A harsh headline, but a fair one. We always try to find mostly good things when testing, but sometimes it’s tricky. That’s the case here, where SilverStone is misleading its customers. The grille doesn’t significantly increase noise? We have no sympathy for hoaxes like this. Especially when it’s all “well thought out” and staged. Such practices do not shed a good light on the combination of three different blade shapes, which actually has something to it.
Results: LED to motor power draw ratio
Explanatory note: Lighting has a significant contribution to fan power draw. The ratios in these graphs express the relationship between LED power draw and motor power draw in standard modes from 31 dBA progressively to maximum speed. The LEDs are always set to maximum brightness. The lower the value in the graphs, the more dominant the lighting is in the total power draw. This is not necessarily “wrong”, hand in hand with this usually goes a higher luminance, which can be controlled to some extent. To what extent you already know from the previous chapter.
Why is there a missing value sometimes? There may be more reasons. Usually it is because the fan could not be adjusted to the target noise level. Some have a higher minimum speed (or the speed is low, but the motor is too noisy) or it is a slower fan that will not reach the higher decibels. But the results in the graphs are also missing if the rotor is brushing against the nylon filter mesh. In that case, we evaluate this combination as incompatible. And zero in the graphs is naturally also in situations where we measure 0.00. This is a common occurrence at extremely low speeds with obstructions or within vibration measurements.
