I just had a brainstorm for a HD silencer. Why not tear the guts out of an old or broken CDrom box, stick your HD in it, and fill it up with spray urethane foam insulation?
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<br>The Aluminium CDROM box seems tailor made for this application. One could use aluminium plates for a heat sink too if they wanted. Stuff whatever you want into the box.
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<br>The expanding/insulating foam is made by GE, DOW, and lots of other folks.
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<br>Does anyone know if spray insulating foam (urethane-based) is sound proof?
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<br>Will an air-tight barrier (this foam creates an airtight seal) create a problem in cooling?
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<br>Has anyone tried this? Thanks for any input you might have.
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<br>I am just beginning a journey to silence my computers. Thanks for this good info at this site.
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<br>4-my-computer
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Using old CDROM case for HD silencer
Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee
A better way is to use a simple insulating "tray". I first saw one in an old IBM Aptiva I had. It attached to the 3.5" hard drive with screws and rubber grommets and the whole assembly fit into the 5.25" upper bay. The noisy IBM drive clattered but did not transmit the noise to the case, which normally would serve to amplify it acoustically. This increases the heat of the drive slightly as there is no large metal to metal contact and heat dissipation is via radiation and air convection but its not a big deal unless you are using a 10K RPM drive.
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[addsig]
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[addsig]
Working...
I know this is a (relatively) dead thread, but I though I would pipe up here. I am currently (as in waiting for the glue to dry in the other room currently) building a hopefully silent HD enclosure out of an old ATX power supply. It appears to sit perfectly lengthwise in the bottom of my case, and has the added advantage that it lines up with the strange side case-fan I mysteriously installed several months ago. The hard drives will be mounted between that bumpy shipping foam stuff that they use in sound stages and shipping hard drives (wonder how I got that?). Ultimately, it will also rest upon a wedge of the sound insulating construction material that failed to silence my computer.
I tried looking at CD rom cases, floppy bay adaptors, and 5.25" floppy drives for possible cases, but A. most seemed to have integral support structures running down the middle B. all were too long and would have closed off the backs of the drives and C. none fit both of the bloody things. I think the power supply is perfect for these purposes (with just a little dremel work). While not as dense as a CD Rom drive, it does give you enough space to insulate and create air channels. And it appears to fit in the wasted space in the front of most cases.
I'll report more when the glue finishes and I find out if this actually runs. In the mean time, everyone should be experimenting like this. We're definitely still in the "million monkeys" phase of silencing.
I tried looking at CD rom cases, floppy bay adaptors, and 5.25" floppy drives for possible cases, but A. most seemed to have integral support structures running down the middle B. all were too long and would have closed off the backs of the drives and C. none fit both of the bloody things. I think the power supply is perfect for these purposes (with just a little dremel work). While not as dense as a CD Rom drive, it does give you enough space to insulate and create air channels. And it appears to fit in the wasted space in the front of most cases.
I'll report more when the glue finishes and I find out if this actually runs. In the mean time, everyone should be experimenting like this. We're definitely still in the "million monkeys" phase of silencing.