Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners silent pc fans

As some may recall, I'm building myself an htpc . The case comes with 4 80mm fans. Two are 80x15mm mounted horizontally under the hard drives. the other two are 80x25mm mounted vertically on the back. I have been running it with the top off and only one of the 15mm fans running, it was pretty quiet. Today I got an adaptor to hook up all 4 fans and when I turned the machine on I thought the thing was gonna take flight. This has confirmed the need for a silent fan solution of some kind. the rear fans are loudest by far, but the slim fans are moving very little air. Can any of you pc experts guide me towards a nice, quiet, reliable fan? I'm willing to pay for quality here.

Well the fans that came installed in my Silverstone case are pretty quiet but then the HTPC is in the entertainment centre some 8-10' away but if I was to replace any fans I would go with Silenx they aren't cheap but have heard a number of excellent reviews on them over the years

http://www.nvnews.net/reviews/silenx_ixtrema_fans/index.shtml

wow.. something I actually know about.

I think your from the U.S., so you might find a better deal somewhere else.. I'm mostly linking to show some specific's of what to look for.

First.. if you can, switch the 80mm fans for 120mm fans.. big fans spinning slower move the same amount of air, but are much quieter.

Here's a link to a good online company that ships to both Canada & US. NewEgg etc might be just a good for the US
NCIX US

At least at NCIX, all the fans have a db rating, and Cubic Foot/Minute rating.

You want to use the biggest, slowest fans you can fit in your case, and only use enough fans to keep decent airflow.. for a HTPC you won't need overclocking etc.

Noctua and Scythe are two great brands of very quiet fans.

Also.. for the video card.. try and find a passively cooled solution.. (I recently saw a passively cooled 9600GT , which would be overkill for a HTPC). A Passive video card with a 120mm case fan nearby at even 20 db is going to basically inaudible.

From what I've seen.. the best fans are the Noctua (80mm fan).. from the couple of the pictures of the case, your probably stuck with 80mm fans.. It looks like airflow in the front of the case might be pretty restricted as well

The AMD x2 you list is certainly low voltage.... but it isn't that fast anymore compared to Intel.

I'd also recommend replacing the CPU heatsink/fan.. after the video card fan, it's often the loudest fan in a PC. Something like this is going to be much quieter than the stock heatsink/fan.

If you are determined to get the quietest fans that push the highest volumes of air, then you may want to check out the fan reviews on this site.

Noctua makes very quiet fans, but they don't handle any back preasure. They will work as case fans, but the openness of the protective grill may affect the volume of air moved.

The best bang for the buck is probably Yate Loon fans. Get 120mm fans if you can fit them in your case.

I'm quite happy with my Scythe fan on my CPU heatsink, but it's also a 120mm fan.

Thanks for advice guys, looks like I've got some reading to do. One of my reasons for building this thing was to learn some new things, and that's definatly happening.