Noisy silent case - Be Quiet Dark Base 700

[blaznee]

I need some help here.

System is build using Be Quiet components.
Dark Base 700 case with 2 extra 140mm 1000rpm Be Quiet case fans in the front
Be Quiet silentloop 360 cpu cooler
Be Quiet Dark power 850 psu
Asus 2080ti strix OC graphics.
And only SSD drives.

When just browsing the pc is virtually silent but gaming makes it sound like a jet engine. My old Corsair Graphite case was WAY quieter during gaming.
I can help it a little bit by taking off the front panel, but I didn't buy a premium silent case to have the front panel permanently off.

Any ideas how to fix the acoustics here?

 

[natr0n]

Put case farther away from your sitting area.

 

[Vayra86]

Wait, what. The case is quieter with the front panel OFF? Does not compute. Do the fans spin harder with the panel on? Or does the case/panel resonate?

Few things you can do:
- Run each separate fan type at different RPMs and see what noise profile is least noticeable. This has to do with acoustics of the room / your typical position in it. Configure your fan speeds such that all fans run at this RPM. Different fan types may need different RPM sweet spots. What you want is for all of them to 'sound as similar' as possible. This can include GPU and CPU fan(s) as well. Determine which one is the loudest and perhaps you may even want to reduce voltages for that part to get things in line.

- Fan curves. Fan curves that ramp up and down all the time are more noticeable than a fan running at the same speed. Configure fan curves such that you reduce the amount of spin-up and down between idle and load temps. This can be done in two ways; a very gradual curve from low to high temp, or a single cutoff point from idle to load temps, at say 60 C (for air); this cutoff is set at a temperature you will always exceed under any serious load, but never touch for light use such as browsing.

- PSU. In many cases the loudest component is often the PSU, because many PSUs have a shitty/loud fan and it tends to run longer than the CPU/GPU which cool down and heat up faster.
Check this and replace if you deem it necessary.

- ODD/HDD resonance/vibration. Not happening in your case, looking at your parts list.

- Get a proper case. Fractal for example does know how to do sound dampening... For future reference: when it says or wants to say 'premium' you're getting ripped off. Its an empty marketing term, nothing else. For cars, premium means having a (often plastic) chromed line around your windows... Complete BS.

 

[Chomiq]

It's not much of a silent case if your components are reaching higher temps due lack of airflow. Run some monitoring software while gaming and look at fan rpm's and CPU/GPU temperatures and report back. Also, check your motherboard for sys fan settings if they're not set on auto, if so manually set them to a specific value. It's a lot of trial and error.

Your Corsair case was "quiter" because your fans were running quieter on lower speeds due to better airflow.

 

[Caring1]

I need some help here.

Any ideas how to fix the acoustics here?

Stop gaming, or use headphones.
Just putting it out there, silent cases aren't known for great airflow, and not the best choice for a gaming system.

 

[Chomiq]

Oh wait, it's 2080 Ti OC? Yeah, that's probably the culprit.

 

[blaznee]

- Get a proper case. Fractal for example does know how to do sound dampening... For future reference: when it says or wants to say 'premium' you're getting ripped off. Its an empty marketing term, nothing else. For cars, premium means having a (often plastic) chromed line around your windows... Complete BS.

I don't think you know the brand Be Quiet then .. It's pretty expensive stuff, and comes highly recommended for building quiet gaming systems. Just as fractal does, but they don't do PSU's and I wanted the same fan noise profile across the case, which is why everything that can possibly have Be Quiet fans on it has it. Case, CPU and PSU coolers.

I did some testing out with the Be Quiet support, and it seems like it's the SilentLoop fans that go bananas. The reason why it stays more quiet with the front panel off, seems to be because the overall ambient case temperature stays cooler that way. They suggested moving the SilentLoop to the front of the case - but I'm not convinced the overall performance will change. Sure it's cooler air across the cpu cooler, but the air around the gpu will be significantly hotter - so then that would just spin up to crazy speeds..

Any experiences here with front mounted 360mm radiators and better acoustics that way?

