The silence is golden thread

[johnnymg]

Greets

Just measured the noise from my 2010 3.2 GHz (5770) MP.

Front grill top: dBA 44.5, dBC 54
Front grill middle/bottom: dBA 46, dBC 56

Sound level at ear level with MP under the desk:
dBa 40
dBc 50

I'm using an American Recorder SPL-8810 sound level meter.

Qualitatively, I'd call the sound level as quiet with a mid/low frequency tone. This is in a smallish room. In a larger room (office/work) I might not even hear the slight hum of the MP.

For sound/music editors a little bit of sound foam might be useful.
cheers
JohnG

 

[yoink]

Thanks so much for taking the time to measure and share!

I hope others can chime in with their results for varying 2010 MP configurations. I have an old 2006 MP in my control room and I still find it a bit "annoying." It's quiet all right, quieter than any PC I had before it (and I'm a SilentPCReview.com kind of guy)... but I am hope the 2010 MPs are even better.

I'd rather not have to splurge for an ISO box.

 

[chrono1081]

I hear a little buzzing sound every now and then, almost like a REALLY fast vibration. I just tug on my towers handle and it goes away. Its from the back and its one of the cables that is plugged in, I think the mini display port. The sound stops if I remove or jiggle the mini display port cable.

 

[2contagious]

If my PSU wasn't buzzing/whining and my 5870 card's fan wouldn't make a non-constant "blowing-into-an-empty-bottle" sound, I'd say the 2010 Mac Pro is an incredibly silent desktop computer. I just hope I'll get rid of those two problems some day.

 

[phil-z]

Greets

Just measured the noise from my 2010 3.2 GHz (5770) MP.

Front grill top: dBA 44.5, dBC 54
Front grill middle/bottom: dBA 46, dBC 56

Sound level at ear level with MP under the desk:
dBa 40
dBc 50

I'm using an American Recorder SPL-8810 sound level meter.

Qualitatively, I'd call the sound level as quiet with a mid/low frequency tone. This is in a smallish room. In a larger room (office/work) I might not even hear the slight hum of the MP.

For sound/music editors a little bit of sound foam might be useful.
cheers
JohnG

This matches my experience. Some reports of silent Mac Pros make me feel as if mine is faulty. There's no way I'd say mine was silent - quiet with a low hum (I think from the CPU fan).

 

[raptorsoft2000]

I find almost NO noise whatsoever coming from my Mac Pro 2006 model 2 x dual 2.66. I DO hear a lot of noise that I know comes from the hard drives when they are in heavy use, I don't know what you call it, but it's that funny noise when I guess the heads or whatever are moving over the platters. It's almost like grains of sand or pellets of some sort trickling on the ground, or like a soft rain. Weirdest sound to describe but I'm sure everyone here knows that sound, and NO it's not my disks failing, it's not a clicking. And oh yea, I hear a very subtle sound coming from my SATA RAID box that has a fan in it to cool the drives, and I probably hear that disk sound coming from those disks too. But other than hard drives I hear almost nothing. I should switch to SSD's and I would know really how quiet my MP is!

 

[phil-z]

I have the 2010 3.2 GHz (5770) MP and have taken it in to a store but the Genius didn't think there was a problem. After reading these posts I'm still left thinking that mine is noisy!

 

[Umbongo]

I find almost NO noise whatsoever coming from my Mac Pro 2006 model 2 x dual 2.66. I DO hear a lot of noise that I know comes from the hard drives when they are in heavy use, I don't know what you call it, but it's that funny noise when I guess the heads or whatever are moving over the platters. It's almost like grains of sand or pellets of some sort trickling on the ground, or like a soft rain. Weirdest sound to describe but I'm sure everyone here knows that sound, and NO it's not my disks failing, it's not a clicking. And oh yea, I hear a very subtle sound coming from my SATA RAID box that has a fan in it to cool the drives, and I probably hear that disk sound coming from those disks too. But other than hard drives I hear almost nothing. I should switch to SSD's and I would know really how quiet my MP is!

Which graphics card do you have? The 7300GT doesn't have a fan, and often graphics card fans are the nosiest part.