3480 ala Swed, small, fast and quiet

swed · Post by **swed** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 4:14 am

Hello guys!
Iâ€™m new to this forum and I thought I would share my last build with you!

I start with an introduction of my self, just fore the information (Iâ€™m not the guy that brags, I just think this is very fun to do, and I gladly help out with what I can):

Iâ€™ve been into this sin 2002 and build 8-10 rigs, from passive mITX to water-cooled full tower and 2004 I came in 7:e place in the Swedish OC-championship. Nowadays I just build rigs thatâ€™s quiet/silent and of course fast to, do I like to play like CMR or something between times.

My last rig was a Silverstone SUGO SG-03 with this mobo, CPU and GPU in, but I was really never happy with neither the cooling capacity nor the sound level. I tried several improvement among other thing I reversed the airflow through it and let the PSU push air through the heat Zink and in idle I made a few degrees on the CPU an the noise of the PSU went down do it got fresh air. But the PSU died the other week, I recon it became ugly hotspots in it with the reversed flow, so donâ€™t do that (with a PSU with 120mm fan).

Now to this built, Iâ€™ve planning to get this rig the way the SG-03 never became:
Small, quiet and relative fast.

Iâ€™ve read tons of reviews on the net and especially from SPCR, and I got stuck to the Antec NSK3480 though I think it has potential to have good cooling and be quiet. Though I plan to make it quiet I chosen the heat Zink thatâ€™s best fore low airflow, and thatâ€™s (today) the HR-01 plus as I understand. And it can fit in to the 3480 to, without any mods.

I also saw Krickâ€™s thread about cabling in it and simply copied it, with a few changes, I hope thatâ€™s OK. I also read several opinions that the 3480 PSU isnâ€™t that quiet, so I fixed that from the beginning. Hereâ€™s the pictures from episode 1 (the quality isnâ€™t the best. itâ€™s from my cell phone).

What does this tag mean

?

Of with the top and out with the fan

The replacement fan and a comparison

Modify the cable to monitoring the fan rpm in bios

Then this â€œguyâ€

swed · Post by **swed** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 5:57 am

A question, I have (in my mind) 3 opptions about the front fan:
* connect it to the chassifan header on the mobo, with the rear fan.
* connect it to the GPU-fan header.
* block it and make a wall from the bakplate to the end of the graficcard to force the rearfan to such air through the S1.

What do you prefer?

Swed

thejamppa · Post by **thejamppa** » Fri Feb 06, 2009 6:25 am

Very nice and clean mod. Its probably nice to have so good place to work your rig. I livei n flat and I can only dream such working place. All mods very nice and professionally made. Your u-rubber almost matches cases colour so it took me bit to see that there was lining in there ^^

. Since you run GPU passive, I'd keep front fan. It helps in small cases.

Plugging fans into case fan header sounds very good option. Of course one would that you would use passive cooler ducted on rear and place rear fan into CPU header and front fan on case fan header.

swed · Post by **swed** » Sat Feb 07, 2009 6:03 am

thejamppa wrote:Very nice and clean mod. Its probably nice to have so good place to work your rig. I livei n flat and I can only dream such working place. All mods very nice and professionally made. Your u-rubber almost matches cases colour so it took me bit to see that there was lining in there ^^

. Since you run GPU passive, I'd keep front fan. It helps in small cases.

Plugging fans into case fan header sounds very good option. Of course one would that you would use passive cooler ducted on rear and place rear fan into CPU header and front fan on case fan header.

Thanks!
This was done on my job and there is a big workshop that I can use.

The "u-rubber" is in fact plastic, but it's very good, a pain in the ... to get on to small holes, but very slim and nice outhervise.

I'l probebly test all 3 variants for the fans!

Swed

ACook · Post by **ACook** » Sat Feb 07, 2009 7:31 am

I'm terribly sorry, but could you fix your quite and quiet pls? I'm getting terribly annoyed reading. and there's a few whole's that need a hole.

the pictures are perfect though, don't worry about those. quite clear.

good luck with the rest of the mod

ntavlas · Post by **ntavlas** » Sat Feb 07, 2009 8:26 am

It`s looking great so far!

I would plug the front fan on the gpu header, since the gpu is the component that will benefit the most from it. Let`s hope that the gpu can control non pwm fans.

megarek · Post by **megarek** » Sat Feb 07, 2009 8:36 am

What a great build!

I did not realize that the SG03 and the Antec are practically the same height. I assumed the SG03 was much smaller because of the way the PSU is set up.

Looking forward to seeing where this is going.

swed · Post by **swed** » Sat Feb 07, 2009 10:29 pm

Sorry for my pore spelling, I've fixed the holes, the quiet and some more now

!

I also think that the best will be to GPU-fan heather, and I dont think that one is PWM-regulated, it's just 2 wire.

About the size, I was surprised to.

Thanks fore the inputs!

