[Sndm3mny]

hey i have a antec 900 and a zalman mfc1 plus (fan controller)

the issue im having is that the antec comes with 4 fans but the fans have molex connectors .... now i ordered 4 cables that go from molex to the 3 pin and they dont seem to be working

this is the converter i ordered....http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16835999104

what im planning on doing is cutting the molex and pretty much just connecting it to a 3 pin.

does anyone else have this configuration? and if so what did you do as a resolution with this.

it doesnt have to be the exact same fan controller because im pretty sure all controllers use the 3 pin but if someone could help out

[knightrider]

what i would do, and have done in the past, is buy the 3 pin connectors, and pins, and cut off the 4 pin molex, and crimp the pins on, and voila, you have a 3 pin fan, lacking the rpm wire of course.

[Sndm3mny]

Originally Posted by knightrider

what i would do, and have done in the past, is buy the 3 pin connectors, and pins, and cut off the 4 pin molex, and crimp the pins on, and voila, you have a 3 pin fan, lacking the rpm wire of course.

hey thanks for the feedback ... .thats what i thought i should do myself also....but i was wondering one thing the controller would still change the fan speed right?...im assuming it would because it would reduce and increase the voltage going to the fan.

[AntecRep]

That's why we have a note in the manual:

Note: The minimum voltage to start a 120mm TriCool™ fan is 5V. We recommend that you set the fan speed to High if you choose to connect the fan(s) to a fan control device or to the Fan-Only connector found on some Antec power supplies.

If you don't, your ZM-MFC1 fan controller will probably be providing too little voltage and the fan won't turn at all until you have the speed setting close to High on your fan controller.

Also, from looking at the back of your controller at the Egg:



I would have expected that the right 4-pin to 3-pin adapter would have been like this one.

Hope that helps!

[Sndm3mny]

Originally Posted by AntecRep

That's why we have a note in the manual:



If you don't, your ZM-MFC1 fan controller will probably be providing too little voltage and the fan won't turn at all until you have the speed setting close to High on your fan controller.

nope its not that its the connectors you described on the 2nd link .... i prob ordered the wrong ones or they sent me the wrong ones whatever...doesnt matter ... and the fan speeds are set on high...because i purchased a led antec fan today (clear one) it comes with the proper connection i need to connect to controller... which totally sux because the other 4 dont ....so i gotta do some surgery...eh well...either that or i go buy new fans because i cant find those connectors at any store....and i dont feel like ordering any more... lol... so i guess its time to pull out the knife and electric tape =D

oh yeah ANYONE got a suggestion on how i should go about doing this surgery ??????????

[AntecRep]

The way I do quick surgery on wires like this is:

1. Make absolutely certain you know the total length you will need for the finished cable.

2. Figure out how much of that distance will be taken from each cable.

3. Cut the wires to slightly different lengths, being careful to allow for the correct overall length. In this example, on one cable the red wire is longer. On the other cable the white wire is longer. Strip the wires about a third of an inch each.
===========--- ---=======
=======--- ---===========

4. The xx's represent where the cut ends are twisted together. In this way, a short-circuit is much less likely and your taping job will be easier. A dab of solder and some heat-shrink tubing would make this a professional job. My usual mistake is forgetting to slide the shrink tubing on before firing up the iron!
===========xxx=======
=======xxx===========

Hope that gets you going!

[Sndm3mny]

niceeeeeeee thanks a lot antecrep.... great help... i dont understand why they dont make the fan a 3 pin and supply a freaking molex adapter like they do when you purchase the antec 3 speed led fans..... like seriously...they know people will/might use fan controllers....but then again they ignore it.....

[oakstave]

Here's a thread about this very issue.
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.p...+900+fan+molex

I had hoped to prevent anyone else here from going through this. Sigh.

[Sndm3mny]

i got it bro just do surgery you don't have to spend one red cent

[AntecRep]

The main reason that our case fans don't come with 3-pin conns by default is that connecting several 120mm fans to a motherboard isn't a universally good idea. Some motherboards can handle it, others don't do so well...

I looked on the egg and couldn't find the right adapter by picture. They had one item that I think is supposed to be the right one(4-pin to 3-pin), but their picture makes it look like what you use to hook up a 3-pin fan to a molex(3-pin to 4-pin). I recommend posting a review on the egg and describe your experience.

Other fan controllers come with different cables that work with 4-pin fans, so part of it is a matter of looking through all the pics at their max resolution and making sure all the connectors on the stuff you are getting will work together. If I'm unsure of connector compatibility/location/clearance/quantity, sometimes I'll pass up some savings and get a product from the place with the helpful pictures that put my questions to rest (although probably not eBay ).

[oakstave]

Is everyone clear here that the 'surgery' method will NOT lead to adjustable fan speed via the fan controller?

My understanding is without an RPM wire, you can't adjust the speed. That's why Antec puts those 3 way switches on them.

You will need to replace the fans to be able to adjust the fan speed with the controller. I recommend it, BTW. The fans on the Antec 900 are loud and buzzy at the high settings.

Also, pick up some filters for the fans. Trust me, you'll see.

Good Luck!

Edit: OK, apparently the surgery method will work with SOME fan controllers. If they have IQ that's monitoring fan speed, it probably won't work, but with the old style "pot" controllers, it can work. I know for a fact however, that it will NOT work on the ZFM-1 controller you are discussing. I already tried.

