Controling Fans and which ones to buy

DamanC

DamanC

DamanC

Associate
Joined
27 Aug 2004
Posts
384
Hi guys, I have a Lian Li PC 0700. It houses 2 front Asaka led 80mm fans, one stock 80mm exhaust fan, a 80mm side window fan(Akasa UV Fan), CPU, GPU and PSU fans.

Ill cut to the chase, its too noisey. CPU fan is going to be swapped out with an Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro, the GPU with something nice when one comes out for an 8800GT. PSU Fan, nothing can be realy done and its fairly quiet anyway.

So it leaves my 4 80mm case fans to be replaced.

Firstly, what are the chances of me being able to control these 4 fans via windows software? I dont like the idea of case fans, they are ugly imo and there isnt much out there that I can see that goes with a crisp Lian Li front.

If I am controlling them via software, do they have to be a special type?

What is all this 'PWM' I keep reading about?

For ref my mobo is a Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R which has 1 x 3pin CPU fan plug, 1 x 3 pin chasis fan plug and another 4 pin fan plug.
 
PWM is a method of speed control. The old style would change the speed of fans by varying the voltage output from the header. This is a bit of a sloppy way of doing it as you can't get good speed control that way. It also limits how low you can go in terms of speed. For instance the highest speed is when output is 12V. In "quiet" mode where the fan does not need to be spooled up all the way it might drop the voltage down to 7V. You could not drop the voltage to, let's say, 2V because the fan wouldn't spin at all.

PWM is Pulse Width Modulation. Instead of lowering the voltage to less than 12v to go slower it turns on and off the 12V supply quickly. The longer you leave the power on, the faster it goes until it peaks at always-on. The less frequency or duration you leave the power on the slower it will go. You can achieve almost any speed lower than the fan's maximum using this method.
 
DamanC said:
I dont like the idea of case fans, they are ugly imo and there isnt much out there that I can see that goes with a crisp Lian Li front.
Click to expand...

I presume you meant "case fan controllers".

If so, before you cast that option totally aside, consider this:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=BB-001-ZA&groupid=701&catid=57&subcat=189

It comes in brushed aluminium, and I am sure it would grace any Lian Li.

I have kept with my Sunbeam Rhoebus, as I value the fact that you can switch off the fan completely. Not as pretty as the Zalman, but it can be modded like this:

mod.JPG


Yup - that's a Lian Li it's sitting in. For more info, check out this thread which may be of interest:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=17682447&highlight=gersen+controller
 
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