P.S. It's an i9-9700k cpu, so not the coolest cpu on the planet either

 

[Vayra86]

I don't think you know the brand Be Quiet then .. It's pretty expensive stuff, and comes highly recommended for building quiet gaming systems. Just as fractal does, but they don't do PSU's and I wanted the same fan noise profile across the case, which is why everything that can possibly have Be Quiet fans on it has it. Case, CPU and PSU coolers.

I did some testing out with the Be Quiet support, and it seems like it's the SilentLoop fans that go bananas. The reason why it stays more quiet with the front panel off, seems to be because the overall ambient case temperature stays cooler that way. They suggested moving the SilentLoop to the front of the case - but I'm not convinced the overall performance will change. Sure it's cooler air across the cpu cooler, but the air around the gpu will be significantly hotter - so then that would just spin up to crazy speeds..

Any experiences here with front mounted 360mm radiators and better acoustics that way?

P.S. It's an i9-9700k cpu, so not the coolest cpu on the planet either

Sorry? 3x120mm SilentWings 3 in the front and a DRP3 on CPU They are great at fans and heatsinks / build quality, I'm not contesting that...

I know BeQuiet well, and I also know premium is an empty term. I also know that building a good case is not all that easy. There's a reason the Define series is popular. Its simply very, very well balanced in terms of airflow vs silence. Quite a few companies have tried their hand at silent cases.... CM Silencio also comes to mind, that one was like a furnace for your components.

Bottom line, be ready to accept that perhaps the case wasn't a great buy. You can always ghetto mod it... but then I'd recommend selling it and getting something else.

One more note on fan placement, you could experiment a bit with positive versus negative pressure. In some cases that can make a notable difference, which might also be what support was alluding to. But I wouldn't expect miracles, that front panel won't magically get more vents.

 

[blaznee]

I still believe in the case, but the cpu cooler is a disappointment. I tried another AIO cooler many years ago and it was also noisy. But that was a single 120mm rad one. Having 360mm I was convinced it would be a better buy. But in hindsight they still can't compete with a good aircooler for silence. I've been running Noctuas for the past 2 builds. Should have done that again.

 

[Vayra86]

What temps are you looking at? Sometimes the fan curve can also just be very aggressive and need some adjusting. Higher fan speeds, at some point barely translate into lower temps.

Other than that, yep, I stay FAR away from AIOs. If you want water, do it proper and get a custom loop that can really get you the advantage. AIOs are just more hassle at higher cost for perhaps 1-3 C profit.

 

[blaznee]

Well. I am away from my pc now but when I initially installed it the top panel was so hot I couldn't hold my hand on it. Installed the 2 extra 140mm intake fans and now it's just warm.

I'll just switch the damned thing to air cooling when I get the time

 

[EsaT]

Top is plain awful place for radiator in that case.
Without removing that top cover there's no place for air and heat to go.
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/beQuiet/Dark_Base_700/3.html
So radiator is just bathed in its own heat.
And that of graphics card, which dumps all ~300W of heat to warm up ambient inside the case.

You should show Dremel to that stamped mesh of rear fan and replace it with good old finger guard made from wire.
That would help to increase airflow and heat exhaust capability of case.
While lowering turbulence noise.

I don't think you know the brand Be Quiet then .. It's pretty expensive stuff

When did price mean automatically something?
You don't even get proper warranty length for the price of BeQuiet PSUs, but only basic five years at best...
Even for models more expensive than 12 year warranty PSUs of others.

And while BeQuiet has very nice combination damping mat as accessory, that case uses standard light foam in very thin layer, doesn't it?
Which is pretty garbage for sound damping and basically pure scam.
It doesn't work for mass damping and neither it has enough thickness to do really anything to airborne sound, while lacking also acoustic opacity.
Cheap car acoustics bitumen etc would be better for all three.

Also fans have only three year warranty for their luxury price.
While Arctic (Cooling) has 10 year warranty in normal price fans and six year warranty in some budget price fans.

Even warranty of that luxury priced (not so) Silent Loop falls short.

