Too loud - PCI Fan - 7V/9V mod

Why not try the 7V mod you suggested? Get the molex to 3 pinconverter and instead of running the fan from +12V (Yellow) to Ground (Black) run it off +12V (Yellow) to +5V (Red). Should slow the fan quite a bit and is a lot simpler than soldering in resistors.

Hey guys, thanks a bunch for the help!
I havent done the 7v mod because i've heard about it messing up PSU's. If theres a foolproof way to do it, then i'd be willing to give it a shot.

@Conumdrum
I would get a fan controller but seeing as its a dell (studio xps 435MT) I would need to do a lot of modding to get a spot up front for it, not to mention space issues inside the case.

It's true that more cfm usually means louder. I have a stock dell 70cfm rear fan right now which isnt the quietest but i've ordered a Scythe kaze jyu which is 58CFM and 30db max. It's significantly quieter than the dell fan. While still pumping out a good amount of air. It should arrive in a few days.

I'm hoping that itll be quiet with that..

Since my OP I have tried a little test to see if my problem was vibration. I took the fan out of the pci slot and listened to it up close and it was very quiet.
I was surprised.
I think that since its in the shitty pci bracket and doesnt sit in the mobo PCI slot its vibrating a tiny bit.

Once the scythe comes we'll see if that helps.

Ok so heres some system specs/temps. I mostly use Everest Ultimate btw. The stability stress test works well.
Not to mention all the information it has.

i7-920 CPU (All cores stay below 50C idle, never seen it get higher than 62C on heavy load)
Cpu's not a problem, it's well cooled.
Hoping the scythes lower CFM doesnt change that.

evga gtx 260 (OCd) GPU
This one gets hot because the only pcieX16 i had was super close to the floor.
It idles at 48-57C and under load it gets up to the low 70's, but only because I've really customized rivatuners auto fan settings. By the time it gets up to 75C it's blowin at 100%.
If i left it at 40% it would get well into the 80's no doubt.
This is the reason why i got a pci slot fan in the first place..

antec earthwatts 500d PSU
Don't know about the temps but the voltages have freaked me out a bit.
Voltage Values (grabbed from everest)
CPU Core 1.10 V
+2.5 V 1.07 V
+3.3 V 1.09 V
+5 V 5.00 V
+12 V 13.44 V
+5 V Standby 5.05 V
VBAT Battery 3.20 V
GPU Vcc 3.32 V

I havent gotten a multimeter to test them out, and my dell bios doesnt give me *** worth of info.. Im guessing its wrong though. I've had shutdowns during gaming before so i really need to check those voltages..

Also ambient room temps get hot, but thats mostly because the heat emanating from my computer .
If my computers off its usually pretty moderately cool.

Let me know if you need more info. I think that covers the major ones.
Thanks a lot for everyones help!

Thanks for the input.
The PSU is very capable of handling the load.
GTX 260 reccs ask for 500W, which it is.
And I believe 36A on the 12V rails.
The Antec i have has two 22A 12V rails adding up to 44A.
Also, you know how GPU manufacturers always overexaggerate power needs.

Apart from a psu fault, It should be able to handle it just fine, with headroom.

Fix it for FREE! I had the same noise problem with my xps 435 mt. Download and install the bios upgrade at http://support.dell.com/support/do [...] eid=318766

Bios 1.1.2 is the upgrade. Just check yours first to see if this is an upgrade for you. Mine quieted down asap with this bios upgrade and it had an option to upgrade it while I was in Windows.... Give it a shot!