Custom Gaming rig - Any good?

ikilledkenny said:

Does anyone know if my computer (the one I have built here) will be loud or not?

Antec cases are typically "moderately" quiet. The 4890 is moderately loud -- not as loud as its nVidia counterpart. Hard drive noise is relatively insignificant when you are talking about only one or two drives.

Even with the 4890, your system will probably be somewhat quieter than my behemoth.

It will also somewhat depend on your choice of power supply. I have the PCP&C "silencer" 750, which is unusually quiet for so large a PSU. The 750-watt, single-12-volt-rail Corsair is less quiet, but not bad. Noise on power supplies varies greatly.

High power pcs are never very quiet, and during gaming they get pretty loud. The main sources of noise are psu/cpu/gpu fans and hdds. Cheap psus are loud when pushed, cpu fans can get loud and whiny also, unless you get aftermarket coolers, and at least my 4850 is very quiet until it's for gaming.

Hard drives get loud sometimes when you boot your computer and during heavy seeks. But they are pretty silent otherwise.

I have an old crappy desktop that is louder than a cave full of screeching bats, and I'm worried that this build will sound like that.

My friend has a 1,200W PSU, Antec Twelve Hundred case, dual 9800GT's, and large fans, and his is on the quiet side. I used his secondary computer, which has some random german case, a bunch of fans, an 8800GT, and I couldn't even hear it.

As an example of what I find tolerable (at max), when I had an iPod Video (5th gen), I didn't usually turn the music bar past the farther end of the album art. I'm somewhat hearing-sensitive.

What are you using this computer for anyways? Video games?

We probably should have asked that before all these recommendations.

My old desktop = I don't know, just to mess it up.
My craptop = Play old games on all lows and get forced to quit b/c of GPU lag.
The build I want = Play new video games on all highs without having to quit.

Power implies heat as a byproduct. Heat implies greater cooling for efficiency (and good electronic health). Cooling implies airflow. The result is fans and motors -- the primary noise producers in any computer.

Some fan designs are quieter than others. Some motor bearing designs are quieter than others. A larger fan needs less speed (RPMs) to move the same amount of air as a smaller fan, resulting in less noise. And finally, the noise spectrum of some fans is less annoying than others. There are also some cases that are better at noise management that others.

It's a balancing act. And there is a web site -- Silent PC Review -- dedicated to quiet computing. They are a good resourse; however, I think they carry things to the extreme -- not unlike us awaiting a new win.7 build.

I'll have to post a recording of how my crappy computer sounds while I sit here at my desk.

After using my friend's computer, I don't think that my build would be much louder than his ([h-e-double hockey sticks], it's the same case as his).

Thanks! I added a count of how many times I've asked my dad for a new computer since this :)