Corsair 650D replacement fans

[darael]

I have a Corsair 650D case and I want to replace two fans in it - the rear and front ones.

I do not care for LED fans and don't want something that glows or gives me a light show.

Silence is more important than anything else. Being able to connect the fans to the 650D's fan controller so I can change fan speeds would be a nice bonus, but not necessary.

The front fan is 200mm, but it should be slim. I won't be modifying the case to accommodate a new fan.

The rear fan is 120mm and I don't think thickness is too important.

 

[darael]

Sorry to bump an old thread, but I am still looking for fans. More-so now as they are becoming noisy.

 

[Heisenberg]

I would look at noctua fans. By far the best performing fans I've used.

 

[Meddling-Monk]

Are you using your 3.5" Removable Drive Bays behind the front fan? If not, you can remove it, or move it across a bit (if you have room), and grab any 200mm (nearly) and it'll fit in fine. Although I myself grabbed a Noctua A20 for that. Otherwise, you need to look for a 200mm that's of the thin variety. The Noctua A20 is of the thicker variety and will be hard to fit in otherwise whilst those cages remain; and even if you remove to fit in first, your cages likely won't be able to fit back in the same place.

As for the rear fan, I have a Noctua A12x25, but that's because it's pushing through a lot more resistance in my case after I modded mine, otherwise, nearly any fan is suitable. Although considering the poor grille design, I'd try and find one with higher pressure on it. But again, it's all down to what you're after, more silence, or more cooling ability.

 

[darael]

I do use my 3.5" bays, but only two of them - one for my SSD and the other for my hard drive. I've always kept my hard drive in front of a fan, even if it's just slow moving. Maybe I'm just lucky or it works, but my drives always seem to last for over 5 years and I'd rather keep it like that.

I want the fans to be silent, I'm not worried about airflow. I hadn't realised fans cost so much, but I see Noctua fans come with a 6 year warranty - not bad.

 

[Finners]

I'm certain I got an aftermarket fan in mine with the drive bay cage still in place. It was a bitfenix 200mm fan can't remember the model number though.

Also for silence it made such a huge difference cutting out the grill in front of the 200mm fan. Almost all what I thought was fan noise was actually being made by the turbulence of the air passing through the grill. Cut it all away with tin snips

 

[Meddling-Monk]

I do use my 3.5" bays, but only two of them - one for my SSD and the other for my hard drive. I've always kept my hard drive in front of a fan, even if it's just slow moving. Maybe I'm just lucky or it works, but my drives always seem to last for over 5 years and I'd rather keep it like that.

Mine are from 2012, so 7-8 years, previous ones also not dead. The only ones with issues with the "Deathstars" really, but that was a known issue (after buying of course, years later, was so annoyed by that). Didn't appear to be temperature based on reliability in my instances.

But back to the point, if you are only using 2 slots in each cage, remove one cage with the two drives into the central area. And completely remove the other one. That way you can put in a thicker fan if you so desire. Believe me when I say that without modding, that area really is your only real intake of cool air, and your drives don't need more cool air than the rest of your setup (unless you went full custom water I guess, or close to it).

I want the fans to be silent, I'm not worried about airflow. I hadn't realised fans cost so much, but I see Noctua fans come with a 6 year warranty - not bad.

Depending on your ears, the Noctua A20 can still be heard in this case at anything above 60% of its fan rating. The only way not to hear it is to either cut the grille (which stops the turbulence that @Finners is talking about, or to have another section to absorb/deflect/reduce the sound in front of it (which also cuts airflow), which is what I did on mine (as well as cut grille).

I'm certain I got an aftermarket fan in mine with the drive bay cage still in place. It was a bitfenix 200mm fan can't remember the model number though.

Yep, was looking at one of these too two years back but settled on Noctua in the end so I could (at least I thought I could, turned out I couldn't) control them via the motherboard.

Also for silence it made such a huge difference cutting out the grill in front of the 200mm fan. Almost all what I thought was fan noise was actually being made by the turbulence of the air passing through the grill. Cut it all away with tin snips

Agreed. The removal of it removed the turbulance, leaving only my ears to deal with the fan itself and any released/echo'd sounds back out the front.

 

[Axel Derril]

Hello there my fellow silence seeker i am not an expert of any kind but the first thing i check when i need a fan is this small website here that lists the most important specs for many fans and sizes. I hope you guys do not consider this SPAM i am not affiliated in any way to this link nor i know the person that owns it etc. Just trying to help out: https://graphicscardhub.com/best-200mm-case-fan/ . BTW if you scroll enough i`m pretty sure you can find the other categories i`m talking about such as the quiet fans here https://graphicscardhub.com/best-silent-pc-fans/ or the HIGH CFM here https://graphicscardhub.com/high-cfm-fan-pc/ etc. I think you get the picture