8 ms·

I'm pretty happy with my setup. My garage shares a wall with my living room, so I put the tower out there. I then ran high quality, 25' long dvi and usb cables

I'm pretty happy with my setup. My garage shares a wall with my living room, so I put the tower out there. I then ran high quality, 25' long dvi and usb cables to the desk in my living room. Edit: I currently have two gtx1050 in it running at full power, and can't hear the fans at all.

mipmap04 8y ago
What sort of ambient temperature do you normally have in your garage?
- pvg 8y ago
  With the two GPUs running full tilt, probably good enough to easily add 'tropical plant horticulture' to one's hobbies.
  - make3 8y ago
    unless he's in a northern country. if it's was in my garage, the machine would probably not need fans
    - pvg 8y ago
      Someone started a fire with their cryptocurrency mining rig in an apartment somewhere near Vladivostok this past February. All it takes a little dedication!
- tsomctl 8y ago
  Between 50 and 70 F. It's unheated/uncooled, but I live in a temperate environment.
robotnixon 8y ago
I did the same but the tower is in my basement. I ran an HDMI and USB cable up thru the wall and into a keystone panel behind my TV. Other than occasionally having to manually flip the tower back on after a power outage it worked pretty flawlessly. Totally silent and no tower to hide in my living room.
- blanderman 8y ago
  "wake on USB" could save you from manually switching the PC back on.
  - 8xde0wcNwpslOw 8y ago
    I haven't found such functionality in my MoBo, but a tinkerer could also use one more cord to move the power button where the rest of the controls are.
    - 0xfeba 8y ago
      An Alexa "skill" or whatever integration would be cool: "Alexa, turn on the computer!"
    - efreak 8y ago
      Wake on lan then?
- matthew-wegner 8y ago
  There should be a “power state” setting in BIOS to turn back on after a power outage. There are also power button remotes that could work, depending on distance: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MQUANS8/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MQUANS8/
gerdesj 8y ago
At the risk of me too! I have a Dell T420 with eight spindles in the loft above our bedroom, plus assorted UPS, APU2 based router, switches and a mini ATX based thing for MythTV. I screwed four lengths of 4" x 2" between two roofing joists to make two trapeziums. I then screwed a 3/4" thick sheet of chipboard to the bottom and then wrapped the top and sides in roofing felt (some protection in case of roof failure). The loft is lagged 200mm deep with 3/4" chipboard on top which deadens the noise nicely. The Dell was running the fans quite a lot today when I went up to check on something - 25C outside in Somerset, UK today.
saagarjha 8y ago
Personally, I just don't like computing at a distance. I actually like hearing things like fan noise or hard drive sounds, as long as they're not incessant, because it can serve as a subtle notification that the computer might be doing something in the background that I might not have realized otherwise.
- fipple 8y ago
  But then a silent build wouldn’t be interesting to you at all. The garage idea is good for someone who does want Silent computing.
  - saagarjha 8y ago
    Hmm, I guess. I think my MacBook Pro strikes a nice balance: it's silent 95% of the time, and I get some fans up when I run builds or something hangs in the background.
- always_good 8y ago
  Better to have usage stats always visible like iStat Menus: https://bjango.com/mac/istatmenus/ https://bjango.com/mac/istatmenus/ Fans don't tell the whole story. Network traffic is super useful to see as well. Also, if your computer never gets hot enough, it can be doing plenty of unwanted background work without setting off the fans.
  - saagarjha 8y ago
    I have that, but I'm not always watching it. Sound lets me know to glance up at my menu bar to see what's going on.
- welly 8y ago
  On a slightly different but related subject, I live on a boat with a diesel engine. Being able to hear the engine run and hear the change of tone is something I couldn't live without. I often run the engine to heat my water and the very slightest change of tone has my ears pricking up, panicking with "I've not heard that sound before! What's up with it? Is it broken? Am I going to sink??" running through my head.

mipmap04 8y ago

What sort of ambient temperature do you normally have in your garage?

pvg 8y ago
With the two GPUs running full tilt, probably good enough to easily add 'tropical plant horticulture' to one's hobbies.
- make3 8y ago
  unless he's in a northern country. if it's was in my garage, the machine would probably not need fans
  - pvg 8y ago
    Someone started a fire with their cryptocurrency mining rig in an apartment somewhere near Vladivostok this past February. All it takes a little dedication!
tsomctl 8y ago
Between 50 and 70 F. It's unheated/uncooled, but I live in a temperate environment.

robotnixon 8y ago

I did the same but the tower is in my basement. I ran an HDMI and USB cable up thru the wall and into a keystone panel behind my TV. Other than occasionally having to manually flip the tower back on after a power outage it worked pretty flawlessly. Totally silent and no tower to hide in my living room.

blanderman 8y ago
"wake on USB" could save you from manually switching the PC back on.
- 8xde0wcNwpslOw 8y ago
  I haven't found such functionality in my MoBo, but a tinkerer could also use one more cord to move the power button where the rest of the controls are.
  - 0xfeba 8y ago
    An Alexa "skill" or whatever integration would be cool: "Alexa, turn on the computer!"
  - efreak 8y ago
    Wake on lan then?
matthew-wegner 8y ago
There should be a “power state” setting in BIOS to turn back on after a power outage. There are also power button remotes that could work, depending on distance: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MQUANS8/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MQUANS8/

gerdesj 8y ago

At the risk of me too! I have a Dell T420 with eight spindles in the loft above our bedroom, plus assorted UPS, APU2 based router, switches and a mini ATX based thing for MythTV. I screwed four lengths of 4" x 2" between two roofing joists to make two trapeziums. I then screwed a 3/4" thick sheet of chipboard to the bottom and then wrapped the top and sides in roofing felt (some protection in case of roof failure). The loft is lagged 200mm deep with 3/4" chipboard on top which deadens the noise nicely. The Dell was running the fans quite a lot today when I went up to check on something - 25C outside in Somerset, UK today.

saagarjha 8y ago

Personally, I just don't like computing at a distance. I actually like hearing things like fan noise or hard drive sounds, as long as they're not incessant, because it can serve as a subtle notification that the computer might be doing something in the background that I might not have realized otherwise.

fipple 8y ago
But then a silent build wouldn’t be interesting to you at all. The garage idea is good for someone who does want Silent computing.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  Hmm, I guess. I think my MacBook Pro strikes a nice balance: it's silent 95% of the time, and I get some fans up when I run builds or something hangs in the background.
always_good 8y ago
Better to have usage stats always visible like iStat Menus: https://bjango.com/mac/istatmenus/ https://bjango.com/mac/istatmenus/ Fans don't tell the whole story. Network traffic is super useful to see as well. Also, if your computer never gets hot enough, it can be doing plenty of unwanted background work without setting off the fans.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  I have that, but I'm not always watching it. Sound lets me know to glance up at my menu bar to see what's going on.
welly 8y ago
On a slightly different but related subject, I live on a boat with a diesel engine. Being able to hear the engine run and hear the change of tone is something I couldn't live without. I often run the engine to heat my water and the very slightest change of tone has my ears pricking up, panicking with "I've not heard that sound before! What's up with it? Is it broken? Am I going to sink??" running through my head.