Tuesday, January 21, 2003

Noisy Office

One of my chief complaints about my home office is the ambient noise level from the various computer systems. To the point that I'm starting to look at the dB level of various components. Fan noise is the biggest contributer to the problem. If I remember, every additional 10dB is twice as loud. According to Dangerous Decibels a humming refrigerator is 40 dB, usual conversation is 60 dB, and city traffic weighs in at around 80 dB. Another list gives the following values.

0 dB Threshold of hearing
10 dB Rustling of leaves
20 dB Whisper
30 dB Quiet conversation
40 dB Average home
50 dB Normal conversation
60 dB Busy shop
70 dB City street
80 dB Busy workplace
90 dB Underground railway
100 dB Pneumatic drill 10ft away
110 dB Propeller aircraft taking off
120 dB Jet aircraft taking off

First up is CPU fans (2CoolTek). At the top end of the scale is the Delta 60mm 50cfm fan which weighs in at 54 dB. The YS Tech 60mm Xtreme 40cfm Fan isn't much quieter at 48.2 dB. Next down the list I see a Sunon 60mm High Output (23.5cfm) fan that is 33.5 dB.

Now, the other place I know of is Cooler Guys. One of the el-cheapos is the Vantec FCE-62540D 38cfm and 42.5 dB.

posted by Wuphon's at 6:22 AM