Lost on case cooling?

AudiophileUk

Hi all, just did my first PC upgrade in 8 years, and included a Fractal Design C Mid (with 2x GF-12X2 dc fans -1200rpm/52cfm/19.4db) and AMD 2700X. I got a Noctua NH-U12S CPU cooler which thankfully is silent.

I had an Arctic F12 PWM (1250rpm/57cfm/22db) so I added that to the front. Also had a F12 Silent I didn't use.

Now first thing, the Arctic is much noisier than the GP12's! Surprised me, especially as it's the only PWM fan!

This led me into the unknown world of fan curves. It seems very arbitrary, as it is I've set them so at idle I can't hear them which seems to mean I spin them at 600rpm odd. Surely their is a sensible way these should be set, was easier in the old days when a fan just ran at 100% and if it was noisy you got a quiet one, now it seems we don't know if its noisy until we know the CFM its pushing at a given rpm...

I was considering swapping all fans to 3x  fractal 140mm GP14x2 as these seem to be quieter than the Arctic's....

anyone have any advice?

Heres the curves at full load with GPU.
                                                                       

EndlessWaves

Just set it low enough that it's quiet during normal use, with a ramp up at the end (say 80-85°C ) in case of unusual events.

How much airflow you need is dependant on components, case, fans etc. so it varies between builds. I'd just set it as high as possible for each fan while maintaining silence and see how it goes, you can always up the speed if you see any throttling.

It sounds like your cooling system is already pretty over the top for a single, non-overclocked CPU so I would expect you to be able to run everything at low RPM.

AudiophileUk

ah thankyou that reply is helpful! My powersupply is prob now the most noisy part so just swapped that out, can relax in peace at last