How loud is your primary computer?
Displaying poll results.34237 total votes.
How loud is your primary computer?
Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm. -- Publius Syrus
Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm. -- Publius Syrus
Cowboy Neal option (Score:5, Funny)
Wouldn't the last option be funnier if it was just
"WHAT?"
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Re:Cowboy Neal option (Score:5, Funny)
ears are only useful in meatspace, vestigial organs for the average slashdotter
WHAT?
Re:Cowboy Neal option (Score:4, Funny)
Say 'what' again. Say 'what' again, I dare you, I double dare you motherfucker, say what one more Goddamn time!
I just replaced my fans. (Score:2)
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Re:I just replaced my fans. (Score:5, Informative)
They're a measure of WHOOSHing.
What computer, I have a dozen! (Score:2)
2009 iMac. Under normal use, the computer itself is completely inaudible. If I fire up the external RAID arrays, however... The 2008 MacPro I can hear, but it's under the table so I don't really notice it. The PCs go up the scale from there.
It did say "primary"... (Score:4, Interesting)
So I went with my mid-2007 Macbook2,1. Audible only under load, and then the fan makes a lot of noise. Or in a completely silent room, with no load whatsoever, there is an annoying whine related to CPU idling.
Also have a PowerMac G5 which under no load is audible but quiet, and under any load sounds nearly like a jet engine.
The quad-core Xeon Dell PowerEdge server is loud enough that I keep it in S3 suspend and just use Wake-on-Lan to turn it on when I need it.
Everything else is about standard desktop PSU/CPU fan quiet. Except for the AppleTV Gen1, now running OpenELEC/XBMC, which is nearly completely silent. Occasionally you can hear the hard drive.
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I've gotten the howling fans on my dual G5 mac (Score:2)
It was running linux, and I was doing a fairly large compilation job (basically an embedded linux distro) with many jobs in parallel, for hours at a time.
Most of the time it was pretty quiet though.
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Which reminds me, I have an smc patch I should send to lkml...
Please do. :)
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Out of curiosity, what distro are you using? Also I'd imagine you end up compiling a lot of software yourself, as PPC binaries seem to be unusual in most distros?
I tried Debian on my G5 for a while, but ended up switching back to OS X 10.5, almost entirely for multi-monitor support.
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My app needs are *very* light, almost everything I do is text-based. So xterms are 99% of my windows. In them there will be shells spawning things like emacs, git, gcc, perl, w3m, etc. Outside the xterm, I use a graphical browser, pdf viewer, and mplayer frequently, sometimes audacity, sometime xpaint or gimp, and that's about it. Window manager? DWM, obviously!
So I'm not a good person to be borrowing
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2009 iMac. Under normal use, the computer itself is completely inaudible. If I fire up the external RAID arrays, however... The 2008 MacPro I can hear, but it's under the table so I don't really notice it. The PCs go up the scale from there.
Yet more proof that Macs are better than PCs, right? You had to slip this into the discussion.
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Or the PCs are powerhouses.
Macs aren't powerhouses???? Heretic!
Get a silent Computer Case (Score:4, Interesting)
Bought a nice case with foam padding (Coolermaster Silencio 550). Dropped the noise level by a considerable margin.
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Primary? (Score:2)
I hate living with noisy machines. My most powerful computer (running VMs, video-encoding jobs, RAID storage, and the like) is noisy like a Harley convention. It's also in a rack in my basement. Same basic scenario at work. The desktops/laptops/HTPC I actually interact with are all as SSD silent as I can make them.
no SSDs (Score:2)
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32-64GB SSDs ($40-60 range) aren't killing me in my desktop, laptop, or HTPC. Your budget may vary. They boot really fast. I don't need any larger than that because all the big files are off in my basement's cloudland.
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I hate living with noisy machines. My most powerful computer (running VMs, video-encoding jobs, RAID storage, and the like) is noisy like a Harley convention.
Meh.
Call me when you've sat next to fully loaded twin-tower Silicon Graphics VGX.
altcoin mining (Score:2)
HDDs (Score:2)
Now the machine I'm using has a horrible HDD clicking during heavy downloads and virus scans. It's been that way since out of the box, and has functioned fine enough for 4 or 5 years 24/7/265, but it's gotten to the point that even though it's now down the hall from my bedroom a late night install will drive me nuts.
I'd like to go solid state, but
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Tell your parents they need to build an addition to the house so you can move the computers out of your room.
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I've been thinking of building a server with RAID 6, placing that in a closet or the attic. Then run a few 10gigE NICs from that machine.
