I've wanted to build myself a PC since I was about 14 and now I've finally built one. My 360 has been headed to hell for some time so I figured a budget PC was a good replacement. It plays my favorite games beautifully and around 40 to 60 fps on high settings except I have a problem with noise. Being fairly new to actual PC gaming and having only used a laptop I have to ask, is it normal for the fan to sound like a miniature box-fan when gaming? I did only spend about $340 minus shipping on it so it's not high end or anything like that. The games I play include the first 5 Assassin's Creed games, the first 3 Arkham games along with the less demanding games like Besiege and the lego games but it still sounds the same. My specs are here: Gigabyte Micro ATX GA-78LMT-USB3 motherboard AMD FX 4300 processor EVGA 400W power supply 8GB Kingston HyperX Fury RAM Asus GeForce GTX 750ti 2gb graphics card Rosewill Micro ATX Mini Tower Computer SRM-01 case And a 500gb 5400RPM hard drive salvaged from my old laptop I'm using the stock case fan and the stock CPU fan if that matters, when I was building the PC most said that aftermarket fans were overkill and not required. Other than the sound though, this machine surpasses my expectations of it and I'm very happy with it. ---------- Post added 22nd Aug 2016 at 04:16 PM ---------- Sorry if I'm sounding like a tech support customer, I tried googling it but couldn't find a definitive answer.
High-performance processors need beefy cooling. That means either a fan RPM higher than those you'd get from a basic desktop, or higher diameter, or both. Higher RPM means it will be noisier, since the motor is pulling more power and turning faster. If you want to reduce the noise, I'd recommend a bigger fan and some software to control the RPM, letting you turn it down when you're not heavily loading the CPU. The only problem might be if it doesn't fit, leading you into making a bigger opening in the case for the increased airflow.
Sometimes a hair or similar gets stuck in a fan, making it spin uneven, and this causes the fan to wobble and be a lot louder than it's supposed to. You think that could be why?
Do you know which fan is loud? While running something, try to figure out if the sound is coming from the cpu fan, case fan, graphics card fan, or power supply fan. Is the noise a normal fan sound, or is there surging, rubbing, rumbling, whining? If it sounds like a normal running fan blowing air, then it could just be a loud fan. If there is some other sound, something could be unbalanced or broken. Aftermarket fans are overkill if you aren't overclocking. But they're also good for running quieter. If the sound is coming from just the cpu or case fan, and you want quiet, you should be able to find a good aftermarket replacement for $20-$40. Bigger is quieter, just make sure it fits in your case. If the sound is on the graphics card or power supply, the easiest fix is a new, and probably more expensive one. (If you swap out a fan yourself don't forget paste!) Desktops in general will be a little louder than a xbox or laptop. But shouldn't sound like a jet engine.
pace e amore, yeah I imagine since you only spent about $340 for your setup, its basically a cheap fan. You get what you pay for. Higher end gaming systems start at maybe $600-800 for desktop and $800-$1000 for a gaming laptop and go up from there toward 2 or 3,000. The other thing is, yes, you use a processor near 100% it's going to burn up with out a fan constantly cooling it. Some things to try: To mitigate this, and if you feel comfortable doing so. Buy and replace the current fan with a higher end one, if possible. A higher end fan will run much quieter if it's higher quality with better parts. Depending on your setup, and using a scheme of longer video cable and wireless mice and keyboard, you can locate the tower some distance away to where it doesn't bother you. I use a 46" Sony Bravia as my main computer monitor with a 12ft HDMI cable so I can put the computer on the other side of the room if I like. I've had fans fail on me before, and usually the whole PC is near the end of it's useful life so I open up the case or if its a laptop, I just buy a regular fan and place it a couple feet away from the PC and point it at it. I would recommend caution on doing this with some PCs though as they have specially engineered air flow regulation and they need that to cool everything properly. But generally one of those $9.99 clippy fans from walgreens will do a lot of work towards keeping your PC cool and they are usually quieter than a PC fan. Figuring out what works best on this might keep the fan from clicking on and running high and loud as often. So, either buy a better fan, relocate the device or add a helper fan that's quieter to help the main fan run less often. This is also kind of an out there idea, but maybe you can get one of those USB fan/cooling mats for laptops and somehow rig it inside the pc or pointed at the PC with the side lid off. If who wanted to finish that off better you could always go fancy and mount the USB PC cooling fan to a piece of colored plexiglass cut to fit the cooling fan, perhaps with some cool lights and cut it down to size so it becomes the new side-lid for your pc. Lots of fun things to do with a little time and a trip to the hardware store. --Scanner
