Sound dampening material? (Noise absorption)

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Eric1285

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Feb 10, 2003
Messages
1,517
Well, I installed a 120mm side intake into my case, and it is LOUD. It's rated at 84CFM/31dBa, but it is much louder than any of my other 31dBa fans. I have rubber grommets between the side panel and the fan, but I want it to be even quieter. I bought a bunch of this rubber foam material from Lowes today...It's a little less than 1CM thick, and it's very, very dense foam. It's supposed to be used under carpets to make it more springy, but it I thought it might suck up sound pretty well. Anyways, I've cut some strips and stuffed them into the sides of my panel (pic below). It doesn't seem to do much, but I was wondering, if I cover the whole bottom of my case, will it help? The stuff is butt ugly, but it's dirt cheap. Is there any special way to install this type of stuff? I'm just stuffing it in anywhere it fits. My friend says I need a roller and heat gun, but I don't have those. Anyways, here's the pic...let me know if I'm just wasting my time before I go on.

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should probably work
I use neoprene

every little bit counts
 
Since your fan is mounted on a window it's going to be hard to quiet it down.

Vibrational noise can be dampened with the rubber grommets you have and by adding mass to the area around the fan, the foam you bought would probably work. But since it's on a window that would look ugly. Just adding it to the bottom of the case will do little, because the area the vibration is coming from is the side panel with the window. Adding mass to the rest of the case will dampen the rest of the case from vibrating but the source will still vibrate.

Actual fan noise and noise from air movement can only be dampened by muffling or turning down the fan with a fan controller (like vantec nexus, etc.). A cheap way to quiet the fan down is to use the 7volt trick, listed in the case mod sticky. A muffler like the one from http://www.muffledcomputing.com would reduce noise a bit, but it's impractical for side blow holes.
 
Hm, I see what you're saying. Yeah, I thought it might be hard to dampen the noise, since I'm not putting anything on the window. I think the stuff I attached to the sides of the side panel increase the mass by a lot. It's definately a lot heavier (the foam is really, really dense). For the fan, I'm slowing down airflow a bit with a homemade filter, and I will be getting a 7 volt switch for it. I'm thinking about spending the extra money for one of the sound dampening kits at svc for the bottom of my kit and the other side panel, because that'll just look so much better than this ugly grey matter that I have here.
 
I line my cases with neoprene
it will help diffuse all the "hard" reflective soundwaves
your window however could be considered a "drum head"

http://members.aol.com/uniquenyc/key24.htm
http://www.noise-busters.com/soundproofing.htm
just think of your case as a house with real loud machines in it
when you sound prrof walls, floors ect, hanging anything on the major flat surfaces will help absorb the energy in the sound waves, if you where to "float" the window some of the reflective sound its currently transmitting would be translated into kinteic movement, of course that doesnt address the direct soundwave that escape from the fan into the room

the basic principles are the same
 
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