That way, the machines that I use will have SSD for the OS to boot from, but for data storage, would have iSCSI. I can add a switch, or just thread the Ethernet cable directly to the client. It won't be enterprise-grade, but it would be decently fast, secure, and quiet.
An added bonus is that on a machine running Storage Spaces or ZFS, a backup is simply copying a snapsh
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I had a tower with 4 of those things in it. It was like listening to a B-52 start up in your garage. :)
Mostly Quiet (Score:2)
Just built a new rig last September. Tried one of those AIO water blocks, a 140mm one. It has 2 140mm fans, but they spin low as a result. It also has 2 intake fans (80mm or 90mm can't remember off hand), but they have a built in fan controller, so you can keep the settings low. It does have a dedicated AMD 7850 video card which of course has its own fan, but it also is pretty quiet.
About the only thing that makes any noise is my speakers.
You see my current system has gremlins. It might be windows update, b
Silent to me, at least (Score:5, Insightful)
My tinnitus drowns out the sound of all but enterprise servers so all my PCs are totally silent.
Re:Silent to me, at least (Score:5, Funny)
Hear! Hear! (or not)
Same here. If I actually hear a computer running, then everyone else in the building has already evacuated to the bomb shelter, trembling in fear at the world-ending THING they can hear coming...and here I sit clueless about the upcoming disaster, posting to slashdot. :-)
I used to lament my hearing loss until several years ago when I tried a hearing aide.
After hearing the conversations around me for the first time in several decades, I promptly removed it for good. (I have an unreasonable fear that stupidity might be contagious when exposed to large amounts of same)
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A hearing aide you say?
"Sir" [taps you on shoulder]
"There's a conversation you may be interested in" [furiously working at semaphore/sign language/scribbling on paper]
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Noisy and they need to be cleaned up. (Score:2)
Maybe replace the dusty fans. My room gets dusty easily due to the desert area. :(
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I live in the plains it's windy and dusty... I clean out my desktops about once every 3-4 months and I'm always amazed by how quickly it builds up. They are coming close to the end of their warranties but are still silent. Nothing like the desktops I had a decade or more ago they sounded like the hard drive was being etched in stone with a chisel and hammer when you wrote to them.
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Isn' that annoying to keep our PCs clean all the time? Taking everything out, cleaning them, putting them back in, testing to be sure nothing broke, fix whatever was broken, etc. :(
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I've not actually taken out any cards or memory to clean the contacts since the mid 90s and the compaq pressario with it's mismatched cheap materials that caused the contacts to corrode over night.
I just open the case, blow them out, cough, and close the case.
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Wow, for mine. Dust get clogged in tight areas, fans, etc. :(
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Ha, I have dust filters. Inside still get dusty after a year. ;P
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I live in the plains it's windy and dusty...
Same here: Oklahoma.
What I've found that helps is a decent case with good airflow, then I plug all but the air intake vents with drier 'softener' sheets (ie:"Bounce" sheets) that have been used.
They filter a LOT of dust and debris, and I have found my 'dust bunny herding' time cut in half.
Instead of tw or three times a year, now I only have to clean my PC once a year, and my temp. stays cool even when gaming.
Where I see a lot of people making a mistake when buying a case is going for looks instead of spendi
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I've been told about the drier sheet before they also said it freshens the room, which gave me a chuckle.
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Well, I can't comment on the 'freshens the room' bit, but it really works well on the dust bunny reduction.
I'm afraid that the 'freshens the room' effect would require a series of tornadoes, hurricanes, and several tsunamis to freshen my lair!
The wife refuses to enter my lair, she claims it causes nightmares relating to the world ending.
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I have a workbench in the garage for soldering because the wife says it stinks and I'll burn the house down... I've been considering putting in a projector in the basement {aka man cave} she likes that idea.
It's in the other room . . . (Score:2)
. . . . so if I'm not in that room, I don't hear it.
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Three machines (Score:2)
My laptop, farore, is pretty much silent except when the fans really need to kick in. Even most games don't faze it - I have to run Crysis or something for over an hour before the fans get noticeable. It does spit out a good bit of heat, though, so if it's actually on your lap you'll want to have some padding between it and your er, most significant bits.
My primary desktop, ganon, is normally barely audible, but when any of the fans get going it can get quite loud. I mined Bitcoins on it for about a month -
Ignorant clod (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Ignorant clod (Score:5, Funny)
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SBD (Score:3)
My computer is like my farts:
Silent, But Deadly
I only hear it when it's ringing... (Score:5, Interesting)
I only hear it when it's ringing... it's a cell phone.
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Depends on what you mean by primary. The one I use most often during the day ... probably. The one with the most horsepower ... definitely not.
Very noisy but... (Score:2)
...on the plus side, my daughter now falls asleep in datacenters.
