New build startup - Couple of questions

martian_aphid · 13 Jul 2008 at 14:14

Ok so kept my fingers crossed pressed the start button and yay! my first POSTed, thanks to all for past advice =D

BIOS reads temps on the Q6600 at 44degrees with TT at full

Anyway just wanted to ask a couple of things - chassis fans, dumb question but just checking, I assume these need to be plugged into the molex connector as well as the 3pin connector on the mobo as they aren't spinning atm?

Second question, before I install the OS should I be setting the SATA optical and HDD to AHCI [would it be necessary for an esata hdd]?

martian_aphid · 13 Jul 2008 at 15:17

btw safe to daisy-chain 4 fans on one molex?

soulhunter123 · 13 Jul 2008 at 15:20

Your fans only really need to be plugged into the power source (i.e. molex) connector; the 3-pin connector, if not supplying power, usually just serves to provide your computer with statistics like temperature, fan speed etc.

Secondly I do like to enable AHCI first of all, as I do use hot-plugging of SATA drives regularly. But I don't think you have to do it pre-install. And finally, as long as your fans aren't drawing too much current from one rail (check your PSU's specs) it should be fine to daisy chain them on one molex.

martian_aphid · 13 Jul 2008 at 15:42

Thanks for the info soulhunter, I plan on using an external HDD through esata. I know that AHCI allows hot-swapping of SATA drives, not sure if esata is classified as that but I'm guessing it might be. The reason I asked before installing windows is that I heard switching to AHCI after installing windows would cause the drives to fail to boot and require repairing the installation.

I guess I wasn't thinking about the chassis fans, I just assumed they ran off the mobo like the CPU fan but now I realised there's only one wire on the 3-pin :S Anyway I will try daisy-chaining these two case fans in with the other 2 already on the molex for a total of 4. My PSU is 800W with 20A on the 12v rails, 64A combined.