Ask HN: Can I buy a soundproof box to stick my server in? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Can I buy a soundproof box to stick my server in?

8 pointsbreck25 comments

I've got a laptop working as a server running from my room but I turn it off at night because it's loud. Do they make boxes that I could stick the thing in that would muzzle the sound but still keep it at a good temperature?

Thanks!

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Have you considered buying a silent computer? I think it would be cheaper than an enclosure. Depends what type of power you need though. Mac Mini is good for this or maybe ATOM if you can get by with it. An easy solution I've used before is to stack a small wall of books in front of a loud device. Don't fully enclose it just make a little wall between yourself and the laptop. It may not erase the sound entirely but it will definitely smooth out the higher frequencies.

Here's another reseller of such cabinets: http://www.acoustiproducts.com

But I second what jsz0 said, the pricing is normally prohibitive for personal use. Their cheapest offering (the orion) starts at around 650 USD - and that generally seems to be about the starting range for these things.

That money is better spent on a Mac Mini, or if you need more extensibility from your server then have a look at your local "silent pc dealer" - various levels of noise reduction can be had, from dampened cases to completely passively cooled systems.

Personally I can recommend the stupendously awesome products from http://www.hfx.at/. Reasonably priced, absolutely stellar build quality - and no fans (heatpipes for everything).

I think "my laptop is noisy" is the symptom, not the problem. The problem is that you have a server in your bedroom. You can address your problem by renting a cheap VPS or low-end dedicated server. You'll never hear it or worry about temperature again, you'll have increased reliability, and you'll spend less of your valuable time keeping the server alive when you could be doing more important things.

Sorry I should have added more info. I have many cloud servers, this one is for a personal project that is running on Windows, and I have never worked with a hosted Windows server before and am not sure if I want to. So for now, I'm just running it from home.

It's a laptop, try using one of those little $100 fridges from Home Depot. Try putting it in there. That might work for you, plus you can keep something cold to drink close at hand too.

really interesting idea actually. Would there be a problem with moisture inside a fridge?

Most fridges have a temperature adjustment, and the machine is generating heat. Throw a temperature monitor in the fridge and keep it above the dew point, and you won't have any condensation.

http://www.decatur.de/javascript/dew/index.html

Even if you do, you won't have a problem in the computer. It will be warmer than the refrigerator so any dew activity will be elsewhere.

Getting the power cord in will require some creativity.

And frankly, I have no idea if a small refrigerator can keep up with the heat output of a small computer. It would be an interesting duel.

Fridges often make more noise than laptops.

http://acapella.harmony-central.com/showthread.php?t=1578901

Here's the schematics: http://nearworlds.org/stuff/soundproof_box.jpg

Put it in someone else's room.

I put mine in the closet, and run long video/keyboard wires to my desk. Works fine.

Maybe your fans are old and you could clean them/lube them/replace them? Maybe you could disable the fans safely (might reduce lifetime or something, but maybe not kill it) if you watch temp.

Do not ever disable the fans! It’s probably not a hardware problem with the fans. If it has a server OS running on it the bios on the laptop is probably not server friendly. Plus if the OEM had some kind of temp sensing application on the laptop to spin the fans up and down as needed the server install might have wiped it out. Net result the fans run wide open all the time making the laptop seem noisy.

What differences in CPU power management do you think there are between a server OS and a desktop OS? (Operators of server farms try even harder than laptop users to save power. Hot servers sucking down a lot of power require very expensive infrastructure. Reducing power consumption and heat production makes the infrastructure cheaper.)

It is not a power management issue, but servers are optimized to run certain server operating systems. Laptops lack this server OS optimization. For instance our Dell PowerEdge 1850 has different fan drivers depending on if we load it with RHEL5 vs WinServer 2008. The drivers control the fan speed and are OS specific and work with the server bios. If we loaded XP Pro or Ubuntu as an OS the box would probably light up and function but would lack the fan speed control (and some other management features), plus the Bios is not optimized for a non-server (non-supported) OS meaning possible loss of USB functionality (This is the voice of experience).

Fan speeds are often a software-controlled feature. There's a daemon running in the background that gets temperature inputs, and sets the fan speed output as a result. If this daemon (not "the OS") doesn't step in and do something, many mainboards will just turn all the fans to "high" just to be safe.

The is not an OS issue, but rather a userspace configuration issue. Install your favorite Netbook OS, install the userspace fan-control daemon, and enjoy quiet fans from your server. It has nothing to do with the OS.

If I had to guess he has an old sony vaio series of laptops that had a problem with the fans not slowing down ever. There was a firmware fix for it a while ago. If there is not a problem with that then I would guess that the laptop has high cpu utilization warranting the fan speed increase. Seriously though you should get a linode account and let them handle the sound/power/bandwidth costs. 20$ a month and you can leave it on.

http://www.silentpcreview.com

My reference for silencing computers. The guys there take their noise VERY seriously. I was among them at one time :)

Would it be cheaper to buy noise-canceling headphones?

Search for 'kell systems' for a high-end option to address this need.

This company used to appear a lot at LinuxWorld & Mac World touting rackmount enclosures for acoustically sensitive areas like recording studios.

http://www.xrackpro.com/

I had this same problem, except I didn't have a laptop making noise I had 5 Dell poweredge 2650's (yes i realize how outdated they are) plus 4 other home brew servers. I rewired my network, and placed them in a closet. I'm at the point now where the hum actually helps me sleep better.

on another note, the servers keep the closet a comfortable 70º on average (I leave the door open during the day, so air circulates) which is the perfect temperature while my homebrew is fermenting, I'd like to think I have a wonderful nerd eco-system.

Try one of those plug computers like http://www.tonidoplug.com. It runs ubuntu though.

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