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IMO 120mm+ fans running at low speeds combined with large heatsinks and SSDs pretty much solved noise problems for desktop PCs.

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I used 120mm fans in my previous build, worked fine. However the enthusiasts seem to have moved to 140mm. Fits all the normal size cases and moves either more air for the same RPM, or the same air at less rpm. My favorite thing about them is the pitch of the hum is just a bit lower.

Except for discreet graphic cards, of course.

There are discreet graphic cards with passive cooling available. The power-hungry models fitted with dual 120mm fans and a large heatsink are not too noisy either.

Some GPUs have fans that spin down entirely under light load (Asus calls it 0db mode), and only spin up the fans when under moderate to heavy loads.

Yes. Also, at least With NVDIA cards, you can specify a temperature target to the driver. I think the defaults usually run the chips at ~70C.

I guess the fans are actually mostly 100mm in 2x fan configurations, manufacturers seem to have many custom solutions for blade configuration etc.

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