are there many quiet 80mm case fans?

[ExoMale]

i know in some scenarios a fan this size can be quiet noisy due to its type, but i took delivery of this case yesterday and while im looking for parts to go in it i was thinking of getting a fan for the bottom and while i dont know the decibel of the stock fan yet, as always, would like any new additions to run near silent without messing around with fan controllers etc.

My basket at Overclockers UK:

• 1 x Aerocool CS101 Micro ATX Case - Black= £26.99

Total: £37.49 (includes shipping: £10.50)​

​

havent decided what to put in it yet, but will want good airflow as well.

 

[LuckyBenski]

I use a 9v battery, a few 1.5V ones and some jumper leads to test fans before setting up a system. Ultimately fan speed correlates to noise so an 80mm PWM fan can be quiet. And then can ramp up to match other system fans.

 

[Rroff]

From a lot of recent experimenting - cheap and a good chance of decently low noise the Arctic Cooling F series silent fan. Noctua offerings are good but I settled on Be Quiet! Silent Wings despite the cost as while not necessarily the quietest though very close (no fans are truly silent above very low RPM) I found the noise they made the easiest of anything I tried to ignore - might be somewhat subjective but I found I quickly stopped hearing any noise from them unless I concentrated on it while some of the others the slight drone I was always subconsciously aware of.

IIRC The Noctua ones are slightly better compromise between airflow and noise level than the Be Quiet though.

A lot of the other brands really aren't close to silent - I used to recommend 1-2 others (i.e. Akasa) but increasingly the quality control just doesn't seem to be quite there and you have to buy like 10 to find 2-3 that are actually close to silent.

 

[LuckyBenski]

+1 for Arctic F series, I've used 80mm and 120mm PWM and been very pleased, especially for the price.

Rroff is also right that fans vary, and if you want the quietest it's worth buying one or two spares and cherry-picking the best. Arctic fans are available in 3 and 4 packs

 

[ExoMale]

thanks for replies.

good shout on the Arctics, i will check those out.

i havent had many experiences with fans, if its not case fans included from factory its those store brands from the closing down M store, but i have had some led icutes that were fairly quiet and did use to buy those coolermaster stickleflows, but they started to become as loud as the stock fan on my elite 110 lol, so they wasnt worth buying anymore even for the lights, i have always read the Nocts to be the best for quiet, but they come at a price im not willing to spend most the time, some on the zon between £13-20 i could get with prime, but they seem better suited for heatsinks?.

not many cases ive had that have only ever needed 80mm which is why i needed to ask before buying, i dont think this case would be good with just the single exhaust fan.

 

[Rroff]

+1 for Arctic F series, I've used 80mm and 120mm PWM and been very pleased, especially for the price.

I've a couple of data cabinets that I've stuck NAS, etc. into and used Arctic Cooling fans on them connected up to 5V they are pretty much silent and still provide good airflow - quite impressed. I did consider using them on some of my PCs but when it came down to it at the speeds I needed for the airflow I wanted there the Be Quiet! won out.

I used to use Akasa Apache Blacks for my PCs but it is such a lottery whether they are truly close to silent or not and 1-2 of them after a couple of years or so had started to run a little off centre or something making a horrid noise so I decided to replace the lot while I was at it.

 

[EsaT]

Just stay with standard design Airctic Cooling fans and avoid those F "Pro" marketing BS fans.
Those vibrate lot and without frame their airflow is only worser, because instead of actually pushing air to where it's supposed to go lots of air leaks radially away.

If motherboard has fan "open" header accepting 4-pin PWM conenctor that could be better for good scaling if you have hotter components there.
Motherboard doesn't even have to support PWM control but can use voltage control.
F8 Silent's 1200rpm max might be low in case of needing more cooling.
Though of course if default is no fan in that spot then even 1200rpm would give some airlfow and wouldn't make much noise even at full speed.

Stock fan's speeds is reasonably low, just don't have much trust for bling bling Aerocool using good design fan.
Though speed limits possible airflow noises caused by design...
https://www.aerocool.com.tw/au/chssis/pgs-c/cs101

i have always read the Nocts to be the best for quiet

Noctua is only best in hype.
NF-S12 is so quiet per RPM because it's pressure impotent and can't really push air against any impedance.
It actually made SilentPCreview change testing method from their original, because unlike suggested by impeller anemometer testing people had temps actually increasing:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article734-page1.html
(designed to fool impeller anemometer?)

And NF-P12 and NF-F12 which have come bundled with Noctua's expensive heatsinks (no excuses for can't afford QC) aren't that good either.
First of all both vibrate badly, which causes case (or even table if you put fan onto it) amplify noise.
And P12 has quirks developing at certain rpms some weird resonances (likely those big notches in blades) described by SPRC as airplane flying nearby.
While F12 has all around mediocre sound signature, no doubt because those motor hub supports being in same angle as/parallel to trailing edge off blades.
(which causes constant big "bumbs" for airflow pushed by blades)

For comparison from nearly dozen Scythe SlipStreams (costing one third of Noctua) I've had only two have had vibration detectable when keeping fan in hand
And they have no acoustical quirks with smooth noise scaling with airflow.


Noctua NF-R8 and Noiseblocker BlackSilent Fan XC1 have motor hubs supports partially parallel to trailing edge, so those might get noise from that at more significant speeds.

Noiseblocker BlackSilent X1/X2 again has good looking geometry.

 

[doyll]

Lots of good info.

I think be quiet! are the best, some Noctua are good and Arctic F series (except Pro as stated above) the best value and perform amazingly.

 

[Pocah]

The smaller a fan is the less air it shifts at the same RPM so smaller fans do less cooling unless they are running faster, in other words making more noise. Of the small fans I have used Noctua are by far and away the best, but they are expensive.

 

[Rroff]

Just stay with standard design Airctic Cooling fans and avoid those F "Pro" marketing BS fans.
Those vibrate lot and without frame their airflow is only worser, because instead of actually pushing air to where it's supposed to go lots of air leaks radially away.

Yeah I was talking about the standard ones - I've not spent a lot of time with the Pros though similar was used on the old arctic freezer 7 pro they seem better suited to moving air through heatsink fins than as regular case intake/exhaust so might work well with rads dunno.

F8 Silent's 1200rpm max might be low in case of needing more cooling.
Though of course if default is no fan in that spot then even 1200rpm would give some airlfow and wouldn't make much noise even at full speed.

Any degree of "silence" pretty much goes out the door above 1200RPM anyhow and which fans are the most acceptable at higher speeds completely changes compared to to lower speeds IMO.

NF-S12 is so quiet per RPM because it's pressure impotent and can't really push air against any impedance.

Pretty much goes for any of the "silent" fans that operate upto 1200RPM - not tried the NF-S12 but the other Noctuas didn't seem much different to me in this regard to the rest of the pack I tried but then I was mostly going on temps and waving my hand around in the airflow heh. Maybe I was just expecting more for the hype and price but I wasn't really that impressed with them I thought they were good but didn't really stand out from the other ones that performed well like the Arctic Cooling and Be Quiet! - Be Quiet! are a bit anaemic airflow wise as well but I found the noise when they were audible the easiest to live with of any of the offerings. The Akasa Apache Blacks actually move a nice amount of air for the noise level but they aren't particularly different to any other standard fan once you get above a little over 1000 RPM and the quality is just so varied - none of them are bad bad but so many either vibrate badly (for use as a quiet fan) out the box or seem to develop vibrations after a bit of use the good ones are really good though.