Tom's Reviews Expensive, Noiseless Case

hakker writes "Toms Hardware Guide is running a review of a new case that claims it provides noiseless computing. The TNN 500A case from Zalman Tech is fanless (including PSU), and uses a bunch of heatpipes to move heat outside of the case from sources inside the system. Potentially costing as much as $1400, how much is your peace and quiet worth?"

Comments

Worth a hell of a lot

[Saven Marek]

> Potentially costing as much as $1400, how much is your
> peace and quiet worth?

I'd value it highly, but not that high. Almost all of my computing life has been spent around equipment with fans, drives or printers that clatter whirr hum or otherwise make other white noise underneath. That's stretching back to the late 1970s.

On a few occasions I've had a chance to use an entirely silent machine, one of which was a 700MHz iMac belonging to a dear friend, who has since sold it on for a G4 model. When I used it however, the sound from the HD was undiscernable, and with no fan inside it was genuinely silent. Browsing online and emailing while it was raining gently outside was an experience, at my own desk I often have no idea it's been raining for hours as I've been working with the white noise from at least two PC cases.

If I could have genuine silence again, I would. I'm considering putting all the noisy components in another room and cabling through the wall for the KVM.

The silence is well worth it. Perhaps if I won the lottery I'd invest in $1400 per case for it, but not on my current salary.

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My fans sound delicious.

[xankar]

My box is located in my bedroom, and I have an assload of fans.

I recently discovered that I can't sleep without the computer running. I actually find the noise pleasant.

I wouldn't shell out 1400 bucks for insomnia.

Silence?

[bluewee]

Could someone fill me in on the background of "silence". How many dBs is silent?

A cheaper solution

[sokk]

I have a totally silent workstation.

I've got a empty room besides mine, and some months ago I got the idea of putting the computer in the other room (while having the monitor, keyboard, mouse etc in my room). So I drilled a hole in the wall, and bought extension cables for the monitor, keyboard and usb. On my end I've put a USB-hub, so my extension cable give me four usb inputs (nice if you've got memory card readers, joysticks etc). I've been thinking about buying an USB2 CD-writer, but since I already own a cd-writer it seemed like a better idea to somehow get my cd-writer inside my room. I managed to get an IDE-cable through the wall, and I now only have to reach a little to use the cdrom drive. I've also put an own power switch on my side (extended), so that I don't have to leave the room to restart my computer.

I tried putting the computer back, just to check the difference. It's huge!

Because I have my workstation in the same room as I sleep, I can set some downloads for the night (eg. Linux ISOs) -- and sleep :).

Cost: ~60 bucks. (usb hub included)
Value: Great! ;)

Re:A cheaper solution

[sokk]

Yeah, it's somewhat large. The hole consist of two holes actually :).

I hacked this without thinking much about making it pretty. I guess it's possible to cover the hole with a hard plastic cover, but I haven't gotten to that yet. (I usually watch the monitor when I'm in my room :).

Had some spare time right now, so I took some pictures:
The computer in the other room
The entry-point (hole) for the cables
Desktop , usb connected devices

Solid state hard drives

[DigiShaman]

If you want a truely silent PC, then you will need one of these flash drives. It will cost you a shit-load of money, but it's a solution non the less. Check them out here http://www.m-sys.com/

Re:After years of listening to my computer's hum

[jred]

I have 4 PCs running 24/7 in my bedroom, including the server w/ 2 PSU fans, 3 big case fans, and 10 little fans on the SCSI RAID enclosure.

On those rare occasions when my power has gone out at night,I wake up instantly. The absence of noise is what wakes me up.

Just don't tell my daughter, or she'll kick the power plugs to wake me up at 7am on Saturday :)

Hey Tom, better pictures would help

[iamhassi]

is it just me, or do the pictures look pretty bad?

Looks like he just whipped out a cheap digital camera and started snapping away, which is fine for your dime-a-dozen review site, but this is Tom's Hardware, which I'd argue is one of the largest review sites online (surprised they don't have a magazine yet). You'd think he could invest in a little better lighting or something, especially when it's a review of a product they have in office.