Quote Originally Posted by Eastcoasthandle View Post
But isn't that looking at the forest instead of the tree? That would be a perfect example of showing the readers what to expect. If a reviewer wants to provide data of the video card fan I can't see why that couldn't be added. But for all intent and purpose letting people know that a 3 fan PC case is louder then the actual video card at idle and/or load would be something that readers would like to know. But that's just my opinion, to each his own .
My only question is what sort of fan would you use during this test? Really quiet ones (noctua) or not so quiet ones? I think that's what SKYMTL is getting at. If you put a case in front of the card, the case will be part of the noise and you won't get an accurate reading. If the case is louder than the card, the quietest reading will get is that of the case fans.

I see where SKYMTL is coming from, and his methodology makes sense. It's not designed to be representative of the real world. It's scientifically designed to figure out which card is the most quiet.