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CPU Fan Controller

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Deltafan909

Member
Joined
Jul 19, 2011
Location
USA
I have an Alienware Aurora, although I wish I would have just built. The fan attached to the radiator for my liquid cooling never seems to get up to full speed, even under full load where my temps reach 71-73C. Is there some kind of fan controller I can buy to directly control this fan instead of having it on auto? I want to overclock higher, but also want to keep my temps to around 70C or less. Thanks for any help you can provide.
 
There are fan controllers out there... but they may or may not be the best solution for you. If you have a spare 5.25 external bay, you could mount one like this for $13 from the 'egg.

To be honest, your liquid cooling setup probably won't benefit much from simply faster fan speeds. If you can give us some more information about the radiator and how many fans are on it, etc. we may be able to help a bit more. If it is a single 120.1 radiator and fan, you are pushing the limit of what that thing can do. You may be better off getting a high performance air cooler for around $30-40 in that case.
 
It is one fan, and the radiator is stock from alienware. If I do look into better cooling options, it would probably be liquid still. A faster fan speed would not give me better temps?
 
It will, but it won't improve them to an amount that you'll see. The different won't be huge, but it will be there.

Best to replace your cooler with say a H80 from Corsair.
 
It will, but it won't improve them to an amount that you'll see. The different won't be huge, but it will be there.

Best to replace your cooler with say a H80 from Corsair.

I agree. The H80 is a good option if you want to stay with water. Just didn't want to see you go out and get a fan and expect temps low enough to overclock very much.

The pre-fab WCing kits from manufacturers like Alienware, Cyberpower, ibuypower, etc. are to be considered the bare minimum in terms of cooling, and in most cases aren't much better than a good air cooler.
 
I agree. The H80 is a good option if you want to stay with water. Just didn't want to see you go out and get a fan and expect temps low enough to overclock very much.

The pre-fab WCing kits from manufacturers like Alienware, Cyberpower, ibuypower, etc. are to be considered the bare minimum in terms of cooling, and in most cases aren't much better than a good air cooler.

Yeah. They cut corners to save cash and end up just giving you the bare minimum in terms of cooling performance. OP should upgrade to a Corsair H80 and cooling performance will, most likely, be a lot better.

As for overclocking on Alienware computers, is it possible? I have no idea, I've always built. It's an OEM machine, I mean, the last I checked Alienware was a part of Dell and you sure can't OC on OEM Dell machines so I don't see why Alienware would be any different. :shrug:
 
They have a modified BIOS, but it does allow you to overclock. A lot of features are not int here though.
 
They have a modified BIOS, but it does allow you to overclock. A lot of features are not int here though.

If you plan on overclocking, I would definitely recommend that you look into a much better CPU cooler. Corsair Hydro series (H50, H80, etc) are all great coolers if you are trying to go for another liquid cooling system.
 
What would the difference be in the H50 compared to my current one? A better pump? Better fan?
 
All around better cooling performance.

I can't give you exactly why because I've never owned one, but everyone around here loves them.
 
Final question :) Will it fit into my case alright? I am not sure if my case was designed to specifically hold the current cooler they installed in it.
 
It should fit just fine. If it fits a system similar to the Corsair Hydro series, it should fit.

Post a pic of your current system now and people can better advise you. :)
 
Like what was said, go with the H80. For some reason I am thinking your system is more or less an H50 already. They don't look exactly the same, but pretty close.

h50main.jpg

alienwareh50.jpg


I snagged the first pic from corsair, the 2nd from http://www.waybeta.com/news/264/que...mantling-_-dell-alienwareaurora-evaluation/6/ found from google images. If this is a problem let me know and I'll delete it.

I believe the H80 is something like 10-12C cooler than the H50.

Well I guess a better question to ask is, what is the actual rpms? Do you know what the rated max rpms are? Have you checked to see if there is a pwm setting in the bios that you can adjust to set at what temp to go to max speed?

According to this review by hokiealumnus http://www.overclockers.com/corsair-hydro-series-h50-review/ . The H50 with a high speed yate loon at 2200rpm had only attained a 2.2C drop over the stock H50 1700rpm fan. However, the H50 has a 20FPI density, which would mean that fans with higher pressure would be a better match aka gentle typhoon. Of course if your fan is running quite a bit slower then the pressure would be a lot lower.

If you still are looking for a simple cheap fan controller you can try the Rheosmart fan controller. Can always shop around to see if you can get it cheaper, but less than $10 is not too bad.
 
I'll look into the H80. Thank you all for your help!

My fan on the radiator currently has gotten up to 2600RPM's when the CPU was at 100% load. Usually, it is around 1200RPM's. In the Alienware BIOS, there are no settings for the fan unfortunately.
 
You may want to check and see which 3 pin connector your fan is plugged into on your mobo. If it is plugged into the connector by the CPU, it will regulate itself based upon the temp settings in your bios. If you choose another connector, it should run at the maximum allowed speed all the time.

Either way, you definitely want to upgrade your cooling. You will see cooler temps from an H80, but remember the i7-9xx chips run hot, so it will take substantial cooling before you see really good temps. I've got a full custom WC system and I can only get my i7-920 to 65C or so (granted, that is at 4 GHz).
 
Overclocked back to 3.8GHz today. RAM now at 1450MHz, which is probably too high. I ran Prime for 20 minutes with temps ranging from 68-75C on different cores. I am considering moving my multiplier down to 6, instead of 8 for my memory. But, then my 1333 RAM would be around 1080MHz. Should I just bring it back down? How are my temps? My Vcore gets up to 1.224V under load, and I don't think I can bring it down any further.
 
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