How to silent a socket 7 Pentium 200?

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raphaelmsx
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How to silent a socket 7 Pentium 200?

Post by raphaelmsx » Tue Aug 15, 2006 5:57 am

Hi!

I want to silent down my old socket 7 system.

The specs are:
Asus P5A mobo
Intel Pentium 200MHz MMX CPU
Generic ATX PSU
Casetek CK-151 desktop ATX case (very generic)

The questions are:

Can I use a socket 370 cooler like Nexus AXP-3200? If not, what are the silent socket 7 coolers you recommend?

Can I use the Silverstone ST30NF fanless PSU without any case fan?

Thanks!

IsaacKuo
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Post by IsaacKuo » Tue Aug 15, 2006 6:19 am

How big is the heatsink that's already on it? Does it look like it has a decent amount of fin area? Unless it's very short/small, it may be able to cool the processor completely fanless and passive.

Engine
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Post by Engine » Tue Aug 15, 2006 8:27 am

Yeah, I had a couple of passive Socket 7s; the 200 doesn't produce too much heat, and a passive cooler - mine were all tallish - works fine if you have decent airflow. Unfortunately, fewer decent passive coolers were available for the 7 than were available for Slot 1; I had a passive cooler on a P2-450, which produced a lot more heat than a P-200, but it had three times as much linear surface, and thus a whole lot more total surface area.

Alternately, you can always fan swap or undervolt the fan.

BillyBuerger
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Post by BillyBuerger » Tue Aug 15, 2006 9:00 am

If it's anything like the Pentium/K6 heatsinks I've got, they're a tiny chunk of aluminum with a whinny little fan on them. When my fan died on my K6-200, the system would freeze. I currently have an $5 SVC heatsink on it. It's never crashed when running completely passive. (sitting on my desk with no case and no direct airflow) But it does get very hot. A 80mm fan at 5V keeps it plenty cool. If it was in a case with good airflow, it would probably be fine fanless. Socket 7 is the same dimensions as socket 370/A. I think it only has one mounting lug though.

Either of these would probably do fine:

$7.99 GLOBAL WIN FA782N CPU COOLER FOR AMD K7

$4.49 COOLER MASTER DP5-6I31D-A1 CPU COOLER FOR AMD K7 AND INTEL 370

raphaelmsx
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Post by raphaelmsx » Tue Aug 15, 2006 11:55 am

Thanks all for the answers.

So, can I go completly passive with a good heatsink with fan removed (like the Nexus AXP-3200) for the CPU, a fanless PSU, no case fan, and HD on smartdrive 2002 enclosure, or it´s too much risky?

Or... at least one quiet case fan?

IsaacKuo
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Post by IsaacKuo » Tue Aug 15, 2006 1:12 pm

I'd be very surprised if you had any problems going completely fanless. However, I personally wouldn't be very comfortable with a 3.5" drive in a true fanless computer (regardless of whether it was in an enclosure).

I must admit that my fanless Pentium 120 had a 3.5" drive just sort of crammed in there...but this was an ancient 2gig drive which I really didn't care about. I replaced it with an enclosed 2.5" drive, but only because I had it to spare.

disphenoidal
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Post by disphenoidal » Tue Aug 15, 2006 2:20 pm

Older drives can be very noisy as well. If the drive is the same vintage as the processor, it may make lots of bearing noises.

hapveg
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Post by hapveg » Tue Aug 15, 2006 5:43 pm

I tried running an AMD 200+ fanlessly using a modernish aluminium heatsink with fan disabled, it'd be fine until it had been under 100% load for about an hour, needed a tiny bit of airflow. With heatsink designed to run fanlessly (like the Zalman 6000) you should be OK.

For the last about year I've been running an Intel 863Mhz without a CPU fan using a Zalman CNPS6000-ALCU, it has a (quiet) PSU fan though. Under load it reaches about 60 centigrade.

It had been using a PATA Spinpoint 120GB hdd in a Zalman cooler sat outside the case for about 6 months, max temp about 42C, for the last few months it's been in an Arctic Cooling hdd enclosure, and the drive reaches about 47C. That PC is on 24/7, and uses Artic Silver Ceramic glue (or whatever it's called), since modern headsinks don't like old sockets (desktop case, so the cpu socket is horizontal).

Devonavar
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Post by Devonavar » Wed Aug 16, 2006 1:22 am

I would think that the CPU should be easy to cool ... it will be the PSU and the HDDs that will make the noise. Good luck sourcing a quiet AT power supply; fanless probably won't be an option unless you just rip the fan out of the existing PSU ... and I wouldn't recommend that.

If you're using a modern HDD you should probably be OK ... but I kind of wonder whether it's worth spending the money for such an old system. If you're going with a Pentium vintage HDD, I don't think you'll be able to silence it effectively, even with an enclosure; those ball-bearing drives are NOISY, especially when they've had time to age.

raphaelmsx
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Joined: Mon Jun 12, 2006 10:02 am

Post by raphaelmsx » Wed Aug 16, 2006 3:41 am

The mobo has only an ATX power connector, so I will add the Silverstone fanless PSU. I am currently using a Fujitsu 18GB 10K RPM SCSI and pretend to swap for a IDE card reader with a Sandisk or Lexar 8GB CF card. This don´t produce many heat as an HDD, right?
Devonavar wrote:I would think that the CPU should be easy to cool ... it will be the PSU and the HDDs that will make the noise. Good luck sourcing a quiet AT power supply; fanless probably won't be an option unless you just rip the fan out of the existing PSU ... and I wouldn't recommend that.

If you're using a modern HDD you should probably be OK ... but I kind of wonder whether it's worth spending the money for such an old system. If you're going with a Pentium vintage HDD, I don't think you'll be able to silence it effectively, even with an enclosure; those ball-bearing drives are NOISY, especially when they've had time to age.

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