Is it worthwhile to upgrade the stock fans on the 500D for a quieter build?

I recently purchased a 550D case and used it to make a quiet build, and I love it! I was wondering if it would be worth it to upgrade the fans by replacing the stock fans on the 550D with the quiet versions of the Air Series fans though?

 

Basically my question is whether the quiet editions of the Air Series fans like the AF120 120mm would be any quieter than the stock fans that come with the 550D case?

 

From some searches I've done it seems like maybe the stock fans have the same decibels as the quiet edition AF210 120mm fans, right? So are they pretty much the same then in terms of noise, but just move more air around? Or would there be any benefit to upgrading the 550D fans that I'm not considering sound-wise?

 

Also, if I did upgrade the fans to the Air Series, I'm thinking that the most optimal setup would be to have one quiet edition AF120 120mm fan at the back of the case, and then two quiet edition SP120 Quiet Edition 120mm fans at the front of the case, correct? Or would that be a bad idea if I'm trying to keep things quiet since the SP fans have higher decibels than the stock fans or the AF fans?

 

Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks for the great products! I love the case and the PSU I got from Corsair, as they really helped to ensure that my first build was both easy and successful.

If it was me, I would upgrade to 3 AF140s, the SPs are for water cooling as someone recently told me. You can put one of the stock 120s in front of your PSU on the bottom and it should still be extremely quiet.

Oh really? The SPs are for water cooling? I thought that I would need them in order to pull air through the front of the case when it is fully closed, since the 55D is kind of blocked up front in terms of air flow.

What people fail to notice is that the front fans have plenty of air flow, vented at the bottom and the sides, with the bezel sweeping backwards to deflect noise away from the front of the case. AF140s are going to pull more air than the stock 120s, you should be fine. Honestly my old case that I'm upgrading to 550D has 5 80mm fans, all air cooled, 50C CPU @ 37.5% CPU Fan, 29C GPU @ 33% GPU Fan, 60C Northbridge. 3 120s = 4 1/2 80s. I haven't decided yet if I'm going to upgrade the fans. Might just get a single 140 for in front of the PSU (draw more air from the bottom of the case where it will be coolest).

If I were you I would get 2 AF120 Quiets and an AF120 for exhaust. Don't get SP's the AF's are much quieter and have no difficulty pulling air through the front as mentioned above it is barely even restricted.

 

In mine I seem to notice the fan in the bottom next to the PSU is more audible than the others so I would not put one there on a quiet build. Also running the PSU with the fan coming out of the case would be a little quieter.

If I were you I would get 2 AF120 Quiets and an AF120 for exhaust. Don't get SP's the AF's are much quieter and have no difficulty pulling air through the front as mentioned above it is barely even restricted.

 

In mine I seem to notice the fan in the bottom next to the PSU is more audible than the others so I would not put one there on a quiet build. Also running the PSU with the fan coming out of the case would be a little quieter.

 

 

Yeah, the exhaust fan is the main one that I can hear in mine as well. What do you mean about running the PSU with the fan coming out of the case though?

I just built my 550d system last week. I opted to go with the Air series (quiet versions) right off the bat so I don't know what difference, if any, they would have from the stock fans.

 

For a silent PC you want to put the least amount of fans possible and try to keep them away from areas that are exposed to the outside, like the bottom of the case next to the PSU. You only want to use those slots if you're having trouble keeping things cool. I'm sticking with only 3 fans (rear and two front). I upgraded to the AF140 for the rear exhaust, the goal here was to be able to push more air out and require less RPM/noise. In the front of the case I took the top drive bracket off and put an AF120 for increased airflow into the case which pushes it right to my graphics card. For the lower fan next to the drive bracket I put in an SP120. As previous posters mentioned these usually go next to radiators, and I think the same principle holds true if you have a drive bracket right next to it. From what I understand the SP's are designed to push air through a radiator.

 

The last part of my silent build was changing the stock CPU fan to an aftermarket heatsink/fan.

I upgraded to the AF140 for the rear exhaust, the goal here was to be able to push more air out and require less RPM/noise.

 

Do you use the low wattage adapter on the AF140 in the rear in order to make it so that there are less RPM? Or would that be insufficient in order to keep the case cool?

it all depends on how the fans are set up as to what noise there will be,. running straight out of the box usually results in noise

-i have 2 computers,one with 7 stock h100 fans,the other with 8 h100 fans and set right you cant hear any noise sitting right next to them.

Do you use the low wattage adapter on the AF140 in the rear in order to make it so that there are less RPM? Or would that be insufficient in order to keep the case cool?

 

Yes I use the low wattage adapter. I'm not sure if that's needed since I use the fan controller on the mobo. I haven't read up on it yet to see if using both is redundant.

 

I haven't had time yet to do any temperature tests, hopefully in the next few days.

I just ran a few quick tests, Prime95 and 3dMark06. CPU max temp was 66C and GPU max temp was 61C. I'm running a 212 Evo, no OC.

I OC'ed my CPU to 4.5GHz/1.33V and saw temps go up to 88C on the CPU during Prime95 for 15 min. I lowered down to 4.2GHz/1.16V and ran Prime95 overnight and reached max temps of 78C. All fans were running at 100%.

 

I ran FurMark this morning and with case fans at idle (35% ~400RPM). My GPU at stock overclock got to 78C, the GPU fan only went to 50% (~1600RPM). I ran the same test with case fans going at 100% and only got the GPU down to 77C.