 

[dirtyferret]

noise is my personal pet peeve

I have three 140mm and one 120mm case fans, none of them go over 500rpm and my CPU fan never breaks 900rpm
You can control GPU fan noise through MSI afterburner or any of its equivalents

gaming, my temps are in the mid-upper 50's for CPU and mid-upper 60's for GPU

 

[thebluebumblebee]

OP, you are running into the design flaw (or maybe limitation) of the ATX case design (even with the PSU swapped to the bottom). Remember that ATX came out with the original Pentium chips, when a 250 watt PSU was HUGE. Corsair tried to address this issue with the 600C/Q case but people could not accept the PSU on top and therefore the case failed (along with the fact that the case was huge). With the ATX layout, an axial flow GPU like you have sits in a dead air zone, and basements have made this worse.
FYI, the noise has to be coming from the GPU. The front fans are 140 mm at 1000 rpm, and the fans on the Silent Loop max out at 1300 rpm. Neither of those fans' max numbers are quiet, but they won't sound like a jet engine.

You're just trying to put too much heat into that case. It was designed for a <=150 watt GPU No, the problem that I see with so many cases today is that form precedes function. Glass is nice, but it's a bit difficult to move air through it.

Suggestions:
Either cover up the "open" area on the bottom of the case in front of the PSU or put another fan down there to make sure that air (from the front fans) is not "escaping" through there.
Turn the PSU over and allow it to pull some of the heat from the GPU area.
As for the top of the case, ¡Ay, caramba!

Asus 2080ti strix OC

Have you tried the Quiet BIOS?

However, after switching to the "quiet" BIOS, the numbers are mighty impressive indeed. With just 31 dBA, the card is unbelievably quiet for its performance class. I just wonder why ASUS didn't make the "quiet" BIOS the default, as 75°C is fine as well.

I'll just switch the damned thing to air cooling when I get the time

It won't matter, there's no place for air to go with that case.

 

[Vayra86]

noise is my personal pet peeve

I have three 140mm and one 120mm case fans, none of them go over 500rpm and my CPU fan never breaks 900rpm
You can control GPU fan noise through MSI afterburner or any of its equivalents

gaming, my temps are in the mid-upper 50's for CPU and mid-upper 60's for GPU

Makes 2, I optimize my rigs around a noise level before performance. You wont find anything at max fan speed here..

 

[phanbuey]

Tune the fan curve in MSI afterburner. See if you can also optimize airflow for your components (i.e. reverse case airflow and have CPU cooler suck cold air in from the back) and make sure the gfx card has cold air hitting it.

Airflow optimization + quiet fan curves and you should be 100% fine. You can let components run in mid 80's no issues.

 

[Vayra86]

Well. I am away from my pc now but when I initially installed it the top panel was so hot I couldn't hold my hand on it. Installed the 2 extra 140mm intake fans and now it's just warm.

I'll just switch the damned thing to air cooling when I get the time

'It feels hot' can be 60 C for all we know and that is just fine. We need data

 

[TheoneandonlyMrK]

Personally I would mess about with fan headers and curves , like some above ,my noise is managed but at max clocks ,so my pc is'nt that quite.

I run at speeds high enough to cool but not beyond the water pumps whine , that's my limit.

And on the quest for quiet i figured some things worth sharing, PWM Verses DC can make a massive difference to noise levels , if a fan is set wrong ie a dc as a pwm they tend to make more noise and vice versa.

Also not all headers are equal, your CPU one will tend to drive the highest fan RPM's at load and usually can be managed , let the cpu run hotter, not too hot , my cpu sits at 72 degrees C, 100% load all day , i can get it lower but, Noise, i compromise.

Other headers for fans are not equal either , depending on the board you have, they can be setup in all sorts of ways. at worst, just maxing a fans RPM(MOSTLY commercial systems), or at best giving full power curve control.

one last thing ill have to reference my pc for is , I have a HAMP fan header, a high amp fan header. On it any fan runs too fast, i've tried 4 types ,one of which was DC and it spins them all way quicker then a system or cpu header, shrug.

but in general im with Vayra86 , fan curves and tweaking my friend.


oh and if the rear fans the noisey one, bin it, buy new ones, or leave it off go full positive pressure, and given the case I probably would fit an AIO to the roof, not front though.

