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[InflatableMouse]

Since I built my HTPC I've added an Asus GT430 (passive) and an Asus Xonar Essence ST with HDAV expansion board. I also shortly after decided I didn't want a NAS anymore and put all the discs in the HTPC and used Drive Bender to pool the discs. But that lead to a problem. That motherboard only has 6 SATA connectors and with the SSD for booting and a bluray drive that leaves only 4 for mass storage. I had already disconnected the bluray drive to install an extra harddisk but the case didn't have enough harddisk trays. I had to move the SSD to a bay converted 3.5" (with screws only on 1 side, the SSD is 2.5") so I could say that case was quite packed. The mATX board didn't have any available PCI slots anymore either so adding a SATA card was out of the question too.

This week I decided to get another motherboard to get some more SATA space and possibly add a SATA card in the future. I got the ASrock H77 Pro4 and got the Fractal Design XL Usb 3 case. This case is a monster. 10 drive bays and optionally 5,25 bay conversion possible. It is huge and the case alone without anything installed (not even PSU) weighs 17 kilograms! Figured while I was spending money I'd get an extra 4TB disk as well so all 8 SATAs are in use already

System is up and running again, stress tested and all. One thing annoys me though which the Antec didn't do. Disk vibrations are passed onto the wooden cabinet its sitting in and its audible in a quiet room. The Antec was absolutely silent. I need to play around some, maybe loosen some screws or place something beneath the case, not sure yet.

Anyways, I'm happy. The H77 Pro4 is a really nice board, its fast and its stable. I like the case for its slick straightforward design and enormous space inside but the vibrations need to go.

[glynor]

System is up and running again, stress tested and all. One thing annoys me though which the Antec didn't do. Disk vibrations are passed onto the wooden cabinet its sitting in and its audible in a quiet room. The Antec was absolutely silent. I need to play around some, maybe loosen some screws or place something beneath the case, not sure yet.

You can get rubber grommets to go between the screws and the case and they really cut down on that spinning vibration.  I've bought them from here before (though it was a long while back):

http://www.frozencpu.com/

You could also probably just go get some cheap rubber washers from the local hardware store.  The set I got also had special screws that had the appropriate "spacer" to take up the width of the rubber grommit.  Many cases come with these (my Obsidian 650D did), but if yours didn't, they're a cheap add-on and it makes a big difference.

[InflatableMouse]

The harddisk trays have these rubber or silicon isolators, washers, whatever they are called. here's a picture:
http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z112/Thesin56/PC/22222.png

Is that what you mean? The Antec had exactly those trays as well but they also had longer screws with a part unthreaded so you couldn't screw them too tight.

I'll try loosening the screws some tomorrow see if that helps.

[glynor]

The harddisk trays have these rubber or silicon isolators, washers, whatever they are called. here's a picture:
http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z112/Thesin56/PC/22222.png

Is that what you mean? The Antec had exactly those trays as well but they also had longer screws with a part unthreaded so you couldn't screw them too tight.

I'll try loosening the screws some tomorrow see if that helps.

Yep, that's what I meant (and yes, mine are silicone too, surely).

You might just have:

Too many disks (more rotation = more vibration).
Some noisy disks.  Different models behave differently.

[InflatableMouse]

I loosened the screws for the harddisk brackets, it makes a minor difference.

with the pc sitting in the bios screen I unplugged the power to each harddisk one by one, until the annoying hum dissapeared. Although each drive contributed a little, one drive in particular contributed like half the hum by itself. Appeared its screws were much tighter than the other drives so about half the humming is gone.

I guess I can live with it like this, I can hear the fridge too from the living room when everything is quiet and its about the same level as that, depending on how you turn your head or where you stand in the living room.

[InflatableMouse]

I placed an 8mm thick floor insulation board under the case. It prevents most of the case resonance to pass to the wooden cabinet its sitting in.

The humming was driving me nuts. It was very weird. From the listening position you could here a very profound hum. If you moved forward as much as 20cm, it was gone. That hum couldn't be heard anywhere else in the room, except in that one spot or when you stuck you head behind or in the cabinet itself.

Sound is weird.

Reminds me of a song by Philip Glass, 'Changing Opinion' from the album 'Songs from liquid days'. Awesome song with even awesomer lyrics.

[glynor]

Good thinking!

Sound is weird.

For sure.  Makes sense, though.  The cabinet was, essentially, acting as a "natural" acoustic amplifier, just like a hollowbody guitar.

In highschool, I worked at our school's planetarium.  The sound in that place was amazing.  If you sat right up on the "machine" (the star projector) with it put down in its hole, and listened to music, it sounded like the music was coming from inside your body.  The effect was unbelievable.

Good times.

[dean70]

I used a less elegant solution to solve this issue - strapped a couple of layers of bubble wrap under the enclosure. 

[mickrick]

Funny this discussion was going on when I was just planning for exactly the same issue. In my case, I got a roll of furniture removal wrapping for my enclosure to sit on. Its flat on one side and like bubble wrap on the other but quite thick (I have a friend who works for a removal company and he got it for me foc). Its white though, so I'm going to have to spray it black, at least on the flat side.

I'm also going to suspend my 2.5" hard drive using "stretch magic" beaan jewellry thread to cut down on vibration (unless I go SSD).

[glynor]

If you ever want something a little nicer... I used this stuff all the time in a (long ago) previous life installing car stereos.  Best stuff there is for solving rattles in the trunk when you load it up with 3 Orion 10s.  They have all sorts of crazy versions...

[InflatableMouse]

With the drive hum gone, the fans were getting on my nerves! Time for action.

Installed a Scythe 4-way fan controller (the flat one), bought 3 new fans, Scyte whatever silent 500rpm. Top fan 180mm now runs on 240rpm, front fans (in front of the disks) run at 180-240rpm. CPU fan is still on the mobo but was already running reasonably low at 600rpm.

Finally its as silent as the old case again.

I can get really annoyed by humming.   

[Hilton]

Nice job but I would be running a disk S.M.A.R.T. program to check your disk temps with fans that slow with so many disks. Optimal disk temp is between 35C and 40C. (100-110F) Up to 45C or 50C (113-122F) absolute max, but after that you start to significantly increase the risk of early failure.

Most manufacturers specify an operating range of 0-60c with 60c killing drive bearings quite quickly!

Make sure you have some sort of workload running when you check temps.

Use this.. http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php  

[InflatableMouse]

Thanks for the tip! I'm running Hard Disk Sentinel Pro. Disk temperatures rarely go above 40 °C. I would run speedfan to control the fans but the BIOS does a good enough job for the CPU fan and that mainboard doesn't work well with speedfan, hence the fan controller.

Current Temperature   :   24 °C
Maximum Temperature (During Entire Lifespan)   :   37 °C

This is typical for all the disks. Current temps are 34 °C.

I found that a small draft is enough, they don't require a lot of air moving over them to keep them cool. I tried it without fans first which would have been ideal but when the air stands still temperatures escalate quickly because they simmer in their own heat. There's no draft down there from the other fans, their air is sucked in from the top front. I could change that but its not necessary, these fans make no audible sound whatsoever.

I'm waiting for real life benchmarks from the new Zalman passive cooler, its supposed to work with up to 77TDW, perfect for the i5. If its able to keep the temps between 70-75 °C under full load I'll get that. It never runs full load anyways .