Swed

Tobias · Post by **Tobias** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 3:40 am

ACook wrote:I'm terribly sorry, but could you fix your quite and quiet pls? I'm getting terribly annoyed reading. and there's a few whole's that need a hole.

the pictures are perfect though, don't worry about those. quite clear.

good luck with the rest of the mod

So unless I can't write perfectly, you'd rather not have me posting at all? And if I would take such an arrogant elitist position, I would make damn sure I wrote perfectly myself, or I would risk someone saying "I'm sorry, but could you change the first letters in your sentences to capital letters, pls?"

pls? Seems to me that both of us needs to stop posting!

Sorry for going off topic, btw

Nice build. Do you have any other mods in mind for part two?

swed · Post by **swed** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 12:50 am

Tobias wrote:
ACook wrote:I'm terribly sorry, but could you fix your quite and quiet pls? I'm getting terribly annoyed reading. and there's a few whole's that need a hole.

the pictures are perfect though, don't worry about those. quite clear.

good luck with the rest of the mod
So unless I can't write perfectly, you'd rather not have me posting at all? And if I would take such an arrogant elitist position, I would make damn sure I wrote perfectly myself, or I would risk someone saying "I'm sorry, but could you change the first letters in your sentences to capital letters, pls?"

pls? Seems to me that both of us needs to stop posting!

Sorry for going off topic, btw Nice build. Do you have any other mods in mind for part two?

Thanks fore the defens

!
I probebly will test some ducts/walls in it, but nothing that shows from the outside, I want it to be descrete.

Swed

mentawl · Post by **mentawl** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 4:41 am

How did you hold the pilot bit for the holesaw while doing the front 120mm fan hole? I do them a lot, and the best way I've found is to screw a bit of wood in behind the fan grill and use that for the pilot, but I'd be interested to hear if you have a better way

nice mod btw!

swed · Post by **swed** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 4:46 am

mentawl wrote:How did you hold the pilot bit for the holesaw while doing the front 120mm fan hole? I do them a lot, and the best way I've found is to screw a bit of wood in behind the fan grill and use that for the pilot, but I'd be interested to hear if you have a better way nice mod btw!

I had a rather big pilot bit on this holesaw, like 5-6mm, so it dit fit perfekt in the small squares

!

Thanks

Swed

judge56988 · Post by **judge56988** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 5:12 am

Tobias wrote:
ACook wrote:I'm terribly sorry, but could you fix your quite and quiet pls? I'm getting terribly annoyed reading. and there's a few whole's that need a hole.

the pictures are perfect though, don't worry about those. quite clear.

good luck with the rest of the mod
So unless I can't write perfectly, you'd rather not have me posting at all? And if I would take such an arrogant elitist position, I would make damn sure I wrote perfectly myself, or I would risk someone saying "I'm sorry, but could you change the first letters in your sentences to capital letters, pls?"

pls? Seems to me that both of us needs to stop posting!

Well said.
I wonder how good ACook's Swedish is?

ACook · Post by **ACook** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 6:33 am

<offtopic>where did I say not to post unless you write perfectly? It was merely a request/suggestion.

English isn't my first language either, I do make mistakes myself, and I do make typo's as well.

And not capitalizing the first letter is a bad habit, granted, I've probably picked it up from hanging out on irc too much; at least I capitalize my I's.
It doesn't however change the meaning of the sentence.

any more flames can be directed through pm, thanks.
</offtopic>

deruberhanyok · Post by **deruberhanyok** » Thu Feb 12, 2009 10:39 am

Wow, swed, the mod looks good and your cutting is fantastic!

TMM · Post by **TMM** » Sat Feb 14, 2009 6:56 pm

Doesn't your PSU run a little hot with an 1800rpm fan (stock=3000rpm)?

swed · Post by **swed** » Sun Feb 15, 2009 11:45 pm

TMM wrote:Doesn't your PSU run a little hot with an 1800rpm fan (stock=3000rpm)?

I have'nt tried it yet, but it has been done before and it seem to work.
I've connected the Noctua to the PSU-fanslot so it will spinn up if the PSU get hot and I don't think the original fan ever go at 3000rpm.

Swed

ntavlas · Post by **ntavlas** » Mon Feb 16, 2009 1:16 am

The stock fan would probably never reach 3000rpm, unless seriously stressed in hot weather. Many quiet power supplies start @ 1000-1500 rpm. Of course the noctua will run even more slowly, but with a fresh air intake this shouldn`t be a problem.

JJ · Post by JJ » Mon Feb 16, 2009 7:03 pm

Very nice job.

What exactly is the material ("bitumen carpets") that you've used for sound damping? Is it a commercial case damping material or something made for another purpose?

You recommend using a nibbler to cut holes instead of a hole saw. I've never used one. Can you easily cut clean, round holes with a nibbler?

swed · Post by **swed** » Mon Feb 16, 2009 11:38 pm

JJ wrote:Very nice job.

What exactly is the material ("bitumen carpets") that you've used for sound damping? Is it a commercial case damping material or something made for another purpose?

You recommend using a nibbler to cut holes instead of a hole saw. I've never used one. Can you easily cut clean, round holes with a nibbler?

Thanks!

"Bitumen carpets" is an havy material that include tarmac, and it's usuly used to sound/vibration damp cars.
Here in Sweden we buy it in car accessory shops.