 

[John Naylor]

1. Sound in rotating machinery is a function of "tip speed" ... the speed of the utside top of the rotating item, in fans, in fans though it's more a function of the speed of the air thru openings. When you take cover off, their air coming in has much wider area ... so it flows at lower velocities making less noise.

2. Nothing matters but the data. Just cause the company name is BeQuiet. that doesn't mean it is.

https://images.anandtech.com/doci/10837/3.png

3. AIO CLC type coolers will be louder, figure about twice as loud as a a air cooler. If it's about silence, CLC is generally not the way to go. In general, to equal or edge a decent $45 cooler's thermal performance, you will need to spend 3 times as much and be twice as loud.

https://tpucdn.com/reviews/Scythe/Fuma/images/temp_oc_aida64.png
https://www.guru3d.com/index.php?ct=articles&action=file&id=32815

4. More fans at lower rpm is better than less fans at higher rpm. 140mm fans are quieter when moving the same about of air since they will run at lower rpm and air velocity in doing so.

5. Use the provided MoBo utility to control fan speeds. Use separate channels for radiator and case fans. If you have the headers, use separate channels fpor intake and exhaust fans. Radiator fans being is used as inatkes will result in lower CPU temps and lower noise levels.

6. On all but budget boards, the MoBo fan control utility should have provisions for dampening the fan speed's response to changing temps to prevent whooshing sounds and it ramps up and down. For example, when the load is removed, the latent heat remains in the coolant ... so the utility is set to gradually reduce the fan speed over 90 seconds to get that latent heat out. Same on other side when heat is increasing ...otherwise as laod varies, control system keeps chasing it's tail so to speak. I shut the fans off when the curve calls fro speeds less than 250 rpm.

7. Don't give credence to advice saying "Oh that case has terrible airflow" when the claim is not backed up by data. You can't look at a case and make this determination. And you'd be surprised just how little impact on air flow these intuitive reasons have. And you can have a quiet case with good air flow. The 600S (based upon Evolv chassis) has great air flow and it's a quiet case. Start at 5:20. Turns out that removing the "too restrictive front cover" adds just 3% additional air flow

h ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6RDlHueKuU&t=236s

8. Make sure all fans have rubber mounting pads; make sure of same for all storage devices, pump whatever.

9. Always question long held beliefs as things change over time .... was a time when Noctua was king but if ya take the fans off a Noctua Cooler and replace them with Phanteks, ... at the same rpm, CPU temps drop 6C

https://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/phenteks_f140/3.htm

10. In the early days, PSUs were always at the top as we didn't have 300 watt GFX cards and the fan was used to get air out of the case. Now the bottom and behind the mobo are the more common locations.

11. Make sure that you have at least 3 intake fans for every 2 exhausts as the intakes have to push past filter restrictions.

12. A lot of the old axioms for fans are no longer as relevant .....

- "PWM fans are better cause thay have a lower cut off threshold at low rpm". This was because at low % speed, there's was not enough voltage to get DC fans moving from a dead stop and PWM is always 12v ... no longer true or at least not in many current designs. Also, you can use a PWM controlled hub and DCV fans.

- "PWM fans are noisy at low speeds.... newer designs have virtually eliminated this.


I set the fans up and test fans with the MoBo Utility.... after using the auto tune function.....

a.1 Fix pump speed at about 50%, then Run RoG Real Bench with fans at 100% speed using HWiNFO for monitoring

a.2 Make a Spreadsheet with column headers ... Pump rpm - Fan rpm - CPU Temp - Coolant Temp* - Ambient temp - Sound level

* Assuming you have a sensor

a.3 Run the Image editing or Open CL test with fans at 100% until CPU temp stabilizes and record the temps. Repeat with 90%, then 80%, then 70% down to about 30%. This should show that above a certain point, more speed is not having all that much of an effect. You will likely wind up with something rather flat and gradually increasing. Now when you play your most demanding games... see what temps you wind up with ... I see 55 - 62 in the moist demanding games, so i set the curve to go gradually up to 70C and the next point is 100% at 80C.

a.4 Keep in mind that 140mm fans in an enclosed case are inaudible below about 850 rpm. I like to use 1250 rpm as that let's me get down to about 320 rpm before fans will cut out. I have the utility shut them off below 350 rpm.

a.5 You can teak this by now addressing pump speeds the same way. Fix the fan speeds at the upper limit that you have determined is "below audible" and increase pump speeds while keeps fans fixed.

b.1 With CPU addressed, at this point, I'll switch to Furmark and address the fans and / or case fans the same way as above.

