PSU fan has stopped

inquisitive_emu · 3 Jan 2007 at 22:38

Hi,

I just bought a X1950 Pro (AGP), from OcUK at the bargain price it is, installed it tonight whilst giving my PC a dust clearup at the same time (with a soft paintbrush). It seemed to go fine, then when I rebooted from the driver install, Asus Probe is telling me that than PSU fan is not spinning, which it isn't. I thought maybe the X1950 is drawing too much power (unlikely on a 430W Antec?) and I whacked in a 5200 but still no PSU fan. I've doublechecked the motherboard connector.

I'm stuck, any ideas, or has it just broke... :confused:

Corasik · 3 Jan 2007 at 23:12

The PSU fan is powered directly by the PSU, the cable to the motherboard is only there to monitor it. Either the cable inside the PSU has come adrift, or the fan bearings have failed, and/or the fan has seized up from too much dust entering the bearing. (Some PSU's do turn off their fans when they are sufficiently cool, however the majority of PSU's simply range from fan speed slow, to fan speed max, very few totally turn off the fan)

With the power turned off, try to turn the fan manually (with a cocktail stick/non conductive item). It should spin fairly freely. If its stiff then its failed.

If it does spin freely, then its quite likely that the cable for the fan has failed (or in some PSU's the fan plugs in with a connector, and could have fallen off).

If you decide to check the internal connections, please remember PSU's capacitors can remain charged with high voltages for several days, so please treat it with respect and care.

inquisitive_emu · 3 Jan 2007 at 23:54

Thanks for the reply. It isn't spinning very freely and on closer inspection it seems to have come off its bearings, which is a bit disappointing as I was very gentle with the brush when cleaning it.

I'll see if I can remount it, hopefully without taking the main case off, otherwise I guess I'm looking at a new PSU.

ANDARIAL · 4 Jan 2007 at 08:00

or put a new fan in there

you could either
swap fan for same
cut and splice cables if not
use 3pin or 4 pin fan routing cables to outside of psu case and attach to spare molex/converter

as has been said BEWARE the CAPS