So I want a 100% silent PC

[PCJ]

Or as close as I can get.
I'm getting a pretty nice wad of money soon, and I want this rig to be my media PC. I might even sell my secondary PC once I get this one up.
Here's the basics:
- NO FANS. That means I'll prolly have to go with a Via board/CPU.
- Making the hard drive stfu. I'm thinking several layers of silicone right here, any better suggestions?
- The quietest DVD drive around. What is it? Or should I go the hard way and use Alcohol120 to mount all my dvds?

Please remember that I just thought of this right now and wrote it down do I wouldn't forget. This is prolly gonna be my only project for a while, because I've stopped caring about fast hardware for some reason.

Sooo, my questions:
1. Are there any mobos that have 2 expansion slots (1agp, 1pci or 2pci - one for video, one for sound. Or is the IGP on these board half decent?) AND can be 100% passively cooled?
2. What is thw quietest hard drive and how do I make it even quiter?
3. What is the quietest CD drive/how do I skip it all together?
4. Is it possible to cool a PSU to the level where it doesnt need a fan?
5. What should I put this into?

[thrawn86]

you can get fanless PSUS, but the biggest i've seen is about 250W and it has a HUGE heatsink on the back and gets burning hot. Just get a fortron.

HDs... Seagate. problem solved. Seriously. I cannot hear mine at all, and I've got two 8mb barracudas.

and cpu... you'll have to go with one of those giant zalman flower contraptions. I saw a fanless setup once with one of those and a P4, it was hovering around 60C idle. the thing was a freaking toaster.

Check out those zalman TNN cases. pretty pricey, but the entire case is lined with like 2 inches of accostic foam.

[slavik]

look into chaintech nforce2 IGP mobos ...

the NIL/NIF models :)

one of them even has a built-in S-Video out port ;)

1AGP, 3PCI for expansion :)

[James]

Originally posted by PCJ

- Making the hard drive stfu. I'm thinking several layers of silicone right here, any better suggestions?

2. What is thw quietest hard drive and how do I make it even quiter?


The quietest hdd you can get is a CF card in an adapter.
0 noise.
No moving parts, and a maximum of 4GB of decently affordable storage, and 8GB of ridiculously expensive storage.
Massive improvements in access times, while read times will be down a bit.

But if you are doing a media PC, you don't need a huge drive for the OS and basic programs, you need massive storage for your media, and that can always be somewhere else and networked to the main PC.

[GLScooby]

First, a nod to thrawn on the Seagate. My 120GB SATA Seagate is virtually silent. By far the quietest drive I've ever owned.

For a HTPC, any board with IGP should be fine. I just put together a nice rig for my aunt with an NF7-M & XP3000+. The Epox, MSI, ASUS, and Chaintech micro ATX nForce2 w/IGP boards are all around $75 at Newegg. Another thumbs up for the Zalman HS. You don't have to go completely fanless, though. Remember, a 120mm fan can still push some decent cfm's at lower speeds. This may be something to consider when choosing a psu and case. Many psu's are coming with 120's now stock out of the box. Remember: the 120mm and a small fan controller are your friends! Also, I just made an HTPC for myself and the TV tuner card I got recommended about 2GB/hr of recording for DVD quality. So my 120GB drive will record roughly 60hrs of TV (too bad it's only analog cable) Someone needs to get off their duff and make a digital decoder! The holy grail of HTPC's! Too bad the concept is currently illegal.

If you want to skip the optical drive, consider and external usb optical drive. Plug it in when you need it, put it away when you don't.

I also added an additional 20GB hdd to keep the OS and misc crap on. The main 120GB recording drive is in a 5 1/4" hot swap bay so I can take my recordings to any of my other PC's or to someone else's house. It was a pretty handy idea I picked up from some HTPC fanatic message board out there.

Good luck, and keep us updated!

[zackbass]

Instead of using a passive heatsink you could watercool. I've got my CPU and GPU watercooled using a near silent Eheim pump and a large radiator with no fans (no case fans either). Both my CPU and GPU are heavilly overclocked but I'm running 40-45C 100%CPU completely silently. This of course is ignoring the two WD Raptors and the CD-RW drive, which are the the only things you hear when my system is running.

[PCJ]

eh, I'm not going for half silent this time. I want the real deal. I've heard water, and I've heard 120mm. Neither is silent when you're using speakers. I've decided to emulate my dvds, put my hdd into several layers of silicone, and go with either a fanless regular setup (but that would require some crazy pre-planning) or go the easy way and just take an epia.

[punkrunning]

The $200 Antec Fanless PSU has incredible rails despite its 350W rating.

It might be a good idea to have one 11dB cpu fan in your case. The sound really is negligible inside a case and it would help stability enormously.

I saw an article recently about underclocking mobile Athlon XP's to the point where they could be passively cooled. Google it.

Quinientos.

[serotone9]

i definitely would go micro-atx for HTPC. i built a small file server with a micro-atx case i got on newegg for $20 including power supply (http://www.gmc.co.kr/english/good_e_f11.htm - newegg doesn't sell them anymore, unfortunately, i guess it was so cheap b/c they were getting rid of their inventory :D), i put in an asus micro-atx motherboard and 1.4 duron w/speeze hsf, and it is basically silent. case 35/cpu 38 -- folding.

don't be freaked by the 60mm fans and the small PSUs that usually come with micro-atx. with integrated components and no monster case fans you don't need as much power, and 60mm/25 as a case fan is surprisingly quiet. i was surprised at how quiet -- i honestly don't even know it's running.

if you're getting a standard case, consider SilenX psu. some people have said they get hot, but my 350w runs super cool ("supah cool" :D right now: 31.5C case/35.5 cpu) and i've never had any problems with it.

no fans might not be doable, so if you need one, make sure to get a panaflo L.

fwiw, my 80gb seagate is totally quiet -- until it seeks for data. then it's louder than my WDSE or maxtor. i guess the conventional wisdom is that seagate is the quietest, but in my experience it isn't. i guess that's a ymmv. :p

[James]

My Seagate Barracuda IV IDE's were dead silent, seeking for data didn't even elicit a response from them. Now with my SATA drive, it sounds like my 15.3 SCSI drives when it searches for data. Severe grindage in comparison.

[thrawn86]

meh, WC is dead quiet if you do it right. good, insulated pump, and a fanless reservoir. maybe even one of those zalman reserator contraptions?

[JetForce Gemini X]

since when did resrvoirs ever have fans?:confused: you were probably saying radiator. if you wnat a fanless rad go for a double at least maybe a triple core

[James]

If you really want a completely silent case, check out the zalman. It isn't cheap, and it isn't in the HTPC format, but there are no fans, just heat pipes.

Anandtech did a quick cover of it on their Computex review.

http://www.anandtech.com/casecooling/showdoc.aspx?i=2090&p=6

[TAZTG]

The Easiest way to get your PC Silent is to get a few of
THESE (http://www.earplugsonline.com/)
;) ;)

[thrawn86]

LMAO.

fanless reservoir lol. yeah, I meant radiator. Although its quite possible to get very good temps with a kind of reservoir/fan assembly (ie bong-style cooler)