KRONOS Fan Information

jimknopf · Post by **jimknopf** » Sat Oct 15, 2011 11:39 pm

I used an extension: all standard connections, no problems.

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Sun Oct 16, 2011 7:07 am

jimknopf wrote:I used an extension: all standard connections, no problems.

How difficult is it to open up the Kronos?..

And also: do you have any pictures showing how the new fan is attached? Did you use all four available mounting holes?

maphill · Post by **maphill** » Sun Oct 16, 2011 2:10 pm

curvebender wrote:
jimknopf wrote:I used an extension: all standard connections, no problems.
How difficult is it to open up the Kronos?..

And also: do you have any pictures showing how the new fan is attached? Did you use all four available mounting holes?

The first page of this thread answers both of these questions.

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Sun Oct 16, 2011 2:58 pm

maphill wrote:
curvebender wrote:
jimknopf wrote:I used an extension: all standard connections, no problems.
How difficult is it to open up the Kronos?..

And also: do you have any pictures showing how the new fan is attached? Did you use all four available mounting holes?
The first page of this thread answers both of these questions.

Yes, but aren't those pictures of the Acoustifan, rather than the Black Silent?

And also: You mention that your new fan is mounted in a more intelligent way, but that doesn't apply to your pictures of the Acoustifan, which is mounted the same way as the Kronos original.

Or am I missing somehting here?..

aribo61 · Post by **aribo61** » Sun Oct 16, 2011 9:57 pm

as I wrote before, I am not really convinced by my exemplar of the NB XR2.
It seems to be a little bit out of center, so it produces some hum (not much but more audible than I would like).
But may be my Noiseblocker fan got damaged by the transport? It's packaging wasn't in a very good condition, when it arrived.

Btw: It's blue rubber mounts are very soft, so they are dampening a bit better than some black rubber mounts I also purchased.

Unfortunately my Silenx fan didn't arrive, yet.

Opening the case is very easy, at least with my K61, just unscrew all screws of the bottom cover. However, the front bar below the keyboard can be left connected to the bottom cover, and removed together with it, because it isn't connected to the side bars. This front bar seems to be placed there for optical reasons only, it has no mechanical function. May be it should also keep our hands out.

I think jimknopf was talking of the rubber mounts, when he said "mounted in a much more intelligent way", right?

jimknopf · Post by **jimknopf** » Mon Oct 17, 2011 12:19 am

Right, rubbermounts.

It was a bit tricky to get them attached, but worked with help of a collet.

maphill · Post by **maphill** » Mon Oct 17, 2011 12:30 am

curvebender wrote:
maphill wrote:
curvebender wrote: How difficult is it to open up the Kronos?..

And also: do you have any pictures showing how the new fan is attached? Did you use all four available mounting holes?
The first page of this thread answers both of these questions.
Yes, but aren't those pictures of the Acoustifan, rather than the Black Silent?

And also: You mention that your new fan is mounted in a more intelligent way, but that doesn't apply to your pictures of the Acoustifan, which is mounted the same way as the Kronos original.

Or am I missing somehting here?..

Most of the discussion here (except mainly "aribo61") is talking about mounting fans in the standard location.

The short of it is: Different fan can be quieter, and rubber mounting "screws" can reduce hum.

Mark

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Tue Oct 18, 2011 4:43 pm

Aribo,

Please tell me, are you still running your Kronos without the fan?

How is that working out for you?

After a lengthy session today in front of Kronos the Noise Maker, I am tempted to do the same...

Unless there is some BIOS change in the 1.5 update that regulates the RPM of the fan..

aribo61 · Post by **aribo61** » Tue Oct 18, 2011 6:59 pm

curvebender,

Please tell me, are you still running your Kronos without the fan?

no...

currently my Kronos runs with a noiseblocker XR2 mounted in the "tunnel" between PSU and back cover.

I have inserted a Zalman Fan Mate 2 to further reduce the fan speed.

If my fan wouldn't rotate a bit out of center (so there is some vibration from it), I think this would be a good solution.

I'm waiting for a Silenx IXP-34-12 fan now, mainly because I hope the "fluid dynamic bearings" make a difference, and also because of dfahrner's comments. But it will be shipped not before next week, may be even later. There doesn't seem to be any german shop having it in stock.

