Be Quiet! PC Noise Absorber Kit

Be Quiet! PC Noise Absorber Kit

Manufacturer: Be Quiet!
UK Price (as reviewed): Around £20

Noise! The pain in the ear of many PC users' lives. Anyone else remember the days of 6,800RPM 60mm Delta screamers? How they were actually pined over for our Taisol and Swiftech heatsinks on socket A/370. Now it’s all about low noise, and as far as you can go with a quiet PSU, CPU cooler, fans and graphics card you’re still essentially limited by hard drive noise and the accumulation of every component.

You can buy specialist cases with insulation built in, and more and more manufacturers are offering an option to do this but often only on one of two cases from an entire range. What if your current case (you’ve modded and) you love to bits doesn’t offer the same facility? Well, there’s still the Akasa PaxMate on the market, but that’s only 4mm thick foam which only really stops the high pitched whines and little else (I had an YY cube carpeted in it for many years). In comparison the Be Quiet! kit offers a range of sizes and thicknesses, and is around the same price.

So, what’s the catch? Is this too good to be true or is there actually an inexpensive sound deadening solution for everyone not willing to pay through the noise for a “sound insulated silent case”?

In the Box

• Six 400 x 240mm pieces of foam of which contains:
  • One 20mm foam unit with honeycomb foam
    
  • Five 10mm insulating boards with 2.2mm dense “special” plastic-foam and 8mm honeycomb foam
• Detailed colour manual
  
• Available in both Black and Blue

There are two separate kits available – the large tower kit featured here includes one more piece of 2.2/8mm foam. Some people might have liked a single big sheet for the sides, but by splitting it up it leaves more freedom for different sized cases and making squarer off-cuts are more use than a single strip or a big circle for a side case fan. Obviously when you’re buying a pre-insulated case everything comes perfectly pre fitted and you get the exact amount, whereas buying a typical “box of foam” you’ll always either have too much, or worse, too little meaning a second investment doubling the cost.

The manual is very well written and nicely detailed with has some great advice for everyone newbie right up to enthusiast. It’s even got down to which type of knife and blade you should use, and most importantly, it reminds you to measure and test BEFORE you stick it down.