Silence your PC

You can turn your PC into a zone of tranquillity. This isn’t about spending a fortune to build a totally silent PC, but rather about using simple techniques and a moderate investment to modify your existing computer and to make irritating fan noise and rattling hard disks things of the past.

You really can get some astonishingly good results using standard PC components. Investing just a few hours’ work will help make your PC much more pleasant to live with.

First you need to identify the noise sources in your PC, then you can make modifications, starting with the worst offender.

We’ll examine the most important PC components in a logical order, starting with the processor cooler, progressing to the hard disks, the power supply unit (PSU) and the graphics card, and finishing with the chassis fans and case.

The big picture
When you’re carrying out noise optimisation, you need to keep in mind the overall cooling needs of the PC.

For example, the PSU fan plays an important role for the thermal management of the whole system, as it ensures that there is a continuous airflow through the PC’s insides. It’s possible to make a completely silent passively cooled system, but only by careful planning and using a lot of expensive components.

Whatever you do, don’t try and switch over to passive cooling without considering the whole PC’s ventilation: for example, using passive cooling on your graphics card can easily lead to the graphics chip becoming too hot if there isn’t an adequate cooling airflow.

However, fans don’t have to be loud. The size of the fan is important here: large diameter models, up to 120mm, are slower and less noisy than a smaller, faster fan with the same cooling properties.

1 The CPU cooler
The processor’s cooling system is usually the noisiest thing in a PC. The simplest way of dealing with an excessively loud CPU cooler is to swap the existing fan for a quieter model (see step 5 for more about fans) and continue to use the existing heatsink module.

The larger the diameter of the new fan, the better the cooling characteristics will be and the lower the noise level. If you use a fan adapter, you can fit a large diameter fan onto a small cooler unit (see figure 2 ). These adapters cost £2 or less from suppliers such as Casetech.

If the installed cooler is too small or can’t be fitted with a new fan, the only option is to buy a new unit. For good cooling results, a CPU cooler needs to have a heatsink with a large surface area. Expensive materials such as copper tend to make better heatsinks.

Our pdf table above lists a selection of powerful and quiet CPU coolers. Among the best are fanless heatsinks such as the Thermalright SI-120 at £32 (see figure 3 ). Their size means these coolers can also be used in conjunction with ultra-quiet 120mm fans.

The Vapochill Micro cooler from Asetek comes in an Ultra Low Noise version at around £33, equipped as standard with a particularly quiet 92mm fan.

The Asetek cooler/fan assembly can be rotated in any direction in the CPU socket, allowing you to direct airflow from the fan to improve the heat circulation in the case.

At about £18, the Arctic Cooling Freezer Pro series offers a good compromise in terms of noise, cooling performance and price, and the fan is isolated from the cooler unit with rubber fittings.