[hseikaly]

Hey all,

I was thinking of dropping some hard earned dollars on a new Mac Pro. I'm just wondering how noisy the machine gets as it will be sitting in my apartment and I dont' really want to be hearing fans whirring away all day long. Anyone have any opinions on the noise factor?

thanks!

[chabig]

Extremely quiet, from what I've heard.

[tvbi]

all I hear is the hard drive

[Xyrrus]

Originally Posted by hseikaly

Hey all,

I was thinking of dropping some hard earned dollars on a new Mac Pro. I'm just wondering how noisy the machine gets as it will be sitting in my apartment and I dont' really want to be hearing fans whirring away all day long. Anyone have any opinions on the noise factor?

thanks!

Probably the quietest PC I've ever personally used.

- One of my kittens was sitting next to it, purring. I could not hear the machine over the cat.

- Playing a DVD I could hear the optical drive enough that I noticed it. The machine right now is less than 1.5 feet from one of my ears. Once its setup it'll go under the desk. Optical drives do have a tendancy to be noisy, though.

- I added a second hard drive (Western Digital 7200 RPM SATA) and the noise level has gone up the drive is possibly not fastened well enough to the cage; the machine has a slight vibration to it which is being transferred to my desk. I'm also expecting this to no longer be an issue once its under the desk. This is of course 3rd party hardware we're talking about (The drive originally shipped in a dell, for whatever that's worth )

- Overall, its quieter than my dual 2.0 G5 at work, which is 3' from my head and I hardly ever notice. Its also quieter than my powerbook when the PB's fans are on.

And of course its about 10 times quieter than my AMD 64 homebuilt machine

-Xy

[wr11]

" "

I cant hear the machine if my ear is more then 10 cm away from the front. Reminds me of my old iMac - silent. I can imagine that the BTO machines with upgraded video cards will be a little noisier due to the fans on the card.

[angelmb]

Originally Posted by chabig

Extremely quiet, from what I've heard.

Best answer ever.

[silverboy31]

Very quit went from a dual 1.8 which sounded like a jet to an extremely quit MacPro 2.0 with dual hds all i hear is the HD once in awhile

[imitchellg5]

It is vewy vewy quiet, you can't hear it under light load that much, but under heavy load, the noise picks up. It is still not horrible, quite acceptable, and waaaay quieter than the G5s.

[k2director]

I can't hear my 3Ghz, unless I listen very carefully for it, in a quiet setting. We'll see how my ATI X1900 card (due here end of Sept) affects all that, but so far so good...

[houstonmacbro]

i have a mbp 17" at work. it is really quiet. especially compared to my dell (desktop) w/ hyperthreadiing running at full tilt. the mbp is a mouse compared to that screaming banshee.

[UnixMac]

Not at all! My raptor, now that's a whole different story!

[Suzyplums]

Hi

Does any one know where I can find a Mac driver for my Konica Minolta Migocolor 2300w laser printer?

I have managed to set up my 2 epsons they work fine but not this one.

Thanks very much.

Suzy]

[UnixMac]

Suzy, my MagicColor 5430DL came built into OS X.. Go to KM's website however and you'll see drivers for all of their printers..

[goMac]

So much for Intel chips with loud noisy fans.

[- - e r i k - -]

I have my iMac G5 right next to my MacPro (had to bring it home for the weekend to set it up... oh noes...). Guess which is louder? By far the iMac drowns out everything. Seriously the only thing you can hear from it is hard drive noises.

[UnixMac]

Let me be the first to say that I will not miss IBM or the PPC.. They had their chance to get their act together and produce something special for the PC market but they de-prioritized Apple, and the small market and now where here.. I'm not looking back. This is why I made the switch right away.. I am an early adopter. I got OS X Beta and ran it before just about anyone I know, and now I'm running an Intel "Power Mac" before anyone

[Cadaver]

PowerMac G5 dual 2.5GHz = vacuum cleaner
MacPro quad 2.66GHz = don't know its on until the hard drive does something
(no exaggeration, either!)

[UnixMac]

Just posted my bench score on Geekbench.. highest one there..

382 points..

Geekbench Result Browser

[rotuts]

very very quiet

its not here mostl;y

two very lare slow fans front to back you can see through the machnine

BUT mine came with a Sony DVD and its very noisy

got a Pioneer 111 from new egg for 32 delivered and use that its quite a bit quiter

cheers

RAM is another story

[milhouse]

My 2.66 GHz Mac Pro is the most silent PC I've ever used and I'm also running with non-Apple RAM.

[ciparis]

My first Mac Pro had a noisy fan (bad bearing or something, sounded a bit like an old jalopy when it ran slow). Got the machine replaced and the new one is very close to silent. The only real noise above what I get from my iMac Core Duo (which is as near silent as you can get from a non-passively-cooled machine) is from the drives. Adding more drives increases the chance that you'll get some resonating sounds from them, but with 4 bays you can move things around to find the quietest configuration.

A simply massive difference from my old PowerMac G5 Dual 2.0. This is a huge relief, because I love the silence from the iMac Core Duo, but I needed more upgradeability. Finally I can get it all in one machine.

[Oversoul]

My Mac Pro is a bit noisy once you turn it on and during the first few seconds of startup. Copying/Installing off a CD is also somewhat noisy. But other than that, very quiet.

[draizor]

Same as Oversoul for me... During startup, I can hear all the fans getting ready for action but then it's back to quiet... And the raptor is dead silent too with occasional sound when it's writing many files at the same time.

