Mini-PC w/o Fans?

blinky2 asks: "I just read this article on Tom's Hardware about small PC-cases. I would really like to have a small box next to my current one for development stuff etc. Here's the problem: I don't want to have any fans in it, and case like the one in the article needs heavy cooling. Is there anything out there that is small and doesn't need any cooling? the box should run 24/7 here in my room and i don't want to hear some noise while I sleep. A case like the SAX01 from Gigabyte would be nice, too. BTW, there is no need for a high-performance box: something like 300-500 Mhz with a moderate amount of RAM would be enough." A while ago, Ask Slashdot tackled this very question, has the intervening time made such a system a practical possibility?

Comments

CPU/Motherboard suggestion

[MadCamel]

I think the best CPU/Motherboard combination for your purposes would be a Socket 7 motherboard with an AMD K6-III+ (note the +) 550mhz. If you set the clock multiplier to 2, you can easily get 600mhz out of it. Being a laptop CPU, it's cooling requirements are low, and you can get away with a 100% passive cooling system(Think: large heatsink, no fan, or a very small/quiet fan). Combine this with a pizzabox case with holes or a screen in the top and sides for ventilation, and a small fanless power supply, and you have a small, very quiet system. You may also want to consider lower RPM hard drives, their not as fast, but are quieter and produce less heat.

Just get the right kind of heat sync...

[Leviat]

If you didn't want to go with water-cooling, (such as ripping apart a koolance 1U case), you could instead just go with a convection-cooled style case similar to the Mac cube (iCube?).

Plycon sells a nice assortment of different heat-syncs, the one you would be particularly insterested in is this one, it's designed to use a moving air current to cool the CPU rather than a direct fan. If your using a slower or underclocked CPU, it probably won't take very much to keep it cool.

Your biggest problem will most likely be finding room for a large enough heat-sync that doesn't require a fan of some sort.

Re:Strange idea

[awx]

A power supply's current rating is simply a measure of the maximum current its components will supply before they break due to overwarming; therefore a higher rated power supply will still have to dissipate the same amount of energy internally and will run at the same temperature, if not fractionally higher due to its bigger componentry with their correspondingly worse thermal conduction properties.

Want a silent supply? Adapt the output of one from a Mac Performa. Or buy a Cube or iMac.

It's simple really, you want decent hardware, buy decent hardware!
Disclaimer: I am not a Mac Fanatic, I do not own my Performa 630TV any more - tis DEC all the way baby...

Re:Strange idea

[Perdo]

The enermax EG651P-VE FMA has one 9 cm fan intake heat and one 8 cm fan exhaust heat with a rheostat included produces 500w/650peak with the fans at full. Turn the fans down to silent and it still performs at 300w. The heat sinks are massive, Representing 60% of the unit's weight. The unit is rated for 650 because of it's quality components and high heat tolerance. Combined with extreme passive cooling capacity, This allows for silent operation if you do not need the unit's full capacity. The Performa 630 used a 45 watt power supply. Not ATX and not enough power. The cube used an external power supply. The Imac has a decent power supply but you have to by all that glossy plastic and tiny monitor that goes with it.

So..

Enermax EG651P-VE FMA $185
NV7M $136
XP1800 $133
MC462 $57
256 kingmax DDR PC2100 $69
Travelstar 40gb $201
CD $20
Brand name microATX $40

So, $840 for a silent Tiny 1Ghz/ 40Gb/ 256Mb/ GF2mx/ Ether/ Modem/ Dolby6.1

Or get an Imac