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Fan question

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Nemo

Member
Joined
Jan 31, 2003
Location
Modesto, CA
Hey, I'm a bit new at all this, so I figured I should ask before I go cutting and splicing and plugging things into my motherboard. :)

I recently salvaged an 80mm fan (the sticker on it says DC 12v 2w) from the power supply in an old 286 pc. It only has two wires and a two-pin female plug. I have a dead 60mm heatsink fan with the standard 3-wires and 3-wire plug. How do i set up the 80mm fan's wire situation so i can plug it into my mobo, or is that even possible? It seems a shame to let this perfectly usable 80mm fan go to waste.

Thanks in advance!
 
Splice the red wire of the 80mm to the red wire of the 3 pin plug. Splice the black wire of the 80mm to the black wire of the 3 pin plug. The yellow wire of the 3 pin plug is for RPM monitoring and since your fan is not equipped for this, you can cut it wherever you like. Now you should be able to plug this into any motherboard header and get power, just no rpm monitoring.

I wouldn't expect that an old PS fan would supply a great amount of cfm, but it's free.
 
lyle said:
Splice the red wire of the 80mm to the red wire of the 3 pin plug. Splice the black wire of the 80mm to the black wire of the 3 pin plug. The yellow wire of the 3 pin plug is for RPM monitoring and since your fan is not equipped for this, you can cut it wherever you like. Now you should be able to plug this into any motherboard header and get power, just no rpm monitoring.

I wouldn't expect that an old PS fan would supply a great amount of cfm, but it's free.

Thanks, I figured it would be something simple like that, but better to ask first than make a costly (and stupid) mistake! :)

I dunno how powerful the fan is (the 286 has just been sitting in my closet for years), but I was just planning to stick it somewhere it can blow across the vid card for a bit of airflow on the ram. Thanks again!
 
Well, it works fine. I'm actually a bit surprised at how quiet it is AND how much air it moves. I'm actually thinking about getting an 80mm-to-60mm adaptor and putting the big fan on my CPU heatsink, and moving the 60mm to blow on the cards. :)
 
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