Silent Running! What Cooling Gear Works Best?

[Segueway]

As I've stated in other posts, I'm in the middle of my gear selection phase of building my own dedicated PC DAW.

On my current, out going system, I've always had an issue with the noise of the fans eminating from the case.

What I would ultimately like is to have a 400 or 500 watt powersupply and "ZERO NOISE"!

I've seen several gadgets from multiple slower fans that generate minimal noise all the "WayOut" to Watercooled and Side Case mounted heat sinks*which adds about 5lbs per sink?

What silent tower cases have any of you got and what products to you say stay away from???

P.S.>>>
I'm leaning towards the liquid cooled system but thats $200 more. Anyone kno of a better system?

[Easto]

This may not be the answer you're looking for but... I drilled a hole through the wall that leads into my closet. I put one of those large grommets you see on desks where you computer cables would fit through and then set the computer box up in the closet. Close the closet door and it's almost completely silent.

[Alan]

Easto has a point.No matter how silent you make your CPU(ie: water cooling ect.)the loudest component is the PSU(power supply) fan, which a good condenser mic will alway's pick up,even the Enermax whisper.I just use a standard CPU fan(Volcano 9)and use directional condensers.

[maggotcontrol]

Well the Inwin S500 with the 300W PSU is very quiet once you replace the case fan with an 80mm 21dBa Panaflo (the L1A model). Then get a Zalman heatsink and fan for the CPU and a fanless video card such as the Radeon VE or Matrox G450. The Seagate Barracudas are the quietest IDE hard drives made and they're very reliable.
The 300W in the Inwin is a high quality 300W made by Sparkle (rebadged as Powerman) It'll handle Athlon XPs without a problem.
Hope this helps!
http://www.studiokobari.com

[Segueway]

Thanks guys for some great suggestions and idea's.

I have considered building an isolation case for my DAW-PC and venting it out to another area with sound dampening and some other damp mats inside the case so I can have the cases face exposed for access to the DV\CD-R.

I also appreciated the tip on directional condensers. I have just bought a Behringer B1 and it has 4 directional modes. But I will also have the Main mic inside a large "live sounding" vocals chamber for added separation.

I am currently using the ATI Radeon VE dualhead and yoru right.. for a 32meg card it rocks, but it still isn't enough even with 512megs of main ram to deal with all the CubaseVST24 windows I keep open on my PIII-600.

On my next DAW, I'm planning of using the ATI 8500 128meg Radeon inside my new 2.53-833FSB machine.

[maggotcontrol]

Good choice on that 8500 but most of them have annoying fans unless you mod it with a Zalman VGA cooler or something. There are 64MB versions of the VE without fans. Look around at mwave.com or googlegear.com

[opetereit]

I bought recently a PC from Dell. Nothing special on it, but unbelievable quit! They use large slow rotating fans and a good quality mounting for all devices. Thats it!
Oliver

[IGWright]

http://www.norenproducts.com/acoustilock/acoustilock.html