New to Aluminum cases

[LEO454]

First, I really like my watercooling setup and therefore wanted a large case. I bought the ABS Tigas case which is a Lian Li design with some minor changes. The case options I really liked and offered the least amount of modification required by me. The alternative case was the Lian Li A71F mostly because of the front door optin to limit the reflected noise of the intake fans.

My question pertains to aluminum cases, as this is my first all ALU case. I was really shocked at the overall weight of the case as its dimensions are large. I was really disappointed in the amount of vibrations exhibited by nearly knocking on the case with my nuckles. I have begun dismantling the whole case to re-manufacturer with rubber cement coating all shared joints. The case is put together with screws, not rivets, which has pros and cons as well.

I have plans to add ALU braces to reduce the internal resonance frequency of the external frame but I do not believe this will be sufficient. All the external panels (top, front cover, both side panels) are not braced and do not have any heavy items connected so these are my problem areas.

Is sound deadening material enough or should I seek to cement additional aluminum or steel panels before covering with dampening foam?

[b_rubenstein]

Put the thing together first and then see what, if any, problems thee are. The reason for this is that the resonant frequencies of the different panels are rather specific, and will only be excited if your components vibrate at the right frequencies.

[mkk]

Something that adds weight to the panels is likely to be necessary. Thin(1-2mm) bitumen sheets are plenty effective if you can cover most of the surface area. Though satisfied with the current result with a CM Stacker I'll never buy an Alu case again if I can avoid it, although steel cases tend to have thinner and thinner sides as well nowadays.

[BlackWhizz]

Something that adds weight to the panels is likely to be necessary. Thin(1-2mm) bitumen sheets are plenty effective if you can cover most of the surface area. Though satisfied with the current result with a CM Stacker I'll never buy an Alu case again if I can avoid it, although steel cases tend to have thinner and thinner sides as well nowadays.

If you get a quality steel case (Antec, Aerocool, Coolermaster etc) panels will be thick enough

But to alu cases. Get some thickness in your panels (by using bitumen as said).

[EsaT]

bought the ABS Tigas case which is a Lian Li design with some minor changes.

That ABS is basically crossing of acoustically bad things from PC-A70F and PC-B71: Former's open noise leaking design and later's hard plastic HDD mounting for better conduction of vibration and useless Akasa crapmate which is just on the way of adding mass damping.
So besides most noise leaking always straight out you'll need to waste time for getting rid of that fraud foam.

Top panel is easier to line with dampnig material if you detach it, and also other areas when you remove "loose" parts from frame.

If you get a quality steel case (Antec, Aerocool, Coolermaster etc) panels will be thick enough

Antec's basic cases (vs. P180 etc) probably have thinner than 1mm material, and Aerobling is among last ones I would trust to use good materials.

And despite of its weight 1mm steel is still thin metal sheet while 1mm Alu + 2mm bitumen is probably clearly lighter and sounds more like plywood when tapped.

[LEO454]

Thanks for the replies. I figured the sound deadening material of bitumen would be used but was worried if it would be enough. I was into car stereo systems and used to put several layers on to reduce the resonance under my peak bass standing waves.

Good note on the 3.5 inch drive mounts. I already removed all the sata hotswap and spare mount at top in favor of a custom suspension mount with a decent heatsink attached to two drives.

I have a 3x120mm radiator that I am mounting in the front panel, with a home made variable voltage regulator. I am using 120x38mm Panaflo fans that produce good static pressure at low rpms (about 6.2 volts). My cpu and video cards are watercooled. My goal is keeping all temperatures below 45C under load so I do hear my fans somewhat in my current case.

I expect with aluminum that I will have to use much more tedious means to reduce overall noise floor. Again, thanks for the replies.

BTW I love the website's goal of silence and the various tips. My wife's computer is so quiet now that neither of us turn it off most nights because we forget it is on. I will have to setup her computer to go to sleep on its own. Cheers.

[EsaT]

Car or computer case... both made of sheet metal.
If you got side panels rattling already when lifting case from box mass damping stops that, at least it stopped completely in my A71B after ading BeQuiet's combination mat with 2mm bitumen base layer to side panels.

If there's some airflow around HDDs don't need heatsinks. Those become more useful if HDDs are in some cramped corner without any airflow in there.

There's really no sense for trying to keep CPU and GPU temps that low, 10C higher would be perfectly acceptable (20C for GPU) but as all components are then bathed with that air heated by radiator there's sense in keeping good case airflow. (CPU and GPU voltage regulation circuitries need that)

[supersize]

imo aluminium cases rattle too much against each other increasing noise, and it channels noise through small gaps.

won't be buying another aluminium case.

look to buy a cheap p183 case if i can.

[GuyClinch]

Some aluminum cases are better then others - with thick enough aluminum and a careful design noise isn't that much of an issue. I have gone lately for steel/aluminum hybrid designs but aluminum from a quailty vendor can absolutely work, IMHO.

[LEO454]

Quick upate on the ABS Tigas 100% aluminum case:

*I stripped the case down of all removable panels and used silicon on all the joints that are riveted to prevent rattling of the infrastructure.
*I removed the foam padding on the side panels and applied bitumen and reapplied the foam.
*The top hard-drive cage uses screws with a large rubber bushing that attaches to side wall channels to isolate the hard-drives. I am using this since it has a fan attached to the cages as well. The SATA hotswap tower with the hard plastic channels was removed as I had no use for it.
*I used 3mm ALU sheeting to make a front mount for my radiator which stiffened up the infrastructure quite a bit.
*the front door was filled with silicon on the back in the crevices which added a lot of weight to decrease the resonance.
*Used soft mounts on the two case fans.

Due to the depth of the case, the rear case fans will need the wires to be lengthened to reach my voltage regulator so running the fans with 12 volts and dumping excess voltage using a power resistor to get 8 volts.

I would like to get some ABS plastic to shape into some ducting as the case is large and airflow velocity needs to be increased over the motherboard since I am watercooling.

Cheers,