Cooling Options

Functionally, the two Silent Base cases are nearly identical. Both cases were designed with good air-flow in mind to keep all your high-end gaming hardware running cool and reliable. There are six different case fan mounting locations along with support for liquid cooling.

Air Cooling

(Courtesy of Be Quiet!)

The Silent Base 800 comes with three Be Quiet! Pure Wings 2 fans preinstalled. Two 140mm intake fans on the front panel and one 120mm exhaust fan on the back panel. Additional fans can be added on the top panel if you choose.

All of the Silent Base case fans are mounted with silicone rubber grommets to de-couple vibration and keep transmitted noise to a minimum.

Be Quiet! has changed the RPM of the cooling fans slightly with the release of the newer Silent Base 600. The SB 800 fans are rated for 1,000 rpm (intake) and 1,500 rpm (exhaust), while the SB 600 fans have slowed down to 900 rpm (intake) and 1,200 rpm (exhaust). The SB 600 also comes with a built-in fan speed controller that the SB 800 lacks. Overall, this results in the SB 600 being even quieter than the original SB 800.

The following table lists the noise generated by the three included case fans while operating at different voltages.  Sound Pressure Levels were taken 3’ from the front of the enclosure.  The ambient background noise level was approximately 27 dBA.

Note: The Silent Base 800 does not have a built-in fan speed controller like the Silent Base 600 does. If you want to slow the fans down you will have to add your own fan speed controller.

With all three fans running at full speed the noise is noticeable but certainly not loud while providing very good baseline airflow through the case.  Slowing the fans down still keeps air moving but quiets the case considerably.

The Silent Base 800 enclosure is designed to support large, tower-style CPU coolers up to 170mm (6.7”) tall.

Overall, the three bundled fans that come with the Silent Base 800 provide excellent baseline cooling with minimal noise. Many users will be well served with the two fans included with the Silent Base 600 but my personal preference is to add the optional second 140mm intake.

Liquid Cooling

The Silent Base 800 case offers the same options as the Silent Base 600 for installing either single or dual fan/radiator liquid cooling systems. For this comparison we installed two different liquid cooling systems, the Corsair H80i (back panel) and H100i (top panel).

The Corsair H80i liquid cooler uses a single 120mm radiator mounted on the back panel with two fans in a push-pull configuration. The bundled 120mm rear exhaust fan was removed prior to installing the H80i.

The Corsair H100i liquid cooler uses a dual 240mm radiator, which mounts to the bottom of the top panel. The Silent Base 800 case can alternatively mount a dual 280mm radiator up top if you prefer.

There is not a lot of extra space up top when installing a large radiator-fan combination. In our build, we had to slide the radiator as far as possible towards the left side of the case so that the radiator would clear one of the heatsinks on the top edge of the motherboard. To install a larger 280mm radiator, we would have to use thinner fans (15mm) on the radiator or a different motherboard. Note: A dual radiator mounted under the top panel will most likely block rear access to the top 5.25” drive bay.

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