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BYU Project to Silence Computer Fans

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the anti-noise-is-nifty dept.

phunster writes "The New York Times has an article about Scott D. Sommerfeldt and his students at BYU who have created a noise suppression system for computer fans (drop of human blood required to read article). The technology is not new, he uses out of phase sound to substantially cancel out the sound of the fan. What is interesting is his implementation of the technique. While other systems place a microphone and speakers in the center of a room, he places four miniature speakers and microphones around the noise source itself. His results are promising."

6 of 369 comments (clear)

  1. Now THIS is just great... by ControlFreal · · Score: 5, Funny

    BYU Project to Silence Computer Fans

    We as /. computer fans have been discriminated for so long, that you'd think that we, as computer enthousiasts, have had quite enough....

    • First we are bullied as small kids...
    • Then we are bullied as high-school kids...
    • Then we couldn't (or can't) get a girlfriend...
    • Then we are shunned at parties (provided we are invited at all)...
    • Then we are looked at funny for griping about DRM issues...

    An NOW, these people that have been bullying us all along have invented a system that makes us keep our mouths shut... Just great...

    Pills... must... take... pills...

    --
    Support a Europe-related section on Slashdot!
  2. Can the noise be more predictable? by RobPiano · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Blood Donation

    I don't know as much about noise cancellation as I would like, but I understand most of the concepts. Although the method described in the article certainly is very cool, I wonder if they couldn't get better results by redesigning the fan. It seems that the fan generates too much random noise. Is it possible to make a fan that has a more predictable noise source? It could even be a fan that is way noisier before noise cancellation...

    Another thought on this is that you really shouldn't consider the fan alone. The G5 has a beautiful interior with a ton of fans. Its not terribly loud, however, because the airflow is well designed.

  3. Next project... by Fizzlewhiff · · Score: 5, Funny

    Now if they could just silence the kids that come to my house to tell me about Joseph Smith.

    --

    'Same speed C but faster'
  4. It's not the noise made by the fans... by zepmaid · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Personally its them damn harddisks that piss me off.
    If only someone could suppress the disk noise..

  5. No-reg link by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative
    Thanks to Google . . . just add '&source=GOOGLE' to the URL, i. e.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/27/technology/circu its/27next.html?ex=1086235200&en=8355c13a3b4a8afa& ei=5062&source=GOOGLE

  6. Yes, much simpler than.. by schon · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yeah, this is much simpler than just making the fans quiet in the first place, right?

    Wonderful. "Look, instead of paying an extra 50 cents for a higher quality quiet fan, you can use cheap fans and spend $25.00 in additional parts to make the computer quiet!"

    *sigh*