4: Niggling detail. The power led connector for the front panel, isn't quite compatible with the motherboard pinout... the panel uses a three pin socket, and the motherboard uses two pins adjacent... which could normally be adjusted by redoing the pins in the socket... but.. there's a protective wa...

I put it all back together and voila! It worked perfectly - What a silly oversight! I don't think it's going to short anything, but I still don't like components to be touching if it can be avoided. I ended up pounding on the heatpipes with a hammer and bit of rubber (to soften the blows!) to bend t...

That's what set me back 1 day on my last build.. :) I like the *really* smart feeling you get when you notice it. :oops: Haha I'm glad it's not just me! :lol: A months worth of anticipation only to turn on a brand new build and have no video output. After swearing my t*ts off for several hours, I f...

Let me just start off by saying that I've successfully built several computers in the past (2 k6-2s/socket 7, and 2 or 3 p4's/socket 478) so I'm not new at this - but I'm stumped! So, my computer goes kaput last week, and I figure "time to upgrade!". Let's see what the fuss is about the E8400 that's...

Maybe that crazy closed fin design is actually somewhat helpful to the performance of the heatsink, since it redirects all of the air to the hottest part of the fins - the part immediately around the heatpipes. Impressive numbers, considering that only half of the heatpipes were really doing anythin...

If I'm not mistaken, SATA hard drives are hot swappable. But it sounds like your 80gb is old and is probably PATA. In that case, your computer would probably crash. Yes, I did forget to mention that my main drive is SATA on a RAID controller, while the old drive is connected via the IDE controller....

However, I would like to have a configuration in which the fans kick in (or increase speed) only when needed (i.e. when CPU or case temperature goes above a certain limit). This way, the HTPC would hopefully stay quiet most of the time and make noise only when necessary (like my refrigerator :lol: ...

Well, I decided to simply install the drive normally (inside the computer case), and utilize the ability of Windows to shut the drive down. Thankfully, the drive appeared AFTER all of my other drives, but I still changed it to drive Z:, so it wouldn't interfere with my USB thumb drives, etc. I actua...

It sounds like you won't be using the HDD very often. If you only turn it on or off while the computer is shut down it will work, of course. Doing it while the computer is on is a bad idea. Yeah, that sounds reasonable. I'd only need it on every couple of weeks to run some kind of backup. Only, it'...

Hi folks, I currently have a wonderful Samsung 400GB drive that is nice and quiet. However, I also have an old WD 80 GB drive that I'd love to be able to use as a backup drive, but it's one of the noisy kind(ball bearing, whiny!). I'm too cheap to buy one of those external cases that change the driv...

Reason im asking is because i dont really know where modern laptops are dbA wise... at work im sitting with a laptop and if i ever would have a computer this quiet i would never be able to know when its on if i didnt look at the LEDs. I have a relatively new laptop (Dell 640m/e1405 from Dec 2006), ...

A potentially confusing statement in the article is : "To be perfectly clear, there's no way to install this heatsink having access to both sides of the motherboard." I think you meant to say, " without having access to both sides..." I realize the next statement in the article clarifies your actual...

Two problems I can foresee with a Plextor recommendation: 1) No lightscribe. If this is an important feature to "line" then Plextor is a no-go 2) Quality of the latest Plextor drives is in question, since they are no longer manufacturing their own drives. This is easy to confirm, since Plextools Pro...

Finally, got that drive in, did a little testing. Here's what I think: -The drive is pretty quiet while reading a DVD-video... Not as quiet as my Plextor 708A, though. I believe the Asus is spinning at 4x, while my Plextor would be at 2x(I know it does 2x - it's documented.) -Unfortunately, it doesn...

I will have an Asus 1814BL arriving either this evening or sometime tomorrow, so I'll be able to give you my impressions of the noise character (I'm pretty sure that the BL should have same noise as BLT, as it's only PATA vs. SATA interface that's different) as well as it's response to DriveSpeed. S...

falcon26 wrote:My average room temp is about 72C So I guess my temps are about average than...

Dude, time to get some air conditioning installed! Complain to your landlord or something!

You're doing really well to keep your C2D nearly 30C below ambient...

9. Installed ATITool .27b1 (works with nVidia cards and Windows Vista). ATITool controls clock rate of the graphics card. Set ATItool to underclock video card when idle down to 200/200, from default of 576/900. And an overclock of 630/1000 was achieved 100% stable with stock video cooler. ATITool d...

Does simple subtraction work with logarithmic scales like the decibel scale? It doesn't seem to make sense to me, but I'm not an expert. I just can't swallow the idea that if the diff between 12V and 5V at 5" is 24dB, that it would be the same at any distance... Is the starting distance were far eno...

If the bay is designed to be only wide enough to squeeze your 3.5" drive in there and have screws secure it in place, I'm not sure there's much you can do... However, I've succesfully suspended my HDD in the 3.5" cage of the Antec P160, because it uses a drive rail mounting system for the HDD's, whi...

I monitor temps through a sensor attached directly to the heatsink that goes to my Kama Meter. That way I don't use any software at all. Where can I get one of those temp sensors? I realize this a late reply, but to answer you, cloneman, the sensor comes with the Kamameter. That unit comes with 4 t...

Yes there are single 2gb chips. But your better off with two modules so you can run your RAM in dual channel. Dual channel > single channel Owkey thanks, didn't know that.. Howcome actually? I would think single is better since it's all in one? That's like suggesting that single core CPUs are bette...

...make sure the wattage is enough on them. If one were to use 2 half-watt resistors in-line, would they have a total dissipation capacity of 1 watt? And does one simply add the resistance values of the 2 resistors to get the total resistance, or is there a special formula for that sort of thing? (...

That bracket is clever. I've actually come up with an idea of my own, similar but not as pretty. I'm going to use those break-out panels from the 5.25" bay and drill a few holes... we'll see what I come up with. Should look better than the wire, at any rate, and be a bit more solid. I also have succ...

I had no idea that zener diodes were so cheap! I always thought that they must be expensive because they start with "Zener", and most things with a Z in the title are going to be expensive Do they have those at Radio Shack?

I also have order from buy.com dozens of times, and never had a problem except once. A portable CD player arrived in non-working condition. They paid for the shipping label back to them, and replaced the unit with a new one that worked. No complaints here! Unfortunately, the deal is far less sweet n...

Even 60C is scaldingly hot to a finger, but it a very reasonable and acceptable temp for a GPU, especially passively cooled. As to a solution for monitoring, I don't know of any all in one solutions. Some graphics cards just don't have a temp sensor built in - like my 9600XT (AIW). I monitor temps t...

I'm going to attempt to quiet down my kids' computer, and I don't want to buy a fan controller or build one. I'd like to use the 6V trick, and have a couple of case fans that work(they are the same size and amp draw.) But, I am wondering what I can do to slow down the CPU fan - (I'm going to install...

I might still be... Thanks for the reply. I'll pm you.

If the drive has a Fluid-Dynamic-Bearing motor, then you really need to backup and replace the drive(or get warranty service on it, if it's new enough). It shouldn't make noises like that. I have a WD 80GB with non FDB motor, it has a screechy whine, too. Like a pulsating high pitched whine that it ...

I'm not sure if this is applicable, but can't hurt to check: If your SATA controller is first gen, 150Mbps, and the HDD is 2nd gen, 300Mbps, there might be some incompatibility there. Most SATA II drives come with a jumper on the back that will limit the drive to SATA I mode. Try it and see, if you ...