If you have the space this is an ideal solution. There was a posting about mounting drives through the wall from the closet/support room. That way you could even pop in music or DVDs (though you'd have to deal with the drive noise, which can be quite loud for a DVD player)
Don't go out and buy a new power supply just because someone said it would make your PC quiet.
Approach this like any performance problem:
Stick your head in the case, and figure out the noisiest component in YOUR system.
Solve that noise problem.
Lather, rinse, repeat until you have a quiet computer.
For my computer, my video card fan was by far the noisiest component. It was also the most irritating sound. I think this might be typical for power systems, as it's ok to have a noisy video card so long as it is blazing fast. They're competing on speed, not sound. Take heart though, there are solutions out there to remove their cheap fans. For my card I used a zalman heat pipe solution to remove the fan from my card. I found info at http://www.quietpcusa.com/ and then found a better price elsewhere.
I also replaced my CPU fan with a zalman unit. I am very happy with it. After you do this, you may find that it isn't necessary to swap out your power supply.
I would not recommend Antec. I bought a Antec SmartCool 120mm case fan that was temperature controlled, and it produced an irritating clicking sound and was louder than my stock case fan. I may have had a bad unit, but it soured me on Antec. At 10 bucks I was too lazy to do a mail order return.
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If you have the space this is an ideal solution. There was a posting about mounting drives through the wall from the closet/support room. That way you could even pop in music or DVDs (though you'd have to deal with the drive noise, which can be quite loud for a DVD player)
-DarkhogDon't go out and buy a new power supply just because someone said it would make your PC quiet.
Approach this like any performance problem:
For my computer, my video card fan was by far the noisiest component. It was also the most irritating sound. I think this might be typical for power systems, as it's ok to have a noisy video card so long as it is blazing fast. They're competing on speed, not sound. Take heart though, there are solutions out there to remove their cheap fans. For my card I used a zalman heat pipe solution to remove the fan from my card. I found info at http://www.quietpcusa.com/ and then found a better price elsewhere.
I also replaced my CPU fan with a zalman unit. I am very happy with it. After you do this, you may find that it isn't necessary to swap out your power supply.
I would not recommend Antec. I bought a Antec SmartCool 120mm case fan that was temperature controlled, and it produced an irritating clicking sound and was louder than my stock case fan. I may have had a bad unit, but it soured me on Antec. At 10 bucks I was too lazy to do a mail order return.
- Darkhog