Small Silent Case Comparison

Enclosures and acoustic damping to help quiet them.

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SilentISaid
Posts: 37
Joined: Wed Jul 11, 2012 8:52 am

Small Silent Case Comparison

Post by SilentISaid » Wed May 20, 2015 2:32 am

I am in the market for a new small Silent case. Here are my key aspects I need to find :

Case with no fan controllers, Front USB and Noise Isolation, All 120/140 mm not larger nor smaller. One bottom, two front, 1 rear fans. 1 very big back motherboard opening, Removable (from the front if possible) front and bottom dust filters, Top hard drive cage removable to allow airflow to the graphic card, 4 HDD cage.

Here is what I found so far :

Antec P100 very good hard drive isolation. No bottom fan intake. Full cage Hard Drives. H(484)xl(220)xL(523) 7.3KG
Corsair Carbide 100R Silent Edition Perfect oveall, but poor drive isolation. H(471)xl(200)xL(430) 4.8KG
Corsair Carbide Carbide 330R Silent Edition (Standard Version) poor hard drive isolation. H(495)xl(210)xL(484) 6.8KG
Silvetstone SST-PS11B-Q. Top problems woth mouting the motherboard, bad hard disk decoupling. H(426)xl(215)xL(481) 4.8KG
Cooltek Antiphon poor hard drive decoupling H(445)xl(195)xL500) 8KG

Anyone wish to add to this ? improve my thinking about this ?

best

quest_for_silence
Posts: 5275
Joined: Wed Jun 13, 2007 10:12 am
Location: ITALY

Re: Small Silent Case Comparison

Post by quest_for_silence » Wed May 20, 2015 3:51 am

SilentISaid wrote:Antec P100 very good hard drive isolation. No bottom fan intake. Full cage Hard Drives. H(484)xl(220)xL(523) 7.3KG
Corsair Carbide 100R Silent Edition Perfect oveall, but poor drive isolation. H(471)xl(200)xL(430) 4.8KG
Corsair Carbide Carbide 330R Silent Edition (Standard Version) poor hard drive isolation. H(495)xl(210)xL(484) 6.8KG
Silvetstone SST-PS11B-Q. Top problems woth mouting the motherboard, bad hard disk decoupling. H(426)xl(215)xL(481) 4.8KG
Cooltek Antiphon poor hard drive decoupling H(445)xl(195)xL500) 8KG

Anyone wish to add to this ?

The Corsair 100R and Cooltek Antiphon cooling prowess is ridicolous (btw, none of the proposed options may be called "small", IMO of course).

SilentISaid wrote:improve my thinking about this ?

Noise Isolation is futile.

xan_user
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Re: Small Silent Case Comparison

Post by xan_user » Wed May 20, 2015 6:24 am

do the drive isolation yourself. that opens a lot of possibilities.

wait, you said a small case and 4 HDD's? never mind, there goes your chance for silence.
improve my thinking about this ?

build a small PC and put a 4 bay NAS in the other room.

SilentISaid
Posts: 37
Joined: Wed Jul 11, 2012 8:52 am

Re: Small Silent Case Comparison

Post by SilentISaid » Wed May 20, 2015 8:40 am

I have built a bigger machine before

viewtopic.php?f=14&t=65805

it is COMPLETELY silent, I can't hear a thing, it's inside my cabinet.

I am looking to do something similar on a smaller scale, hence me asking.

quest_for_silence
Posts: 5275
Joined: Wed Jun 13, 2007 10:12 am
Location: ITALY

Re: Small Silent Case Comparison

Post by quest_for_silence » Wed May 20, 2015 11:37 am

SilentISaid wrote:hence me asking.

Your requirements lead towards a system just a tad smaller than your Nanoxia DS: the bottom fan add depth, the two front intakes add height, along with the needed four drive bays. For instance, dropping the fans requirements, a much more smaller Fractal Design Node 304 could be a viable alternative.

By the way, come to mind two (though different) candidates, still from Fractal Design, the Define Mini and the Node 804: on the other hand, talking about the options you proposed, the Antec P-70 (or its "dampened" sibling, the Antec VSP-5000) is a bit smaller than the Antec P-100.

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