The fanless "solution" did run for some weeks, but the temperature at the top cover was around 35-40°C, which should be much more at the chip set. When I tried with my hand the combined chipset+cpu heat spreader was very hot, may be 80°C? I could touch it without fearing to get burned, but it was at my limits.
Note, the Atom CPU isn't a problem at all, as it never gets very hot. It should always be <70°C, and the maximum is specified at 90°C or so. But the chipset may get hot, because it generally consumes most of the power on an Atom board. Atom mainboards often run with a fanless cpu but a small (and often loud) fan on the chipset cooler.

I tried several solutions and fan speeds.
From those I concluded, that it should be possible to get a solution which is nearly inaudible and also keeps the top cover cool (say: the hottest spot being max. 5°C above the rest).

Btw. I also upgraded the Kronos memory to 4GB, because I had the case already opend.
I used 2x Kingston KVR800D2N5/2G DDR2 PC800 2GB CL5 ValueRam...each at a price of EUR 24.77.

maphill · Post by **maphill** » Fri Oct 21, 2011 3:17 am

The SilenX is finally quiet enough. SO much better!

Details and pictures in the 4th post from the beginning of the thread.

Thanks dfahrner for the suggestion.

I'll be keeping an eye on the temps, and if I'm ambitious I might reload the stocker with some special rubber mounts I purchased for comparison. We'll see.

Thanks everybody for contributing!
Mark

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Fri Oct 21, 2011 6:55 am

Great news Maphill, congratulations!

I have a 73 as well, is just a matter of turning it upside down, and removing the screws, in order to open it up? Does anything else come off?

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Fri Oct 21, 2011 10:00 am

Well, I went and bought a PC silencing kit by Fractal Design.

It contains, among other things, the extra long rubber mounts, which should fit the closed type Kronos fan.

I am not disturbed by the hiss of the fan, but rather the low frequency vibrations, presumably coming from vibrations being transplanted to the chassis.

Hopefully this will help, I will let you know how it turns out.

aribo61 · Post by **aribo61** » Fri Oct 21, 2011 11:03 am

curvebender wrote:It contains, among other things, the extra long rubber mounts, which should fit the closed type Kronos fan.

does it mount the fan in a larger distance (e.g. 10mm)?

I am very convinced that the original fan should be thrown out (I mounted it somewhere in a similar way like maphill did before)

I am not disturbed by the hiss of the fan, but rather the low frequency vibrations, presumably coming from vibrations being transplanted to the chassis.

like me

I got the best results at the original mount position with the cable ties (see my pictures linked somewhere above). The rubber mounts didn't decouple much much less vibrations.

But my original fan also has a hum when I totally decoupled, say holding it in my hand. This is because it's own case transfers the vibrations to the air (note I'm not talking of the sound of the air flow).

My experiments with other fan positions aim at reducing the fan speed even more and are successful in that at the cost of less decouling and much more hassle with the mounting. This is all driven by the rest of the hum I get from my exemplar of the Noiseblocker fan.

May be if the Silenx is quiet enough, I will use the standard position, as it is easier to mount. Then I will definitely use the cable ties.

Better fans should not vibrate at all. I hope the Silenx is one of them. And ~13 EUR for the Silenx is not much compared to the price of the Kronos, isn't it?

So as a conclusion, if I were you, I would at least buy a Silenx IXP-34-12, especially after hearing the two very positive comments from dfahrner and maphill, and then mount it at the original position, if you don't want to start trying more.

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Fri Oct 21, 2011 11:19 am

Aribo,

Do you switch on your Kronos while it's open, or do you close it every time you've made a modification and want to hear the results?

Obviously, I am aware of the inherent danger of switching it on with it's cover removed.

maphill · Post by **maphill** » Fri Oct 21, 2011 12:58 pm

curvebender wrote:Great news Maphill, congratulations!

I have a 73 as well, is just a matter of turning it upside down, and removing the screws, in order to open it up? Does anything else come off?

Just the screws, then remove the bottom panel. More details on first page.

Mark

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KRONOS Fan Information

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