Hi Will,
This is something I've been looking at too.
I've got an old AMD-k5 (which I rescued from the bins!).
I found that the PSU would run fine without a fan. It would get quite warm
if the lid was closed, but not too hot.
Also, the CPU fan was redundant if the machine sends much of the time
quiescent. If the system isn't running anything, then there was no
noticable heating on the CPU (it maintained room temp.). Running CPU
intensive tasks resulted in a considerably increased temperature. After
about ten minutes of running at about 80% load (w/o a fan), the CPU got
warm enough that I didn't want to push it further. If its doing
NAT/firewall, then the cpu load shouldn't be too great.
Another thing is to tell the hard drives to spin down during inactivity
(using hdparm program). This will reduce the power consumption in the PSU,
reducing the temperature and make everything quieter too.
On Fri, 6 Apr 2001 [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> I am looking to make my PC as quiet as possible.
>
> I currently have an old Dell Pentium 166 running my firewall at home. I have
> already replaced the case fan, and put in a hard disk muffler from
> www.quietpc.com.
How well did this work?
> The PSU is however completely non standard, and can't be replaced.
>
> How easy is it to open up the PSU and replace the fan inside that with a
> ultra quiet model ?? or are PSUs sealed ?
Usually just screwed. The fans usually have a standard connector inside
and run off 12v. Be _very_ careful if you are taking the lid off the PSU
coz mains voltages doesn't take prisoners.
> Would it be crazy to have the PSU
> outside the case, and just cut the wires to the fan.
Well, it would be a bit awkward. You could try removing a backing plate or
two. Sometimes, if there isn't sufficient inflow area, the fan can stutter
or generate turbulent flow, causing some of the noise problems, ditto for
the safety grill in front of the fan. Another cause is from the design of
the blades (how cleanly they cut through the air), but the majority of the
sound comes from unbalanced blades causing the fan unit vibrate. This is
amplified by the back of the case, which acts as a sounding board.
I tried using home-made neopreme (sp?) washers from the back of an old
mouse mat to prevent this sounding effect. It kinda worked, but there were
problems with the screws.
> There is VERY little drain on the PSU. The hard disk is only used once evey
> 24 hours, when the logs are turned over. All the Ip filters and NAT sit in
> the memory, and no swap space is used. There is no keyboard, mouse or monitor
> attached to it, just 2x 10 Mbps NICs. I think I even unplugged the CDROM. I
> installed everything via the net.
Sounds like you can get away without the PSU fan. Try unplugging it (but
leaving it in place), putting the PSU lid back on, running it for ten
minutes or so and seeing how warm it gets. On a number of occations I've
come around old PCs where the PSU fan accidentally came unplugged and
noone's noticed!
Cheers,
Paul.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul Millar yo-yo, n. :
Particle Physics Theory Group Something that is occasionally
Department of Physics and Astronomy up but normally down.
University of Glasgow, (see also Computer)
Glasgow G12 8QQ, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Scotland +44 (0)141 330 4717
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