There is not much worse in life than sitting beside a PC tower which has noisy fans. It is like living next to a hamster, continual squeaking, droning, air rush sounds in the not-so-background. It is time to do something about it.

If you have to change the fan because it is squeaking or droning, don’t throw the old one into the garbage just yet. When the fan bearings give up, the only useless part is the fan itself.

Your new replacement fan will be more efficient but also be noisier because of the air turbulence created between the blades of the fan and the grille on the case. The way to minimise the turbulence is to put some space between them, and what better to do this than the old fan housing.

What you do is simple. Cut the old fan out of its housing with wire snips or similar The photo to the right shows the parts to be removed. The fan can go straight to your electronics recycling pile and and the cable can be kept for attaching to a reclaimed power supply fan which never have the right connections to either connect to the mainboard or spare power connectors coming off the power supply buses.

Screw the new and old casings together, having first ascertained which way the fan is pushing air, and then fit the complete assembly into the PC case. No more whooshing sounds.. relative peace and quiet.. yessssssss.

The photo on the left shows the finished job. Please not that this is the view of what goes on the INSIDE of the case cover, so ensure that there is enough clearance. The grille will stop loose cabling from being shredded, and will also protect fingers in the event that you remove the side panel without first powering down.

Btw, I get my ‘custom’ spacers from old power supplies if I don’t have any broken case fans kicking around, but it is almost worth buying a new fan to get the job done.