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.p...51#post5500851

[AntecRep]

The RPM sensor wire is only used to send signals to a fan monitoring circuit. It does not have the ability to control the speed, only report it. If a fan control modifies fan speed, it does it one of two ways. Either Pulse Width Modulation (PWM: the 4-pin fan connector that you see on a lot of CPU cooler fans) or voltage regulation. There's no third way that I'm aware of.

If your controller puts out an alarm and stops a fan because it doesn't have an RPM sense wire, that's a choice on the part of the engineers who designed the controller. A $14 controller would handle all of the fans in this case perfectly and without surgery or buying adapters. That includes the BigBoy! Just remember to set the switches on the fans to High to allow a full range of speed from the controller.

[oakstave]

Originally Posted by AntecRep

The RPM sensor wire is only used to send signals to a fan monitoring circuit. It does not have the ability to control the speed, only report it. If a fan control modifies fan speed, it does it one of two ways. Either Pulse Width Modulation (PWM: the 4-pin fan connector that you see on a lot of CPU cooler fans) or voltage regulation. There's no third way that I'm aware of.

If your controller puts out an alarm and stops a fan because it doesn't have an RPM sense wire, that's a choice on the part of the engineers who designed the controller. A $14 controller would handle all of the fans in this case perfectly and without surgery or buying adapters. That includes the BigBoy! Just remember to set the switches on the fans to High to allow a full range of speed from the controller.

Correct.

In the more advanced Zalman fan controllers, the system sets off a constant alarm and powers the fans up and down when it has no RPM wire response. Obviously, this is to inform the user if something is blocking the fan operation, or a fan goes bad.

It also makes your solution to this problem not work.

Sorry to repeat myself, but I've seen something like 4 threads on this exact issue, and people keep advising that you can haxor the thing together with some electrical tape and a wire stripper, and it just ain't so.

If you are using a more advanced fan controller with IQ for RPM monitoring, and you want to use an Antec 900 you have three choices:

1. Get a cheaper fan controller
2. Use a different case
3. Replace all the fans

[Sndm3mny]

Originally Posted by AntecRep

The RPM sensor wire is only used to send signals to a fan monitoring circuit. It does not have the ability to control the speed, only report it. If a fan control modifies fan speed, it does it one of two ways. Either Pulse Width Modulation (PWM: the 4-pin fan connector that you see on a lot of CPU cooler fans) or voltage regulation. There's no third way that I'm aware of.

If your controller puts out an alarm and stops a fan because it doesn't have an RPM sense wire, that's a choice on the part of the engineers who designed the controller. A $14 controller would handle all of the fans in this case perfectly and without surgery or buying adapters. That includes the BigBoy! Just remember to set the switches on the fans to High to allow a full range of speed from the controller.

yup you are very correct..reason why i chose the zalman is because it controls 6 fans and thats what i needed because i have 5 major and the rest are whatever...the yellow wire is just there because the motherboard reads the fan speed.....the blue and red/yellow wire are the important ones.... because the controller basically lowers & raises the voltage thus leading to the fan going faster and slower and also i realized that when i do lower the fan speed with the controller the LEDs dim as i lower them and get Brighter as i raise the speed.... so who ever said "surgery" isnt going to work...WELL I DID IT ALREADY SO WHY do OTHERS say it wont work? when it works just the way i wanted them to =D
oh and on top of this i purchased the clear LED antec fan from circuit city the other day and it does the same thing as i mentioned above with the 3pin connector...(it also comes with a 3pin > molex converter that im not using)

so my surgery proved to be successful thanks for "antecrep"
hope this clears everything up now its time for a

[oakstave]

Originally Posted by Sndm3mny

yup you are very correct..reason why i chose the zalman is because it controls 6 fans and thats what i needed because i have 5 major and the rest are whatever...the yellow wire is just there because the motherboard reads the fan speed.....the blue and red/yellow wire are the important ones.... because the controller basically lowers & raises the voltage thus leading to the fan going faster and slower and also i realized that when i do lower the fan speed with the controller the LEDs dim as i lower them and get Brighter as i raise the speed.... so who ever said "surgery" isnt going to work...WELL I DID IT ALREADY SO WHY do OTHERS say it wont work? when it works just the way i wanted them to =D
oh and on top of this i purchased the clear LED antec fan from circuit city the other day and it does the same thing as i mentioned above with the 3pin connector...(it also comes with a 3pin > molex converter that im not using)

so my surgery proved to be successful thanks for "antecrep"
hope this clears everything up now its time for a

Glad it worked for you. It was my experience with my own Zalman fan controller that led me to warn you, (and others) that SOME controllers require a working RPM wire to function.

Cool.

Edit: The fan controller I use, that this method will NOT work on, is the ZM-MFC2

[AntecRep]

oakstave: Your model looks amazing. That display beats the tar out of the LEDs found on regular fan controllers. If you hook up a 3-pin fan with RPM sense wire to the PWM location, does it function fully? Since the unit only controls four fans, I expect that using PWM would be optional.

To all readers: Just like you need to know if the graphics card you want to use with your motherboard will fit, you need to check the connectors for your fans and controller. My recommendation is to know the features you want in a controller and find one that has connectors for your equipment. If you want an alarm to sound if a fan stops, however, then you need to switch to fans having that RPM sense wire.



Two wires are used for power and ground. That third wire only sends pulses to allow another device (motherboard or controller) to monitor the RPM of the fan. Look at all the pictures of your fan controller and examine its features before choosing. If your controller doesn't require the RPM sense but doesn't come with the 4-pin cables, then you can get 4-pin to 3-pin adapters or do the surgery described earlier. Adapters are cheap and less permanent than surgery. Hope that's clear!