I've never recommended a nibbler, must have been someone else.
I've tried it several times in cars and it make fine edges, but it's very difficult to make round holes with it (or a straight lines).

Swed

swed · Post by **swed** » Tue Feb 24, 2009 1:57 am

I coulden't get any warrenty on my mobo, and I now don't have the jizz or time to argue anymore, so I order a new one, should be coming the other day.

Swed

miahallen · Post by **miahallen** » Wed Feb 25, 2009 4:17 pm

Very nice build...looking forward to your updates

Pegar · Post by **Pegar** » Thu Feb 26, 2009 1:24 pm

Wow. This is a great thread considering my future project. So thanks a bunch for the current stuff.

A couple of questions pop to mind tho:
1) Specs?!

2) Any chance for a second 120mm fan in the front? The pictures seem to say "no" but I'll ask anyway.
3) Is there room to attach a fan onto the Accelero? Again pictures say "no" but...

Eagerly waiting for more content.

swed · Post by **swed** » Fri Feb 27, 2009 1:35 am

Pegar wrote:Wow. This is a great thread considering my future project. So thanks a bunch for the current stuff.

A couple of questions pop to mind tho:
1) Specs?!
2) Any chance for a second 120mm fan in the front? The pictures seem to say "no" but I'll ask anyway.
3) Is there room to attach a fan onto the Accelero? Again pictures say "no" but...

Eagerly waiting for more content.

Hehe, you're so welcome!
I got my new mobo today, so I'm planing to put in some stuff today!

1) I don't understand wath you meen, but no, theres no space anyware in this case

2) No
3) maybe a slim one

I'll take 2 pictures and come back...

Swed

matt_garman · Post by **matt_garman** » Fri Feb 27, 2009 7:10 am

swed wrote:
Pegar wrote:A couple of questions pop to mind tho:
1) Specs?!
...
1) I don't understand wath you meen, but no, theres no space anyware in this case

I believe he meant "specifications", i.e. what brand/model of all the components? At least, that's the question I have. Everything looks really nice and clean. I love seeing posts where people do really professional-looking modifications.

Nice work!

swed · Post by **swed** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 12:38 am

Thanks for the praise, everyone

!

If I go back to Pegar's questions, and do them again:

1) Here's the specs

, I hope this is what you're looking for.
* ASUS P5E-VM HDMI
* Intel Q6600
* Geil DDR2 6400 2x2 Gb
* Leadtek 8800GT (G92) 512 Mb, with an Accelero S1
* Seagate 7200.11 500 Gb
* Vista Home Premium 64-bit
* 2x Noctua S-12 800 rpm
* Thermalright HR01-plus
* Nexus PWM-fan, 500-2000 rpm

2) Yes, you can squash in another 120 mm fan in the front if you dont use the 3,5" bay

3) You can squash in a fan, but I don't think it's gone giv any effekt, though it's to tight to the floor.

Here's some more pictures, I haven have time this weekend to do more, I'l be back later this week.

[/list]

Swed
P.S. The first impression of the Nexus PWM is really god, I judge it to be as quite as the Noctuas at 12V.
I don't now how quick it span though, but it Was quite!

Pegar · Post by **Pegar** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 3:22 pm

matt_garman wrote:I believe he meant "specifications"...

Yeah, that's what I meant. I am just used to use the shorter version.

swed wrote:- Answers, lots of pictures and nice progress -

Thanks for the answers! They are really helpful.

As are the pictures.
As is the fact that you are actually making progress! I'm slowly gaining my interest into my own project while following your as it is so similar...

So, what is still to come in this build?

Looking forward to more updates.

JamieG · Post by **JamieG** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 4:05 pm

Hi Swed,

Like Pegar, I've been eagerly following this thread as I am also considering a somewhat similar system in that case with similar mods, albeit with less power. (E5200 / Asus P5Q-VM instead of your CPU & motherboard and no graphics card).

Now that your system appears to be assembled, I'd be really interested in your results from some tests for temperatures on CPU and GPU and power usage if at all possible.

Cheers,

Jamie

swed · Post by **swed** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 11:15 pm

Hi guys!
I tried some more this morning (I had just halv-an-hour before work).

I'm pleased with the soundlevel. I've just the exhaust-fan and the CPU-fan at the moment.
In idle the CPU-fan is running at 800-850 rpm by the mobo regardless what mode I choose, and then it's about the same soundlevel as the
S-12 (running ~700rpm by the mobo) and the R-8 in the PSU. Can't read the R-8 speed though, working on that.

I put the CPU in ~3 GHz (fsb 333) and let the ram go at DDR800, and fire it up. Folowing temps was what I got:
CPU idle ~42-43 degrees, and no spinning up of the fan
Harddrive ~31-32 degrees
GPU 59-62, the front fan is not connected

After OCCT a while the CPU-temp stabilized at ~54 degrees, and the fan is spinning by estimate ~1200-1300, and can be heard, but not load.

I'm very pleased so far, and all of this "sound estimates" is with both the roof and the sidewalls of.

To be continued
Swed

JamieG · Post by **JamieG** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 11:34 pm

Thanks Swed.

If you've got the necessary equipment, some power consumption measurements would be great.