New Mac Pro taken apart

[mshan]

http://www.powermax.com/articles_review ... .php?id=32

Is that two 120 mm exhaust fans? (one for cpu duct; other for RAM compartment)

PSU fan looks like it's on the inside end of the psu. Can't tell if it's 92 mm?

And what do you think of those hard drive trays in terms of noise suppression?

[Entropy]

I have no extra insight yet, but the word from those who have taken delivery is that the system is silent. Not quiet, silent.
Now, I assume that this statement doesn't hold for the people here, since harddrives are always somewhat audible, but the Apple cheesegraters have always been extremely intelligent as far as thermal monitoring and fan control is concerned, so coupled with a relatively modest thermal load, they should be able to do well. Those CPU heatsinks certainly inspire confidence.

[mshan]

I read some blog that said there were four fans, but I see only three (two 120 mm (?) front intake ones and a 80 or 92 mm psu intake fan).

Any idea where the other one is?

[Luddite]

I have no extra insight yet, but the word from those who have taken delivery is that the system is silent. Not quiet, silent.
Now, I assume that this statement doesn't hold for the people here, since harddrives are always somewhat audible, but the Apple cheesegraters have always been extremely intelligent as far as thermal monitoring and fan control is concerned, so coupled with a relatively modest thermal load, they should be able to do well. Those CPU heatsinks certainly inspire confidence.

"Silent" is a word taken very seriously around here. Best not to utter it in vain Judging from the photos of those fans, it would be hard to believe the Mac pro is silent. Let's hope it's at least quiet.

Anyone have any specs on the noise characteristics of the Mac Pro yet?

[nightmorph]

I've seen a couple of good take-apart performance reviews, one at ArsTechnica, and the other one at AnandTech, though the AnandTech article has little to say about noise, other than it's quieter than the PowerPC version, and mostly HDD noise is audible.

Both reviews indicate that it doesn't look like Apple took great lengths to silence the thing, aside from thermal zones & cooler processors. Looking at the photos shows a wealth of metal-on-metal connections (some rather loose, it seems), and the metal/metal hard drive mounts make me wince in sympathy. Those have gotta be a good source of noise.

[cyberspyder]

i want to know if the mobo is ATX compliant, because it's a really good one. quad-channel ram anyone? i also want to mod the G5/MacPro case to contain a regular PC. does anyone know if the power supply uses ordinary ATX connectors?

Brendan

[qviri]

i want to know if the mobo is ATX compliant

I doubt it. To start with, it looks very long (as long as the case, so you can find the approximate measurement), and this photo showing ports further back than the cards are seated doesn't exactly scream ATX either.

[kamina]

Well if anyone is comparing the Noise to the old quad G5, "more silent" does not mean anything by spcr standards. They are damn noisy machines.

Didn't get any Mac Pro's here (at work) yet, but when we do it will be hard to judge due to the AC and other background noises. I got a free G4 PowerMac from work, and it was one of the noisiest computers I ever used. I swapped the 120mm case fan for a 120mm Nexus, and the powersupplies fan for a Panaflo L1A and it sounded completly inaudible. When I got it home I noticed it was pretty noisy in comparison to my previous pc (built with silence in mind and attention to detail).

I received a new 20" iMac yesterday, and it's clear the designers have given alot of attention to silence. It's not quite as silent as my old PC, but then again I don't see how that would have been possible. It's definatly bearable, there is a faint (but grindy) fan which is continuously on, and I did'nt manage to get it to spin any faster then it does in idle use.

[heddhunter]

"Silent" is a word taken very seriously around here. Best not to utter it in vain Judging from the photos of those fans, it would be hard to believe the Mac pro is silent. Let's hope it's at least quiet.

I'm new around here, so you don't have to trust me, but my housemate just brought home a new Mac Pro with X1900 GPU and 4 hard drives. As far as I can tell, it is silent. It is so quiet the only way to tell it's on is to look at the power LED or stick your ear to the case.

In fact, that's the reason I came here - I have to get my PC to be quieter... I am feeling quite inadequate no longer having the fastest, quietest computer in the house.

[stratusgd]

Well if anyone is comparing the Noise to the old quad G5, "more silent" does not mean anything by spcr standards. They are damn noisy machines.

Didn't get any Mac Pro's here (at work) yet, but when we do it will be hard to judge due to the AC and other background noises. I got a free G4 PowerMac from work, and it was one of the noisiest computers I ever used. I swapped the 120mm case fan for a 120mm Nexus, and the powersupplies fan for a Panaflo L1A and it sounded completly inaudible. When I got it home I noticed it was pretty noisy in comparison to my previous pc (built with silence in mind and attention to detail).

Can you give more specifcs on those 2 systems? I've worked on a couple different G5 setups, and found the main noise contributor to be the video card fan (though neither were a G5 Quad - maybe those were significantly louder). Likewise for the G4 - I've used a couple systems that were quiet (by no means silent) - but the last revision or two sounded like wind tunnels.

My limited experience with a Mac Pro and the Macbook Pro are similar to everyone elses it seems like - very quiet. Very very quiet. Not silent, but close. Pretty much any level of ambient noise seems to drown them out.