[someone]

I can hear my fan all the time... other than that, I actually heard the optical drive too once. And I'm getting a low pitched hum, like "mmmm." does everyone else have that too?

[ciparis]

Originally Posted by someone

I can hear my fan all the time... other than that, I actually heard the optical drive too once. And I'm getting a low pitched hum, like "mmmm." does everyone else have that too?

If your room is otherwise silent, that sounds about right, though it might be the hard drive you're hearing. I have to put my ear right to the case to hear the fan over the hum of the hard drives (I have 3). It's nothing like a noisy PC or even a G5, though. Not even remotely similar in noise level. With music or a bit of background noise my computer can't easily be heard.

[k2director]

I had the Mac Pro with a stock 7300, and now I have an X1900. With the 7300, the MP was virtually silent; now, with the x1900, I can hear a faint, subtle whir. In other words, the machine is still very very quiet. What a difference compared to the Quad G5 with the nv7800 card!

[voo]

What temperature does the Mac Pro run at, standard spec and top end chip? and does it have Automatic/Highest processor settings in energy saver like the G5's? and if so whats the temperatures with both...

Automatic can sometimes be a pain with the G5 for noise, highest is bareable I find, but I sometimes hear the chirp every second at this setting if you listen for it.

[UnixMac]

Originally Posted by voo

What temperature does the Mac Pro run at, standard spec and top end chip? and does it have Automatic/Highest processor settings in energy saver like the G5's? and if so whats the temperatures with both...

No settings for ramp up/auto like on the G5.. just one speed... "Fast and Quiet"

[voo]

and what is the temperature of your Mac Pro, if you can run the iStat nano widget or whatever...

[ciparis]

Originally Posted by voo

and what is the temperature of your Mac Pro, if you can run the iStat nano widget or whatever...

No display (on mine at least, using iStat nano 1.6.1). I guess it hasn't been updated for the Mac Pro yet.

[rehoot]

sound from x1900

I have a Mac Pro with a ATI X1900XT graphics card that was not installed properly when I got it. While trying to get it in the slot, I had it crooked at one point, but the connection was good enough that it was powered. There must have been an extra fan that was activated because there was a noticable high-pitched fan blowing air out the back slot where the graphics card is. The card wasn't working because it was crooked, and after I fixed it it was mostly quiet.

I live in Florida, and I'll see if that fan kicks in when the card gets really hot. So far I haven't heard it when the card was in straight.

[Cheznajar]

I have the 2.66 model with x1900 card. It has been fairly quiet for the time I've had it, but after a pretty long session of warcraft yesterday the graphics card fan did kick in to high gear and it was more then noticeable. I'm going to start looking into alternative cooling options.

[Kikaida]

I have a Mac Pro 2.66 and it's dead quiet. I makes my Quicksilver tower sound like it's roaring.

[valdore]

Except for power supply buzzing noise it's dead silent.

[robby818]

I have a Mac Pro 2.66 with the ATI x1900 video card. When I received it I was really happy with how quietly it ran. No fan revving like my G5 and nothing like my Quicksilver. The fan on the video card is the loudest source of noise, not really too bad but audible. I swapped the stock fan on the x1900 for an Arctic Cooling fan and my system is now nearly silent. The only noise I can hear now is the hard drive. There is a good description of the fan swap here:

Mac ATI X1900 XT Quiet Cooler Swap (Accelero X2)

[Cheznajar]

Nice link. That looks like it might be right up my alley.

[damiensmunki]

My 2.66 model produces a lot of HD noise. One of the loudest HDs I've heard. My roommate walked in as I was launching a program, heard the noise, and said, "WTF is that?" It performs perfectly and is otherwise very quiet. I dunno... What do you guys think?

[wr11]

Originally Posted by damiensmunki

My 2.66 model produces a lot of HD noise. One of the loudest HDs I've heard. My roommate walked in as I was launching a program, heard the noise, and said, "WTF is that?" It performs perfectly and is otherwise very quiet. I dunno... What do you guys think?

Use disk utility to check your volume. Mine was making more noise than usual, found that the volume headers needed repair. I repaired it from my boot dvd and now it seems to be back to normal. Either way it's worth a look.

[damiensmunki]

Thanks! How would I know if it needed a repair? Disk utility won't let me select "Repair Disk," and nothing is in the white box.

[wr11]

Originally Posted by damiensmunki

Thanks! How would I know if it needed a repair? Disk utility won't let me select "Repair Disk," and nothing is in the white box.

The button just above repair does the same thing as repair routine without repairing. If it finds anything you'll see it in the report. If you do need to repair your disk, startup from the DVD install disk that came with your system. Once you get to the main install program you can switch to disk utility from one of the menus. Since you're booting with another "drive" you can make the repairs.

[damiensmunki]

clicked that button and after a few minutes, disk utility said, "Volume passed verification," or some variation thereof. I don't really think anything is wrong. It's just louder access noise than I'm used to. Maybe when I upgrade the RAM, the HD won't be accessed as much....?

[Todd Madson]

I'm guessing half again as quiet as a G5 2.5 dual under light load.

Which is to say, practically inaudible.

The external hard drive I've got attached to my G5 makes more noise
than the G5 does (plastic case, resonates with drive activity).

So the Pros are very likely as quiet as you can get short of no sound at
all.

[jcee]

Anyone can make a sound recording of this quietness??