Just sitting here typing with AutoCAD and back up utility running in background ... rad fans are @ 400ish and case fans are off.

 

[Midiamp]

Well, here's my 0.2 cent. Halfway on my transition from SFF to traditional ATX format, I went for silent solutions. After my research I steer away from Be Quiet cases, especially the Dark Base 700. Since sound travels through openings, the case essentially choke every possible crevices to maximize sound dampening. In the end, it's probably the most silent case available out there given the same setup and same fan curve on different case, but definitely much worse temperature.

I settled for Fractal Design Define Mini C (should've went for the C, but oh well) and the front panel opening is quite huge compared to Dark Base version. I have zero issue with thermals on my Ryzen 2700X and RTX 2080. My 2 NF-A14 I set to peak at 1000RPM for intake and my exhaust peaks at 1200RPM at gaming, a bit noisy, but my focus would be on the game then, so not so much of an issue.

Gamersnexus did a comparison of acoustic performance between the Define C and Meshify C. They found out that the noise dampened Define C makes more noise at same thermal performance of the Meshify C. Obviously the covered front panel obstructs the airflow, whereas the Meshify C have free open air path, making the fan spins slower to push the same amount of air compared to the Define C.

I think everybody above me already posted the perfect solution, play with fan curves. It will still be noisy, but the Dark Base is built for silence and not thermal performance. Two chamber design case like Corsair's original Carbide Air is great for thermal performance, or go broke with open cases like Thermaltake Core P3.

There's no such thing as "perfect" solution, life is full of compromise.

 

[advanced3]

With custom fan curves your fans will only be loud when you're gaming with headphones on.

 

[GObonzo]

@blaznee i would suggest putting the 360mm AiO inside the chassis on the front panel with the 3x 120mm fans blowing through it from inside the front panel. or setup a push/pull configuration similar to the one i describe below.

obviously most of these members have no experience with Be Quiet and their products. replies like Vrayla's appear to be fan-boy based BS or based on reviews done by YouTube idiots that can't arrange their cooling properly.

i also have the Dark Base 700.
with a 280mm EVGA AiO in the front, setup in a push/pull configuration. 3x Cryorig QF120 Silents are located inside the front panel pulling air in and pushing air through the radiator. the radiator is attached to the front inside the chassis with 2x 140mm Silent Wings 3 High Speeds attached to it pulling air through the radiator into the interior of the chassis. cooling my 8700K @ 5GHz.
a 1080 Ti FTW3 GPU.
2x 3200 RAM.
on a ASUS Z370 E-ATX board.
2x 2TB HDs and a Dark Power Pro 11 750w inside the PSU shroud with it's smaller top-front panel removed.
and 2x SSDs behind the motherboard tray and an m.2 installed.
with 2x Cryorig 140mm QF140 Silents exhausting out of the rear and rear-top(directly under the top vents).

my CPU idles ~35° and maxes ~65° even with the highest demand applications/processes running.
my GPU idles ~30° and with the most demanding games with their highest settings @ 1440p/165Hz, maxes ~60°.

all of my fan curve profiles(AIO, motherboard, GPU) are set at a similar curve; 30° @ 35% > 50° @ 70% > 70° @ 90%.
and it is quieter than any other build i've put together over the last 20+ years. also quieter than any of the setups friends or family members have.

of course there's cases with much better airflow, and therefore can have their fans set to lower RPMs. but will still be much louder due to the sound escaping at more intervals.
it all comes down to a matter of aesthetics and personal choice. this case looks better than 90+% of those out there with better airflow and those with better sound dampening. so this would be my choice again for sure.