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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?"
$1400 would sure buy a lot of Lord of the Rings DVD's or a lot of hookers. Since I am on Slashdot, you know they will be robotic hookers.
...unless you're running one of these :)
$1400 for a quiet PC or $1400 for a bunch of strippers and beer.. decisions, decisions..
(\_/)
(O.o) This is Bunny. (> <)
I know as a college student that a quiet atmosphere while doing work is valuable. The question for most would be, is it $1,400 worth. I *know* that I could not afford that while trying to pay tuition, renting a house, and feeding myself. Somethings are necessary, and some are just...not. Now, if someone gave that to me as a gift or something, no way i would complain :)
Jeff
As expensive as that case is, it sure is gonna be quiet. It'd be months before I could afford to buy anything to put in it that made noise.
for $1400 I'll rent the apartment next to mine, put the computer over there, leave the air conditioning on, drill a hole in the wall, and run my cables to it through the wall while leaving my monitor, keyboard, and mouse in my apartment... and still come out ahead!
For $1400, you could buy two Linux licenses from SCO.
Sears carries one for $600... And thouugh you'll need a tad more square footage to put it, it's ripe for some great extreme case mods.
Heil Sig! -Rob
Fanless cases running VIA EPIA chipsets and cpus have been available for some time and are quite useful, especially when running operating systems that allow one to stick a huge monitor in front of them, a keyboard, a 3-button mouse and connect to the massively parralel machines in the quite noisy, but lovely air conditioned, server room.
I can't run Quake on one of these, but then again it's research we're talking about -- if I wanted games I'd buy a PS2.
The only fan I have is, funnily enough, on my video card.
> 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 room sound's eerily quite without it. Besides, the noise helps droun out my roomates, always a plus.
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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.
~To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation. -Yann Martel
Perhaps if you could retrofit a Mac motherboard into it...
Could someone fill me in on the background of "silence". How many dBs is silent?
[blue] - The Ministry of Information approved this message...
this should be great for recording engineers trying to keep their studios as quiet as possible. you dont realize just how much ambient noise there is arround you until you step into a mix room of a recording studio, its an alien experience.
I want 2D games back.
...in three easy steps.
1. Antec Performance One P160 case.
2. Nexus PSU, fans and CPU heatsink and fan.
3. Samsung SpinPoint series of HDDs.
Zalman's products aren't bad but, IMHO, Nexus' are superior.
Oh, and either ditch the jet engine that masquerades as a graphics card with something quieter or replace its fan too.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
The American Tinnitus Association has a wealth of information regarding hearing and tinnitus. It's well worth your hearing to do whatever you can to prevent hearing loss or damage.
I've suffered with tinnitus for years, and have changed fans several times looking for something quieter. It's amazing the amount of noise the average fan produces, and it would be well worth it to me to quieten down the office even more.
Of course, all those years going to rock concerts at the Grande in Detroit probably didn't help either.
Pete Carr Owner Chatmag.com
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!
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/
Life is not for the lazy.
...if you're an audio engineer, video producer, or run a studio. A case like this allows you to work with instruments and other devices, while editing the sound live, with easy access to your monitor/keyboard. This is particularly useful for those who operate recording studios as a side business, out of their home or office space... or people trying to develop their own music, semi-professionally.
People who know how to do this can start up their business without spending well over $1,400 building a soundproof room. For full-blown recording studios, this is a no-brainer. They probably wouldn't think twice about spending double that to keep the sound engineer from getting distracted and/or missing sound details just because of a noisy fan.
You know those sweet looking cars you see in auto show reports? Those one-offs designed to get people excited about the manufacturer and looking at its other models? Ever try to buy one? They're frickin' expensive. A concept of a $15,000 vehicle will set you back six figures.
That's what this case is, a concept. It's a limited run designed to get the money of early adopters, get people excited about the manufacturer and looking at its other products, and test the market viability of such a product.
It's very cool, I want one but can't afford one, have looked over their other products (well-priced nice stuff and I'll probably get one of their quiet CPU HSFs), and look forward to this case hitting the $100-$200 price range where I'll be able to afford it.
As far as Zalman is concerned with me, they have a success in a $1400 case. Crazy, huh?
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
My noiseless case was about $150, thankyouverymuch.
Another way to do it would be under the "dumb terminal" model. The computer in front of you having very little power, and the computer that actually does the work sitting somewhere in the house. Doesn't quite work for those who need high-end video cards, but for your typical office PC, there's several solutions which allow you to have the real work be done in another room...
After years of trying to build and buy quiet PCs I
finally stumbled upon a Dell 400SC. That thing is
super quiet and super cheap. I have a few of them.
You can pick one up for about $399 and most of the
time there is a $100 rebate on them that brings the
price down to $299. Free shipping too.
Oh and I do have the completely silent VIA based
mini-ITX system also that I boot over the network.
