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AOpen's motherboards are generally acknowledged to be the best at fan management, as they use the powerful SilenTek system, which has both BIOS controls and a Windows application. SilenTek enables you to set maximum and minimum speeds for fans and monitor temperatures. If you're after a new motherboard, an AOpen one is definitely worth considering.

If your motherboard lacks fan control options, you could simply replace the noisy fans. System builders often use cheap, generic units that have poorly designed fan blades. These increase noise and spin at an unnecessarily high rate of around 3,000rpm. So-called 'silent' fans generally spin at under 2,000rpm. Reducing the speed eliminates the most audible noise but means the fans move less air and so provide less cooling. That's why it's important to check that your PC isn't overheating. This may be less of a problem than you'd think, though. PC manufacturers often fit more powerful cooling than is necessary because they don't individually tune each PC they produce. Akasa's Pax Power Fans, and models from Zalman, Vantec and Noiseblocker (see www.whispertec.com), are among the best quiet fans available.

FAN CONTROLLERS

If you regularly use your PC for high-stress tasks such as video encoding or gaming, you may be reluctant to sacrifice cooling power for quietness. Instead of fitting low-speed fans, you should install a fan controller. The simplest is Zalman's Fanmate 1, which plugs in between a fan and the motherboard. The Fanmate's four-position

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switch enables you to set the speed of the fan. The Fanmate has to be sealed inside the case, so it's only really good for setting a fan at a permanent speed.

If you want to alter fan speeds regularly, a unit such as Akasa's Fan Control Pro is a better idea. It slots into a free 5" drive bay and has four dials to control the speed of four fans. This enables you to quieten the PC when you're doing light work in Windows and speed the fans up when playing a game to provide more cooling. The Fan Control Pro's LCD also feeds back information from temperature probes, so you can make sure you're not cooking your PC just to save your ears.

Installing a fan controller is relatively easy, although it's a little fiddly. It also adds lots more wiring to the insides of the case, as you need to plug the controller into the PSU, and the fans into the controller. Keep these wires tidy to aid airflow.

While adjusting the speed of smaller fans helps to make them less noisy, bigger fans are always better as they spin much more slowly while still shifting lots of air. Unfortunately, it can be hard to make a case accept bigger fans without major surgery. If you're lucky, you may be able to use a fan adaptor to fit a 120mm fan to an 80mm fan mount. A more practical alternative is to buy an entirely new case, such as the Antec P160. This uses 120mm fans for intake and exhaust, making it considerably quieter than the average PC case.

LOUD GRAPHICS CARDS

Fans on high-performance graphics cards can be the single most irritating source of noise as they're generally small, high-speed models. Graphics cards lack the fan management abilities of motherboards, and you can't easily wire them into a fan controller. The only way to make a graphics card quieter is to replace the heat sink and fan. Fortunately, this job isn't too difficult. You will need to find a cooler that's compatible with your card, though. Arctic Cooling produces an inexpensive range of coolers that are easy to fit. They're quiet as they use large, slow-spinning fans. The only downside is that they turn slim graphics cards into double-slot monsters.