Adding LED to GPU fan?

[tobsmonster2]

Spotted this today and decided I'd like to do the same to a reference 570 or 580. Any ideas?

That's a KFA GTX 570 in the picture.

 

[Tealc]

The fans of the KFA are of a traditional bladed fan, which usually come with some form of frame to which LEDs can be mounted. Blower reference fans are very different and sometimes do not have a frame to mount the LEDs.

It should be possible to stick some LEDs to the interior of the graphics card shroud, pointing in towards the blower fan but it would be a little messy. Should get a half decent effect though as light penetrates the many fins on the blower fan.

 

[tobsmonster2]

Thanks tealc. I was pretty much thinking of cutting maybe 3 or 4 little holes on the 'inside' of the shroud, and poking them through there. The other issue would be how I'd power the LED's .

I suppose if I opt for a second hand 570 , I'd just find a 12V or 5V source on the board and solder to that. Wouldn't mind voiding my warranty on something that cheap. If I got the 580 however, I was thinking I'd like to mod my way into the 4pin fan connector and have a go at stealing 12V from there .

Any idea which of the pins are which? And what exactly is the connector called? Any attempt to research a 4pin fan connector points me to the 4pin PWM on motherboards, and searching mini 4pin returns much of the same.

 

[Tealc]

The connecor is a JST XHP-4. The terminals are JST SXH-001T-P0.6

The wiring convention on my older HD4890 is 1-Black-grnd, 2-Red-+12v, 3-Yellow-Tach, 4-Blue-PWM. I think all are pretty much the same.

Running 4 LEDs will be fine off the graphics card fan connector. I'd be tempted to run independent wires in though so perhaps you can switch them on and off. LEDs work well off PWM so you could even have them brighten up as the card gets hotter. Graphics card PWM will be 5v at only a few milliamps so the circuit would need a transistor or MOSFET to drive the LEDs. Could be very cool actually.

Edit: I know you can buy flying leads with these connectors on (and possibly mating half) but I am unsure about a splitter which would help keep that warranty intact.

Oh and post pics if you do it.

 

[tobsmonster2]

Thanks tealc, you're an absolute star. Just noticed from your sig, it was your thread that gave me the idea of cutting little holes for the LED's .

If I can find a supplier of the connectors it wouldn't be too difficult to split off power for the LED's and run them through a switch. Thing is though, I'd still need to solder directly to the board at some point for a higher amperage source. At which point I might as well skip the connector completely; though having the LED's brightness scale with load/heat would be pretty cool so the transistor idea isn't totally off the table .

Either way, if I do get anything done you'll be the first to know . Thanks again.