SPCR

silence in software....

(sorry, not sure which place to post this...but you have to store software somewhere, right? )

figure such a list may be useful...

What software based silencing methods are there, and how do you do them?

I mean things like....

1 - using a Ram Disk...with your temp folder on that, things can be speeded up a little, and the hard disk wont need to crunch as the data is in ram

2 - CPU idling software...supposed to let your cpu cool off a it, thus reducing temps, and so reducing the amount of airflow needed.

3 - hard disk idle/standby settings...I know with one of my disks, sometimes when the PC is not in use it will ramp up for a couple of minutes, then shut down....then ramp up again...and this is very annoying, especially when it happens when I am trying to sleep....if the HD was being accessed more consistantly, then things would be better...

4 - better swap file settings...that is, make a partition at one end of the drive, defrag the disk, put a swap file on it and do not allow windows to change it's size..hay presto, less fragmenting of the swap file, and so less noisy thrashing.

so, what other ways do you people know of?
how good can they be if done right?
and...how do you do it?

I just use HDDs that are inaudible from outside the case and I don't worry about disk activity.

As for CPU noise, I run low wattage CPUs that require very little cooling. There's also no shortage of software-based CPU control apps these days, both for AMD and Intel CPU's.

true, but if you have a relitivly noisy piece of hardware, and cant afford/cantr change hardware for technical reasons, then software based methods can be a help

hwsboss wrote:3 - hard disk idle/standby settings...I know with one of my disks, sometimes when the PC is not in use it will ramp up for a couple of minutes, then shut down....then ramp up again...if the HD was being accessed more consistantly, then things would be better...

This one is questionable in terms of usefulness. Sometimes spin-up is much more annoying than just a smooth idle, and worse, the delay will reduce performance speed (i.e. the system has to wait for your drive to spin up).

sorry, what I meant was, it would be better to have the disk contatly spinning, at idle, rather then turning off every few moments, which is annoying

hwsboss wrote:sorry, what I meant was, it would be better to have the disk contatly spinning, at idle, rather then turning off every few moments, which is annoying

In some cases the automatic turn-off can be a lifesaver... I currently use an old Seagate Medallist and that thing has a whine like no tomorrow. I have it set to turn off after three minutes of inactivity and screw the lifetime measured in power-up-power-down cycles.

what are good sempron 754 cpu idle apps?

RE: Point 4, the best way is loads of RAM and just dissable the swap file, it's great, I have done it and havent looked back from 2GB of RAM, can be done with 1GB of RAM as well.

You can also set up Ramdrives using software, but dont expect fast performance due to the fact that you are using RAM to "Emulate" a drive, the only use I can think of is whilst web-browsing.

Not on your list as software, but you can get Hardware Ramdrives, out of this world performance (AKA standard in 5 years), few drawbacks except for the price, and data integrity, see Gigabyte for their newly announced drive.

Andy

what do CPU idle applications do?

andyb wrote:RE: Point 4, the best way is loads of RAM and just dissable the swap file, it's great, I have done it and havent looked back from 2GB of RAM, can be done with 1GB of RAM as well.

From a performance point of view, it's almost always better to let Windows manage the paging file, no matter how much RAM you have.

From a silencing point of view, if you're trying to avoid seeks completely, what's the point of having the drive in the first place? A better solution is to suspend the drive and be done with it.

Sorry Mar, but I have to disaggree with you on both of your points.

If you have enough RAM you just DONT need a paging file, and as such whether it's better for windows to look after it or not is not a question, you DONT have a paging file, anyway I have always had a performance boost from having a fixed page file than letting Window manage it (XP is better than the rest though).

Second point, everyone with a normal cashflow needs a HDD in their PC, and as such we are dicussing "Software" related ideas to reduce noise, everyone agres that suspension is a very good thing, but however the idea was to eliminate noise by other means, i.e. software.

I dont agree that software is the BEST way to fix these problems, hardware is, and always will be, however software is cheap, No-Page file is Free, a Ram-Drive is free, but more RAM is better, and I believe that an extra 1GB of RAM will help most peoples PC's become even quiter, due to the HDD getting used less.

Andy