Almost silent (Score:2)
So loud (Score:2)
Seven hard drives, eight fans, basically fucked.
workstation and laptop, two different beasts (Score:2)
My laptop's silent and all solid state.
My workstation's louder than a Mach truck and about as pretty. But it's a lovely workhorse!
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my work i5 laptop sounds like a jet taking off while its just opening outlook, my desktop has 6 fans in it and one can only hear the video card crank up when playing a game
SilentPCReview.com (Score:5, Informative)
Silent PC review is a Web site that has been around 2002 which is dedicated to silent or very quiet computing. It's a trove of tips and tricks to make computer less noisy. They also have reviews of various components complete with high quality audio recordings.
I highly recommend it!
http://www.silentpcreview.com/ [silentpcreview.com]
Just the one? (Score:2)
My primary computer is quiet enough, it's the other four in the room that make all the noise.
multiple choice (Score:2)
As loud as ... (Score:2)
Silent unless GPU is rendering something (Score:2)
CPU is watercooled (&overclocked 2.53@3.8), but the GPU hasn't received the water treatment yet (no space in case for a second radiator)
ARM laptop, passive cooling (Score:2)
These days the computer I spend most time touching is my TF700T. Though sold as a "tablet" with dockable keyboard, I keep it docked all the time (more useful + more battery) and use it as what I wish my Eee netbook had been -- a lightweight, low-power machine with just enough juice for the common stuff, and let a server(s) handle all the routine heavy-lifting that would be annoying and/or would kill battery life on the laptop (e.g. torrents). (The Eee fell down for two reasons -- mainly battery life, but al
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These days the computer I spend most time touching is my TF700T. Though sold as a "tablet" with dockable keyboard, I keep it docked all the time (more useful + more battery) and use it as what I wish my Eee netbook had been -- a lightweight, low-power machine with just enough juice for the common stuff, and let a server(s) handle all the routine heavy-lifting that would be annoying and/or would kill battery life on the laptop (e.g. torrents). (The Eee fell down for two reasons -- mainly battery life, but also the 1024x600 screen proved more annoying than I'd expected. 1920x1200 on a 10" display is much nicer.)
I still use a desktop when I want more screen space, for apps only available for x86 (most notably Bricscad), and for some games, but the laptop sees a lot more use, and is completely silent.
I also have the TF700T. I don't have the keyboard dock but I do have the mini-dock. I continue to use my desktop for finance, playing games, etc. but I use the tablet for surfing the web, reading email, travel, etc. My laptop only comes out now if I need to update an external device (i.e. firmware updates). Otherwise, the TF700T has replaced my laptop.
Missing option: (Score:2)
Silent but... (Score:2)
...we won't talk about the fileserver it connects to
The same as my brain: (Score:2)
A constant, minimal buzz.
I only hear it when something's wrong (Score:2)
On my Macbook, the fans spin up to audible levels when CPU usage hits 100%. That rarely happens in normal use, so when the fans start howling it's usually because some process hangs (I'm looking at you, Quicklook Helper!).
Ahhh... Quiet.... (Score:2)
I built a new rig last year. No water cooling but also no overclocking...
I replaced the case fans with Hydro-Dynamic-Bearing fans and bought one of the quieter PSUs. I also installed SSD drives and 16GB of RAM (no drive caching). Now, it is so quiet that I can't tell if it is on when idling, surfing the web, etc. The only times it gets "noisy", if you could call it that, is when I'm using the Blu-Ray drives or when I am playing a graphics intensive game and the video card fans spin up, but that's what a
Noisy and I like it that way (Score:3)
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Native American Hearing and a Loud PC (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm partially descended from Cherokee on one side and Choktaw on the other. However, as a computer nerd with a florescent-light tan, I am the WHITEST Native American you will ever meet. (Oddly enough, there are *blonde* native Americans less white than I am.)
I've also been blessed to keep my hearing despite working in or near various data centers and around heavy machinery. I've always been very careful about hearing protection.
I can hear the capacitors in my CRT TVs cycling. I can hear the constant whine of AC power in the walls. If I'm lucky enough to be around older electronics with real vacuum tubes, I can hear them sing or hum, depending on size.
At night, I can hear the nails squeaking in their holes as my house settles. I can hear that damn squirrel scurrying across my roof in the wee hours. Yes, stomach, I know that squirrel is edible, but I am an well-(over)-fed computer programmer and not a nomadic hunter-gatherer. Would you and my ears *please* quit waking me up for that kind of thing?
