Quiet Listening Room PC (not a music server)

[ACHiPo]

I'm not sure if this is the right place, so mods feel free to put it in the right area.

 

My listening room is also my home office in the mornings and evenings (I don't work from home much). I'm looking at replacing my current desktop computer and am looking for suggestions.

 

I'm just looking for a personal computer--I already have a HAL MS-3 and Aurender for music. The desktop PC is my primary PC used for email, web surfing, word processing, picture editing, acoustical analysis, and some personal spreadsheet analysis. It will not be used as a music server, but it's how I move files around my network. It is replacing a ~5 year old Sony Vaio all-in-one with an i3, 500 GB HDD, 2 GB RAM. The Sony AIO is plenty fast for my purposes, but the video card is getting flaky, so that and the fan noise is making me consider getting a quiet box with monitor.

 

 

I have an external 4 TB drive for local back ups.

 

I've looked at fanless gaming computers, but am not sure that's the way to go?

 

Thanks,

AC

[PeterSt]

If nobody answers, then maybe I am allowed, actually to help out (warning : trying to sell something);

 

I still have a few of the former "XXHighEnd PC"'s left which are completely quiet (and were/are meant to be, because for audio playback) and which are sold against cost price of the parts (975 euros). These days they come with E5-2620v2 processor (Xeon 12 core hyperthreaded).

Has 2 hot plug removable 3.5" bays and 1 hot plug removable 2.5" bay.

 

No Disks are provided by default, but can be of course.

 

Regards,

Peter

 

PS: I will report this post myself so it can be deleted right away by Chris when sufficiently inappropriate.

[EuroChamp]

I would of course go the totally silent way, too.

[ACHiPo]

If nobody answers, then maybe I am allowed, actually to help out (warning : trying to sell something);

 

I still have a few of the former "XXHighEnd PC"'s left which are completely quiet (and were/are meant to be, because for audio playback) and which are sold against cost price of the parts (975 euros). These days they come with E5-2620v2 processor (Xeon 12 core hyperthreaded).

Has 2 hot plug removable 3.5" bays and 1 hot plug removable 2.5" bay.

 

No Disks are provided by default, but can be of course.

 

Regards,

Peter

 

PS: I will report this post myself so it can be deleted right away by Chris when sufficiently inappropriate.

 

Peter,

I'm trying to buy something, so I'm good with it! I sent you an email. Not sure if it will make sense given my location (US), but we can explore.

 

Thanks,

AC

[ACHiPo]

I would of course go the totally silent way, too.

I would prefer that, but to get a decent computer (>i3) I'll have to go custom or DIY, which I'd rather not do. The big names don't offer a fanless computer (that I've found).

[macuniverse]

I would prefer that, but to get a decent computer (>i3) I'll have to go custom or DIY, which I'd rather not do. The big names don't offer a fanless computer (that I've found).

 

I was in a similar situation to replace my Mac mini recently. Given that Mac minis not updated for a while, I decided to buy a similar Win10 PC. Long story short, I failed to find a suitable one. So I decided to build one myself. It was relatively easy. If you are not a serious gamer (needing dedicated graphics card) this is the cheapest and best quality gear you can buy.

 

I used Streacom fanless case (no optical drive slot):

 

F1CWS Evo Chassis | Streacom

 

PSU:

 

Nano160 Fanless PSU | Streacom

 

Gigabyte Z170n-WiFi motherboard, 2 x 8GB DDR4 RAM, 250GB SSD, Flirc IR card. So, no moving parts whatsoever, completely silent, including PSU. Putting the whole thing together took me around half a day. It costed me $1300 AUD in Oz but, if you are in the US, it should be around $700 excluding OS.

 

BTW, the onboard Toslink is surprisingly good.

[ACHiPo]

Pulled the trigger on the HP Envy 750-247c along with a 27" monitor and wireless keyboard and mouse from Costco. Thanks for all the guidance and advice. At the end of the day, I just decided to go low-risk and convenient. It'll still probably be this weekend before I get around to setting it up and transferring all the crap off my all-in-one. Looking at the monitor I'm wondering what I've done--it's freakin' huge! Didn't look so big in the store