A quiet computer

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Freya

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Getting on for 2 years ago now, my life completely came apart, cumulating last summer where I almost didn't make it.

During this period the music computer in my studio decided to stop functioning in a very serious and terminal way. My favourite reverb unit (microverb 1) died and the 4 track also thought this was a good time to start acting up! There is only perfect timing!

I managed to push the 4 track into working enough that I could record something for the project I needed to complete and then digitised that using a cheap soundblaster card in another computer. Not great but it worked.

My studio has been dead since then, over a year now.

However things seem to be geting loads and loads better for me right now and I'm trying hard to turn my life around as quickly as possible. So my attention has turned to getting the studio back to life. I've sourced some new reverbs tho so far I don't like any as much as the original microverb (which I've failed to replace), and now I'm looking at trying to find a new sound card as my old ones were ISA based.

At first this seemed fairly a straightforward idea, that was till I remembered that I wasn't just running the ancient computer for the ISA slots.

The other big reason for running the ancient computer was that it had a near silent AT style PSU unit (the fan was the quietist I had heard) and the CPU was soooo old that it didn't need a fan, just a big heatsink. The noise would still show up on recordings but it was minimal and easy to be rid of.

I'm trying to work out how to solve this problem as I suspect it might be the biggest one, or at least I'm not sure of a solution.

My original idea was to put my video editing computer into the recording studio and integrate the functionality so the computer does both jobs! Yay! This computer is an old Amd Athlon (1.2ghz) and could certainly do the job I'm sure, however the ATX PSU fan is noisy and the Cpu fan starts up with a loud and nasty screeching and various other sounds till after some minutes it finally settles down to just being really noisy. I'm guessing I would somehow have to replace these parts with quieter ones and I'm also guesing this won't be cheap.

The other possibility might be the fact I have some ancient macs. A PM 8500 with G3 accel and even a PM6100. The fans in these computers are a bit louder than my old PC but not too bad. They could obviously run pro tools quite easily on obsolete protools audio hardware. However I would be limited to pro tools which might be annoying for me! ;) I'm considering this too tho.


This of course has to be a problem for most people here and I bet there are all kinds of innovative sollutions! I welcome any suggestions or solutions. Sadly all the stuff that has happened to me has had a bad effect on my economic situation too so the cheaper the ideas the better! :)

Thanks for reading!

love

Freya
 
If you are preapred to pay a little more, you can have passive ATX supply without any fan, and there also exist passive CPU heatsinks with Heatpipes or Peltier elements.

Then the only thing that will make sound are the disks which can be treated as well, and the keyboard :)

You can also put the computer into another room, and use extension cables.
 
Thanks Kubeek!

So far I've found this place:

http://www.quietpc.com/gb-en-gbp/products

which sounds optimistic at least for PSU's. I expect it will come to quite a bit by the time I've paid for the supply and shipping but this definitely seems like it could be a solution of some sort perhaps.

Does anyone know of any other uk suppliers of this kind of thing?

love

Freya
 
I don´t really know any supplier in UK, but it seems to me that almost any bigger computer shop has fanless PSU´s and all the other stuff, at least in Czech they do.

You should look for some case with thicker metal, and a hole for at least 12cm fan, which you will need to maintain some airflow through the case to keep things cool.

The other option is to use a PSU with fan, but the version with fan on the large side of the PSU which is inside the case, and not on the back of the computer, for example like this: http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...ake+W0142RB+500W+Modular+PSU+?productId=27044
or this http://www.microdirect.co.uk/(8481)Win-Power-PSU-450W20-24-pin-P4-AMD-12cm-fan.aspx

and for the CPU maybe something like this http://www.microdirect.co.uk/(27202)ASUS-Triton-75-Quiet-CPUCooler-775754939AM2.aspx
 
the fanless power supply is not as great as you would think.
its all a bit of a compromise between everything lose the fan on the power supply with no extra fans in the case the temprature of the power supply goes up turing its fan on untill the case cools down which defeats the object of a fanless power supply.(more fans in the case)

if you got away with such a low spec computer if the mac mini is a quiet as the apple tv i have then it would be bloody quiet.but it would mean an external sound card and maybe an external harddrive 7200rpm.

as to quiet pc's water cooling is very quiet but it has its draw backs the rest of the motherboard has to be cooled not just the chip set and processor also the harddrives need a certain amount of cooling (if you do not cool everything. any item left drives the temperature up within the case)

paq do a very queit pc case but its not cheap

the best solution is have the computer in another room,very cheap
 
Thats what I was just thinking, putting a fan in the case? That just seems like I moved the problem somewhere else! ;)

I did once lend some microphones to a girl who had a computer with intelligent fans tho. It was silent most of the time but every so often it would turn on the fans and sound like an aircraft taking off! It was an okay compromise tho as it never seemed to do it during a take!

I've just discovered that there are "silent" powersupplys for sale on e-bay very cheap but a 2 fan silent power supply sounds like an oxymoron to me!
Not sure how much I cant trust their description of silent, esp on e-bay.

The old macs could apperantly easily run pro tools fairly easily considering how low power they are. I guess all the special outboard hardware and sccsi hard disks help and the sound units are very very cheap as they are basically doorstops now but then the trouble would be getting all the right parts of obsolete hardware. People tend to lose bits.

It seems like it should be easy but it isn't. *sigh*

love

Freya
 
Thanks for the links kubeek! Yes the big fans could presumably go slower and still drive plenty of air so maybe they could be a good choice. The price seems more practical anyway!

The CPU is more of a problem as nobody seems to bother with socket A anymore but I'm sure I can get a quieter fan than the one I've got there too.

Maybe I can get the sound down enough that it won't be too bad.
Clearly it's going to be a difficult compromise.

love

Freya
 
where does your pc live ie under the desk ?

if there is say about 6 inches (15 cm) either side and around the back then you could try making a sound barrier something that would cover the pc but still allow the air to circulate and deflect the sound.
if you look in the studio building forum for vocal booth air supplies this will give you an idea of what i am trying to describe
basically its a box with an another little box off to one side that lets the air out but has raised filter inner walls on both sides,so that the sound waves crash into them reducing their volume
 
If a new computer is a possibility, the current crop of Intel Macs are super quiet.
 
SonicAlbert said:
If a new computer is a possibility, the current crop of Intel Macs are super quiet.
Click to expand...

I don't think that a new computer is a possibility in that sense. Most of my computers come from out of skips and I suspect I only got the Beige G3 that way because nobody realised it was a mac! ;)

A new computer built from various pieces of junk is of course always a possibility tho! :)

Thanks anyway!

love

Freya
 
axeman_ukl said:
where does your pc live ie under the desk ?

if there is say about 6 inches (15 cm) either side and around the back then you could try making a sound barrier something that would cover the pc but still allow the air to circulate and deflect the sound.
if you look in the studio building forum for vocal booth air supplies this will give you an idea of what i am trying to describe
basically its a box with an another little box off to one side that lets the air out but has raised filter inner walls on both sides,so that the sound waves crash into them reducing their volume
Click to expand...

You know thats actually a really helpful idea that could work to help things along with quieter parts! I hadn't thought of some kind of baffle type thing because when I start thinking about soundproofing I tend to think of air tight boxes which would obviously not really work well in conjunction with a fan! ;)
However maybe a bit of a shield could make the sound a bit less omnidirectional! :)

Worth trying given the cost I think!

love

freya
 
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