Renaud Waldura wrote:
>
> I've got that FreeBSD gateway in a corner at my house, it works fine & dandy
> but the constant noise (whirring fans, hard drives) gets on my nerves.
>
> What solutions have people explored to quiet down a computer system? (actual
> experience will be preferred over wild speculations). I'm already aware of
> PicoBSD, but I need more storage than just a floppy. Has anybody
> experimented with RAM cards? How about noise-proof enclosures?
Let's review. The noise comes from the fans and the hard drive. The heat
sources that require fans are the hard drive and the CPU. The fastest way
to quieten your system is to remove the hard drive and all but one fan.
As Warner mentioned, CF cards are a great way to go if you want to try this.
He recently pointed out a CF-to-IDE adapter from TAPR, you can read more
about this at http://www.tapr.org/tapr/html/Fcfa.html
We have several NIC's around here (the New Internet Computer, see
http://www.thinknic.com/ for details) and will be adding a couple of these
so we can boot FreeBSD or NetBSD on them in the next little while. A NIC
running FreeBSD on a silent CF disk strikes me as an ideal bedroom computer;
you can leave it on all the time and just let the screen sleep when you're
not using it.
Another strategy that will help is to turn your computer case vertical.
Provide plent of slots along the top of the case and near the bottom; the
heat of the CPU will create a chimney effect providing cooling airflow over
the CPU.
Lastly, search for quiet fans from a large supplier. Most components don't
use them because they cost as much as a dollar more than the noisy variety,
but you can easily replace your noisy fans with higher quality replacements
that run quieter. A good supplier will list the average sound level produced
by each fan as well as the size, power requirements, and airflow provided.
--
"Where am I, and what am I doing in this handbasket?"
Wes Peters Softweyr LLC
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