So let's see what we're fighting against. The Junipers have 3 sets of fans. One for each PSU and a block of radial fans above the main system board.
Now these are some kind of proprietary deal I think. Sure I don't
know for sure but just seeing the hubs makes me feel quite certain about the fact that I won't find any replacement here. Plus I feel like it's not the loudest set of fans in there either.
No, I think the culprit is that pesky 1U 40mm axial fan. They're notorious for being loud.
So I opened one of the bricks up and found a Nidec w40s12bga5-53 fan inside.
Looking up the datasheet we find a lot of interesting information that we will need to match to get a proper replacement installed.
The datasheet gives us the following:
- Size: 40x40x28mm
- Speed: 18300 RPM
- Airflow: 22.9 CFM
- Static Pressure: 60.198 mm/H2O
- Sound Pressure: 59.5 dB[A]
...Yea that explains a lot. I know it's not quite the scientific method but honestly, in this case, when you hear hooves, think horses.
So I'm not an expert on fan design and matching them to geometry, but I feel like it's safe to say that the people who engineered this power brick knew what they were doing and matched everything to ensure that it's gonna stay working as well and safely as before.
I know that both the pressure and flow have to be as close as possible to the original values. At least, some guy on reddit told me.
Now surprisingly, there's not a lot of 40mm fans that are both low-noise and high static pressure. Something about 40mm fans usually going into rackmount equipment and racks usually being outside of earshot, I think.
I thought to see if Noctua, the supposed kings of silently moving air from A to B, had some offerings for me. Turns out, yes! If I would be content with 1.8 CFM, and 20mm deep ones at that. That's just not gonna cut it for me.
Now you'd think that there'd be more options that I could pick from to at least try to find the quietest one. Can't even do that apparently! Turns out fans like these are rare to begin with!
After searching far and wide, I finally found a fan that might do the trick: the Arctic S4028-15K.
The airflow is almost exactly the same, but the static pressure is about halved. Which logically would explain the reason why I decided to purchase these fans: Their sound pressure is only ~35 dB! Now that's value!
I opened the power supply up and found the plug of the stock fan to be this 2.54mm dupont-y keyed 3 pin header. The headers on these Arctics won't fit, so I mangled it up in the name of science, and removed the plastic around the pins. I know, gross, that's not how I usually do things, really. I just wanted to check what the performance was like before committing.
Now I screwed it all back together, plugged it in, powered it on...
and lo and behold...
IT'S JUST AS LOUD AS WITH THE STOCK FAN!!!
Holy shiiit they fucking LIED TO ME, YOU FRICKING BUNCH OF PRICKS!!!!
I guess for the sake of this project I'll just keep it installed in one of the PSUs to see whether its cooling capacity is up to snuff at least.
Until I find something better, my partner has graciously decided that the noise doesn't bother her a lot and that I can go ahead and install it all into the rack.
Bless her fucking soul. And fuck Arctic's fan division. Don't lie to me, that's not niceys... :(
Chances are you've come here to see what I'm about so you can complain about me or something I've said in an even more precise way.
I'm gonna put it very simply: Your gods are not my gods, your president is not my president. If something I said offends you then that's most likely a problem on your end. You can direct your complaints to /dev/null. Problems with who and/or what I am? I suggest you direct yourself to /dev/null as well.
