my eyesight. I didn't quit playing Baseball until I was past 52! Why, is quite simple really, as I could see at 100 feet what most people could only see at 20! It's how I was born! If you can see the ball, even at 90+ mph, you can hit the ball! It's hard for people to relate because you are both looking at the same thing, it's just that I see so much more than they do, and my focal range was incredible. From inches to infinity! For me it was like time slowed down when the pitcher released the ball! I can see the angle and spin on the ball, and I generally know right where it is going before it's half way there. It was just how I saw things, just like the way you hear things! Unfortunately in my case, I got hit with a batted ball that came through the frame break where they slip on the net, pitching batting practice. I was out cold before the ball hit the ground! To this day, I still shy from the ball! I could track down balls in the outfield or spear a screaming line drive just inches from the ground, in the infield, but if the ball hits the ground, it owns me! LOL!! I back up from a slowly bouncing tennis ball! I even went to a Hypnotist to try and cure me! Ultimately that little chink in my armor cost me in several ways. For one, it kept me out of baseball, and barring injury, the baseball record books, and maybe even a trip to Cooperstown! The curse was that I was reminded everyday of my own failure to overcome something seemingly so simple, for all the years that I could see like that!

Your curse is that you hear things that 99% of the rest of the people don't! Unfortunately you are extremely sensitive to certain types of noise. To you it's clear as a bell annoying, and you can't understand how anyone can stand it! They can stand it because they can't hear it, so it doesn't exist to bother them! I was happy with the noise when I had the E6750, as I felt it was pretty quiet, but after I built this one, I really found out what quiet is! Not to you of course! LOL!! That's why I say it's a curse! People just can not understand something they can not see or hear! When it comes to sound, you are the exception to the rule. Quite simply put you, are in a different class. Quiet to you means an entirely different thing to the rest of us. It's not a question of decibels, it's a question of what sounds quiet to the individual! Your demands are much higher than any of our needs!

Best Regards,
Russ