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jabre
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Posts: 4
Join Date: Jan, 2003
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« on: January 03, 2003, 05:10:10 AM » |
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I'm considering buying a shuttle for use in the living room. So a major factor is the amount of noise the system akes. Can anybody give some feedback ok how the amount of noise is from a shuttle versus the amount of noise for a dell dimension 4550/8250? And how the amount of noise for a SS51G compares to a SS1G?
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jabre
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Posts: 4
Join Date: Jan, 2003
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« Reply #1 on: January 03, 2003, 05:10:10 AM » |
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noise level of shuttle versus dell system
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Factor X
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Posts: 285
Join Date: May, 2002
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« Reply #2 on: January 03, 2003, 09:30:28 AM » |
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My Dell 4550 is probably the quietest PC I've ever worked on. I doubt ANY Shuttle SFF PC could ever come close. Maybe, but it would likely take some fiddling.
My SV24, even with a passively cooled C3 and fanmate is significantly louder.
FX
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def
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Join Date: Jul, 2002
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« Reply #3 on: January 03, 2003, 10:01:13 AM » |
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Yepp, we have dells at our school, and they are almost completly silent.
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Downside
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Join Date: Nov, 2002
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« Reply #4 on: January 03, 2003, 10:01:57 AM » |
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We use Dell pc's at work (optiplex line, gx260's), and they are far and away the most quiet pc's I've ever encountered. There is no comparison to the sb51 I have at home. The Dell's at work are probably the main reason I was so unhappy with the sound of the xpc when I first got it. Having an off the shelf pc you can barely hear sitting right next to you can set some pretty high expectations. Note these are all p4 2.26ghz or faster, so its not like its older, slower hardware with less need for active cooling. I think the gx260's use one 92mm fan to cool the entire unit, but haven't had the case off one in a while so may be off on that.
From my experience you will need to modify the xpc to get it anywhere near the low noise level of the Dell. But of course the XPC doesn't take up near the space the full tower Dell units do.
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CoasterG
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Join Date: Jul, 2002
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« Reply #5 on: January 03, 2003, 10:18:39 AM » |
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Well built tower and mini tower systems are extremely quiet. Most of the Dells I have worked with are very quiet. Built a Athlon system at home that uses a bunch of Vantec Stealth fans (4 - 2 intake, 2 output - Zalman flower cooler with a 92 mm fan at 2700 RPM and a pretty quiet Antec PS). My SS51g is louder than my Athlon by a significant margin right now, the Sunon heat pipe fan is pretty loud when its running full speed.
George
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merkman
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« Reply #6 on: January 03, 2003, 01:09:51 PM » |
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I love my Dell GX1 as a HTPC unit, but I had to mod it to run reliably.
After upgrading the PII 400 to a PIII 750, and adding a second hard drive, PCI TV capable video card, etc... the unit was prone to Thermal Errors from the BIOS, and shutting itself off. I tried replacing the Adda fan that was on the PS, but there just wasn't enough airflow with the default design of the case.
In the end, I took the fan off of the PS. I covered the hole from the original location with duct tape, then cut a new hole that allows air to pass directly through the case and into the PS, before going out of the case on the front right, 90 degrees from the new fan location. Since this mod, I get a fan failure error on every boot (because I don't have an RPM wire connected to the MB), but the unit has been rock solid since and never turns itself off.
The obvious drawback is I took a fairly silent PC, and increased the volume. Because I increased the voltage to the fan when I moved it in the case. It's now running at 12v instead of 5v. This may seem extreme, but with 2 HD's, video card, and CD-ROM in a SFF unit... I'm glad to have all the cooling I can get.
And with the unit in the den, as part of my home theater setup... I really don't mind the noise as long as I can record my TV shows (for burning to disc later), or playing back music at my whim. It really is a GREAT setup. Tivo-like without the costs.
Merk
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cvr
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Join Date: Jan, 2003
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« Reply #7 on: January 03, 2003, 03:52:20 PM » |
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I'm in the middle of doing exactly what you suggest...replacing a Dell 4550 tower with a SS51G for use in the living room as a HTPC. Here's what I've found so far:
o Dell towers are quiet. The quietest "off the shelf" PC I've ever run into. They are still a bit noisy in the living room though.
o The stock SS51G is not as quiet as I had hoped. After doing a lot of research on these forums, I've managed to get the SS51G quieter than my Dell.
Here's the easy stuff that had to be done:
Replace the 80mm cooling fan with a Panaflo FBA08A12L (cheap, reliable, quiet).
Use a Segate Barracuda IV hard drive (amazingly quiet, good performance).
These two changes made the biggest difference. Now the XPC is quieter than the Dell.
Installing and playing with SpeedFan also helped.
Left to do:
Figure out which 40mm fan to use in the PSU. Reports here vary on which one is the quietest.
There is a thread on the 20mm wide PAPST 412 that looks interesting. Availability in the US
might be an issue. PSU mod required. Pricey.
Figure out how to passively or quietly cool the video card (Older Radeon 32MB DDR).
All in all, I'm very happy with the replacement. It wasn't too much work or money
to get the SS51G to a quiet state.
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