3 ms·

Another obvious example here given the people on this website is servers: if you're going to have a home server, unless you can go put it in a soundproofed room

Another obvious example here given the people on this website is servers: if you're going to have a home server, unless you can go put it in a soundproofed room in the basement, you're going to want to use consumer-grade fans that aren't inherently screamingly loud.

drewzero1 5y ago
I found this out the hard way. Picked up a cheap surplus ProLiant to mess around with, and quickly realized it would be far better for my use case to use a business-class desktop or laptop and avoid the unnecessary noise, space, and power draw of pro server hardware. It sure looked cool, though.
- fomine3 5y ago
  Then you miss ECC if you need reliability. Only workstations equip ECC RAM even for business.
  - drewzero1 5y ago
    That's true, but for my use case I found it wasn't necessary (though it would be nice to have, in general.)
- stordoff 5y ago
  I went for a tower server for those exact reasons - sensible idle power draw and quiet even under full load (I've got an x265 encode running at the moment, and it's not quite silent but there's just a very gentle hum) without losing ECC. Some of the older dual Xeon servers on eBay were tempting, but the noise/power draw made it a non-starter.
neilv 5y ago
Your home server can be a RasPi or a NUC or similar. Or it's possible to make/convert rackmount server to be quiet. Right now, I have a silent 4U rackmount GPU server running 24/7 in my living room, cooled just fine by a 120mm Noctua fan (plus a silent consumer ATX PSU fan). I also have a commercial 1U Atom server that I've adapted for living room. The Atom and mirrored HDDs are passively-cooled (though you can also get Xeons in the same chassis). The Flex-ATX PSU was loud, but I opened it up and soldered in an effectively silent Noctua. The noise-no-object jet engine servers are a problem, especially full-depth 1U ones with a phalanx of jet engine fans. But people have had some luck removing fans and replacing some of them with quieter fans, or liquid cooling.

drewzero1 5y ago

I found this out the hard way. Picked up a cheap surplus ProLiant to mess around with, and quickly realized it would be far better for my use case to use a business-class desktop or laptop and avoid the unnecessary noise, space, and power draw of pro server hardware. It sure looked cool, though.

fomine3 5y ago
Then you miss ECC if you need reliability. Only workstations equip ECC RAM even for business.
- drewzero1 5y ago
  That's true, but for my use case I found it wasn't necessary (though it would be nice to have, in general.)
stordoff 5y ago
I went for a tower server for those exact reasons - sensible idle power draw and quiet even under full load (I've got an x265 encode running at the moment, and it's not quite silent but there's just a very gentle hum) without losing ECC. Some of the older dual Xeon servers on eBay were tempting, but the noise/power draw made it a non-starter.

neilv 5y ago

Your home server can be a RasPi or a NUC or similar. Or it's possible to make/convert rackmount server to be quiet. Right now, I have a silent 4U rackmount GPU server running 24/7 in my living room, cooled just fine by a 120mm Noctua fan (plus a silent consumer ATX PSU fan). I also have a commercial 1U Atom server that I've adapted for living room. The Atom and mirrored HDDs are passively-cooled (though you can also get Xeons in the same chassis). The Flex-ATX PSU was loud, but I opened it up and soldered in an effectively silent Noctua. The noise-no-object jet engine servers are a problem, especially full-depth 1U ones with a phalanx of jet engine fans. But people have had some luck removing fans and replacing some of them with quieter fans, or liquid cooling.