Accordingly, I'm one of those individuals who can gauge the load on their PC components simply by listening to them. This has become more true as newer motherborards tend to have throttle-able fans. I can still distinguish when my CPU decides to page out to disk even *with* the fans droning out the hard drives, though.
It can be bloody unpleasant at times. For example, I've paged 3 times while writing this post. Why? I'm running VM and a ton of RAM-hungry apps, including Firefox. I twitch every time it happens.
However, it's also saved me countless hours of frustration and lots of cash as I can often identify hardware problems by sound.
I really pissed off my neighbor once doing this. He had an AC mechanic out because his air conditioner kept quitting. Mine was as well... but I could HEAR the transformers humming oddly on the poles. (And not the good kind, where the Autobots defeat the Decepticons)
"This isn't an AC issue. It's a power issue. I've called the power company."
Made the mistake of saying that after he'd just paid for the AC service call.
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I wasn't aware that "Native American hearing" was a thing
Re:Water cooling FTW (Score:5, Insightful)
Then why in the world would someone "Pump up the Jam"?!
Re:Water cooling FTW (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Water cooling FTW (Score:5, Funny)
There is only one man, who would dare give me the Raspberry! Lone Starr!
Re:Water cooling FTW (Score:4, Funny)
Then why in the world would someone "Pump up the Jam"?!
Perhaps the jam was needed on the second floor?
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Then why in the world would someone "Pump up the Jam"?!
Perhaps the jam was needed on the second floor?
Perhaps the packaging line is on the second floor?
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Then why in the world would someone "Pump up the Jam"?!
To keep the jam cool. Duh.
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Because water pumps make a lot more noise when you're trying to force jams and jellies through them. Lots of splurty noises and grinding whirs. Real popular on late-night college radio in the 90s.
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Re:Water cooling FTW (Score:5, Funny)
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Sadly, just about every "water cooled" computer requires both. Water cooling is rarely anything more than a way to put your air cooling in a more convenient location.
True, but when you can actually have the air cooling with much larger surface area in a convenient location, you can do much better than to just stick a radiator and fans inside or on the side of the case.
I use water cooling to almost silence my gaming "rig". I built a chimney of sorts behind my bookshelf, and have an array of passive radiators hidden there. Also the pump is at the bottom of the chimney, in foam padding. I have a fan at the bottom, and it is being controlled by the water temperature, but th
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The heat exchange doesn't just happen at the radiator, but along the entire route of the cooling system. Even the plastic hoses carrying coolant dissipate heat along their length to some extent.
Not significantly, and as you say later, that is unwanted heat recirculation within the case.
Also, a radiator directly above the CPU means you still have to pump the heat out from inside of the case, so you need multiple external fans to complete the job.
A well designed case will use ducts or position components such that air only travels once through and does not recirculate.
With water cooling, the fan is on the outside, so you don't have to worry about air circulation within the case. You can clog it full of cables and not affect cooling significantly.
Nearly every water cooling setup I've ever seen mounted the radiators on one wall of the case. Except for servers, where they're pumping heat to a centralized location, very rarely do water cooling systems incorporate a completely external radiator. That means air had to travel through the ca
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Actually, this really isn't true. I can't be bummed digging up the benchmarks just now (just apply google), but the all in one crappy water cooling systems that AMD and particularly corsair sell actually perform worse than similarly priced air coolers, and often make more noise too.
Re:Water cooling FTW (Score:5, Funny)
Pump's make far less noise than fans.
Please pull out your apostrophe key and burn it.
Apostrophe does NOT mean "watch out, here comes an 's'".
Re:Water cooling FTW (Score:5, Funny)
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You do realise that's a single quote and not an apostrophe, right?
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Aww!
Take it easy on the Dutch people - they use apostrophe+s as a way to write a plural in Dutch for words ending with a vowel. The member name (DeTech) also suggests a Dutch background, since that simply translates as The Tech. In Dutch, the apostrophe is necessary, in for example the plural of "auto" ("auto's"), as it would be pronounced differently without that apostrophe.
I'm not suggesting that all Dutch people are excused from having to avoid spelling mistakes. But I think that burning a part of the ke
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If I leave my headphones plugged in but don't wear them, I can barely hear the fans on the Twin Titan GTX Cards spin up when I'm playing graphically intensive games, but if I'm wearing those headphones I can't even hear the gunshots from the neighbors outside in the parking lot....
Um... Why are you routing your fan noise through your headphones? And HOW are you routing your fan noise through your headphones?
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When I got my first computer with speakers, I had a similar problem: whenever I would move the mouse I would hear a buzzing sound through the speakers. Eventually, I noticed that the master volume was set low and that the speaker volume knob was on maximum. I fixed the problem by turning up the master volume and turning down the speaker volume knob.
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