Muzzle the noisy fan - My old CPU got fried two years ago playing computer games during the hottest summer I could remember. So when assembled my new PC, I told the guy at the computer store to Give me the biggest and baddest fan you've got!!! And he did, he installed a Thermaltake Volcano 7+. Unfortunately it was also the noisiest one they had. I found out a few days later that the fan came with a speed control switch which the technician didn't bother to install (and inform me too). Since I had all the time in the world, I installed the darn switch (it was a no-brainer) and set the speed to medium. The Thermaltake website mentions that the noise is 47dB at high, 35dB at medium and 24dB at low. I gotta tell you, the 12dB difference between high (the default setting without the switch)and medium (my new setting) is very noticeable. Now, my PC doesn't sound like it's going to take off the ground anymore. To further cut down the noise, I installed a couple of carton walls on one side of the inner casing. I was thinking of using eggshell cartons but then it would be a tight squeeze in there.
First of all, you gotta have these cool safety glasses when working around computers hehehe.
Ahhh yes, the mythical fan speed controller at last!!!
The fan speed controller installed. Hmmm, now where do I place this darn switch?
Noise-reducing cartons. Yeah right. I'm not even sure if they work but it did cut down on the noise a bit.
Revive the dead motherboard - Call me stupid but I messed-up my PC two days ago when I bumped-up the FSB speed in CMOS to 166 Mhz from 133. Now this would be perfectly fine if your the speed of the bus was in synch with the memory and chip. Unfortunately it wasn't. I'm going to cut down on the tech talk but suffice to say, after I changed the setting, my PC wouldn't boot up. Just a blank screen. Not even a beep. Going to the nearby computer shop to have it looked at was not an option. Technicians at computer stores are trained to sell sell sell!!! Even though your computer (or a part) is in perfect working condition, they'll concoct a story telling you whats wrong with it. Often they would throw in technical jargon to confuse you even more and make you believe that your computer is crap. This is based on the "computer shop" assumption that most people who go their shops to have their computer fixed are: a) people who know nothing about computer hardware and b) people who are hardware techies and know what needs to be replaced. They could tell if you fall into A or B based on the way you talk and the questions you ask. Anyway, I just fired-up my old laptop so surf for a solution. As it turns out, my mobo type (motherboard) needs to reset if it encounters an incompatible setting. This involves:
1. Unplugging the power cable
2. Finding the darn reset CMOS jumper. This is a good reason to keep your mobo manual.
3. Moving the jumper to reset the CMOS.
4. Wait 15 seconds (just to be sure).
5. Moving the jumper back to it's original position
If you've done everything perfectly, the computer should boot-up nicely. It boots-up with the default CMOS setting so you have to reset any values you've modified previously. Well, it works. Now I'm happy as a clam again since I learned new hardware stuff.
The "hard-to-find" CMOS reset jumper. Usually it's located next to the CMOS battery.
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