Recommendations for quiet PC case?

[Archer75]

I need a new PC case. The current case i'm using is a coolermaster stacker and this thing is frickin loud. This was my old server case and after moving my server to a different case I used this for my PC but it's just too much. I do have fan controllers, I have played with some different fans and tried disconnecting most of the fans but it's still just way too loud.

So i'm looking for a case for an ATX board and has room for large video cards(currently running a Radeon 6970). My budget is $150 with shipping. I don't need more than one optical drive or two hard drives in it. I've looked at the Corsair 550 and the Fractal cases. Any thoughts on those or any other cases to recommend?

 

[Topweasel]

I need a new PC case. The current case i'm using is a coolermaster stacker and this thing is frickin loud. This was my old server case and after moving my server to a different case I used this for my PC but it's just too much. I do have fan controllers, I have played with some different fans and tried disconnecting most of the fans but it's still just way too loud.

So i'm looking for a case for an ATX board and has room for large video cards(currently running a Radeon 6970). My budget is $150 with shipping. I don't need more than one optical drive or two hard drives in it. I've looked at the Corsair 550 and the Fractal cases. Any thoughts on those or any other cases to recommend?

There are tons of suggestions really it depends on what your looking for a P180/83/90, or a Fractal are about having sound killing materials and builds. You can put good hardware in them, but for example a hot and power hungry card like the 6970, is going to throw a lot of noise out the back of the case or at least require more cooling then a default fan setup to keep the fans from spinning up that high.

Reverse end of that is getting a case with better thermal qualities. Larger fans that spin slower and quieter. It will help keep the CPU and GPU fans from spinning up to high, but wouldn't cut off the quieter equipment. For example I got a HAF X, Sapphire 7950, a H80 cooling a 3930K, and a Coolermaster Hybrid PSU (fan doesn't spin up till 200w draw, and comes with a automatic fan controller). The H80 has the fan control set to low. It is super quiet at idle, I can't here it over the vents in the house. But it becomes audible at full load (still quiet just not as much), sounds like a plain when I first power it on (pump and all fans go 100% for first few seconds) which would be closer to the sound of me trying to eak out a 2-3 degree drop in GPU/CPU. But the whole time I am great temps on the hardware. Also things like HDD seek in the computer are noticeable but the SSD for the OS makes that a rare occurrence.

So the question is it that your case is really loud and you want quieter setup. Or are you looking for something that strives to be quiet, even if means things run a bit hotter.

Probably the one that meets in the middle is the P280, decent build quality, good thermals, sound deadening design. Just want to make sure you know that you don't have to loose cooling capability to have a quiet machine.