But it aint fast. I end up using my Dells most of
the time. They are not as quiet as the VIA, but
they are *very* quiet.
Here is the unofficial FAQ with
tonnes of more information for those interested.
i sent my noisy pc along with $999 to some guy in india named Haji, who will be doing my computer work for me for as long as i live. not only is it quiet, i have $401 left over for hookers and beer.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Every one of the newer flat panel iMacs I've used has been pretty much dead silent while running. If I was ready to spend $1400 for quiet computing, I'd rather get a whole machine for around that price than just a case for one!
When I consider the noise my wife would make if I spent $1,400 on a case, my current case is quieter.
- Evercase 4252 case: $37. About as un-cool looking as you can get, but it has good airflow and the openings on the front are baffled a bit to keep it quiet.
- Fortron 300W PS: $24 A no-name brand. But it uses a 12cm fan instead of the usual 8cm ones, so it can turn more slowly (and quietly) and still move enough air.
- Thermalright Heatsink: $39. Huge and a pain to install, but great heat transfer. Just make sure its weight doesn't rip the CPU socket off your motherboard.
- "Stealth" fans: 2 x $8. These are reasonably quiet and easy to find. The Panaflo fans are quieter but more expensive and hard to find.
- Fan speed control: $19. Ugly, but it works. I actually used two small, single-fan controls that dangle inside my case, but I can't find them online.
- Vibration absorption mats: $15. Dampens vibrations and covers annoying ventilation holes in the side of the case
That's what, $150? You can send the extra $1250 to me.The links are to Newegg just because I like them and it's easy to find things on their site. I'm not affiliated with them, ymmv, void where not prohibited, etc.
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.
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
A case that functions as a heat-sink is a brilliant idea. I do hope the idea if not the product takes off but for now I doubt any of us are reaching for our cheque books.
Personally, I gave up on the idea of swapping out noisy components for quieter, better-engineered replacements (expensive idea if you have multiple systems) and built my own box. The results are always better and you get way-kewl furniture as a bonus. 3/4-inch MDF is cheap, 3/4-inch birch isn't much more, and even if you double-wall the enclosure for a dead air layer (highly recommended), you'll shell out less than $100. The time? Skip tee vee for a night or two and pretend you're Norm -- plaid shirt required, of course.
Oh, and if you're living with rackmount equipment and need a solution, this centrifugal fan (read "bathroom) is probably the quietest in existence, moves lots of air, and works great either housed in a cabinet or installed in the ceiling of a small closet.
Probably much more likely than heatpipes, fans will fail one day, especially if they draw dust and vapors into the PC/server in some environments.
I would not want to be liable for a system that starts a fire rather than powering down after running for a while without cooling, e.g. as it fails to recognise a broken fan a few years down the road.
A case like Zalman's could be dropped at a client's site e.g. even at a petrol plant in the middle of a desert, without having to worry just as much - about travelling a long way for service every now and then, or about potential responsibilities for applying only second-best components which are bound to break in a possibly hazardous way some day.
Not that magically nothing's prone to go wrong anymore at all, but isn't it a good start that due to the absence of fans, you may spare yourself one nightmare?
SilentPCreview.com has reviews for "silent" PC parts(cases, CPU fans, power supplies, etc), and you can probably get some idea from them if you want to build a quiet system. I don't live in recording studio, so I don't think I would ever need this one to create 0db environment. My neighbors are obnoxiously noisy already, so what's the point?
Besides I've been using a laptop primarily and it's quiet enough (...duh) even without water cooling thingy. Laptop these days are not so expensive, you can get a good one for $1400 and less. Of course if you need to build a server, laptop won't work, but for 'home' use, laptop works good enough and is quiet.
Just get better parts. Set a quiet power supply, and fans. Then get something to dampen harddrive noise, get quiet processor and silent videocard heat sink, maybe throw some acoustic dampening foam on the case walls ans you should be able to bring the PC noise down around the background noise of the room. PRobably run you $200-$300 for the whole deal.
www.quietpc.com
www.silentmaxx.net
Two places to get you started.
There are cheaper solutions such as Hush ATX and the Hush ITX computers
I own the 2ghz dual processor G5, and it's a really sweet machine. In fact, I'm typing this on it right now.
:-). Another factor, of course, is that it does in fact get my render done fast, so I never have to listen to it for very long.
I have it under my desk, and at this moment, it's just about noiseless. If I turn off my music, I can hear a slight whir and some HDD noise, but if I put the music back on or stop trying to hear it, it's totally inconspicuous.
But when I do rendering for my video projects, the fans turn up, and I can hear them clearly even over my music. I actually like the way they sound for the short time they're on; I guess it acts as some kind of reassurance that my computer is trying its best to get my render done quickly
Apple brand loyalty aside, I don't think it would be worth a $1,400 case to make my computer more quiet than the G5. On the other hand, I have no idea how much my G5 case would actually cost as a standalone unit. They're using some pretty pricey components in there.
D