Controlling Speed of Case Fans and how to read drive temperatures?

[spinbot]

Let me first admit, I never really cared much about cooling and just trusted what came with my case/CPU was sufficient. I never over-clocked and never ran any fancy video cards for gaming.

 

Now that I am piecing together this tank of a PC for an UnRaid server with many hard drives, I am now thinking about temperatures.

 

I've seen people talk about the temperature of their hard drives as well as controlling the speed of the fans ( bigger fans running slower speeds to be quieter ).

 

I figure I will order up to 5 of these ( http://www.directcanada.com/products/?sku=11130AC7628 ) , as they match the case I am getting ( CM-590 ).

 

Do they have a little switch on them to adjust speeds?  Can you shut the blue glow off also as I am not really sure what purpose it serves on a case that isn't transparent?

 

To check the drive temperature, does a program like UnMenu do that, or do you need another application, or do you have to hook up a monitor to the server and read temperatures from the BIOS?

 

Thanks

 

[lionelhutz]

I wouldn't put fans on the removable side cover. Just makes it a pain to open the server. 3 fans would be more than enough.

 

The LED's can not be turned off. Just buy fans that don't have them.

 

Something like this could be used to adust the speed.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811998129&cm_re=pci_fan_controller-_-11-998-129-_-Product

 

Then use the molex to small fan plug adapters that come with the fans. Or get the Sunbeam version of that controller and splice or solder more fan plugs onto it, which is what I did on my HTPC.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811992003&cm_re=pci_fan_controller-_-11-992-003-_-Product

 

Peter

[lionelhutz]

You temp question - the stock unRAID interface will tell you the drive temps if they are spinning which is OK because they will stay cool even without airflow if they are spun-down.

 

Peter

[spinbot]

Im thinking that rather than worry about controlling fan speeds, maybe I should just get fans that aren't noisy

 

There are  a tonne of different case fans available.

 

I just figured out what "CFM" stand for ( as it appears beside some of the descriptions ).  For others that may wonder, its "The amount of airflow which fans generate is typically measured in cubic feet per minute"

 

Here's what I am picking from: http://www.directcanada.com/search/?kw=120mm%20fan

 

I have no idea how accurate the manufacturers claims are, but I can suspect they are exaggerated some.

 

Quiet and high CFM clearing don't go together.

 

I can get this:

Coolermaster Ultra Silent Fan 120MM Black Case Fan 13DBA 11.27CFM  ( quiet )

or

Antec 120MM Case Fan 3/4 Pin Adpt DBB Double Ball Bearing 2000RPM 79CFM 29.8DBA  ( high air flow )

or

Something else

 

Prices difference are negligible.

 

Suggestions?  My first selected pretty blue one's have to go as plan on just stuffing the case out of site anyways.

 

[lionelhutz]

How about this one - 3 speeds built in.

 

http://www.directcanada.com/products/?sku=10370AC8791&vpn=TRICOOL 120MM DBB&manufacture=ANTEC

 

or one like this where you can run 2 case fans and the CPU fan off of the CPU fan header and basically use the BIOS to adjust the speed. There is always some adjustments like the temp and minimum speed settings that you can adjust for the CPU fan speed.

 

http://www.directcanada.com/products/?sku=10450AC1821&vpn=ACF12PWM&manufacture=ARCTIC COOLING

 

Peter

[prostuff1]

I use Antec Fans in my Server because of the fact that I can control them via the switch.  It works well enough for me but I am not overly concerned about noise as the server sits in my basement.  The room mate that sleeps down there hears it but he could sleep through a hurricane and has never complained.

 

The Antec fans on low are fine, on medium are probably enough, and on high are more than likely overkill and pretty loud.

[spinbot]

or one like this where you can run 2 case fans and the CPU fan off of the CPU fan header and basically use the BIOS to adjust the speed. There is always some adjustments like the temp and minimum speed settings that you can adjust for the CPU fan speed.

 

http://www.directcanada.com/products/?sku=10450AC1821&vpn=ACF12PWM&manufacture=ARCTIC COOLING

 

Peter

 

"CPU fan header" ... im guessing that aside from the power connector on the fan, their is another cable that connects to this?  Considering the size of cases we are using, should one be concerned about this extra cable being able to reach the cpu fan header?

 

The other fan ( Antec TriCool ) sounds decent with its double bearing design, multi-speed ( assuming their is a physical switch for this as the description says "3-speed switch lets you balance quiet performance with maximum cooling" )

[kapperz]

Nexus fans are some of the most quietest IMO. I never liked those rubber mounts though. Ideally a fan with low db and high CFM is wanted, but as long as you have air flowing over the hard drives you'll be fine (1000rpm works). Hard drives are designed to withstand being hot (around 65c can be common). That said, heat is a one of a computers worst enemies. Have you looked into passive cooling?

 

I've tossed around the idea of making my unRAID a fanless system, but I have not used any HD heat sinks before (future upgrade maybe). Some links here, here, and here

 

 

[WeeboTech]

I took a different approach.

I use a number of slow RPM exhaust fans (4 120MM fans) and use passive non heatsink trayless SATA units to house the hard drives.

It comes out cheaper in the long run.

 

I've used the ZALMAN Heat pipe coolers and had decent results, but nothing worked better then having "some" air flow over the hard drives.

I still have 2 in my spare parts box.

 

http://www.acousticpc.com/zalman_hard_drive_heatsink_cooler.html

 

I also thought about using the NINJA Heatsink for my CPU.

But the size and cost of it really made me wonder if I should even bother.

 

http://www.scythe-usa.com/product/cpu/001/index.html

 

 

[jetkins]

You temp question - the stock unRAID interface will tell you the drive temps if they are spinning which is OK because they will stay cool even without airflow if they are spun-down.

Many (most/all?) modern drives support querying of SMART parameters even when they're spun down. unRAID does not yet handle that possibility and will show * for the temperature of any spun-down drives, but if you install unMenu you can tell it (via directives in /boot/unmenu/myMain_local.conf) which of your drives support that function, and unMenu will show temps for them regardless of their state.

[curtis-r]

Having recently upgraded to the Norco 4020 20 drive case, I also have some fan issues.  2 rear 120mm & 5 mid-case 80mm fans makes too much noise.  Since only have 11 drives, unplugged 2 80mm fans & found no drive temp increases, but also not much noise reduction.  This thread discusses fan replacements, but do any of these options take into consideration temperature.  In other words, I would like a thermostat to turn on/off fans based on need.

 

It just kills me to have 7 fans running 24/7 when much of the time all the drives are spun-down.  Any suggestions?

[WeeboTech]

This fan has the option to use the included thermistor to control fan speed.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835999111

[spinbot]

I went with 2 of these fans: http://www.directcanada.com/products/?sku=10370AC8791&vpn=TRICOOL%20120MM%20DBB&manufacture=ANTEC

They have a simply switch off them for "Low, Medium, High". 

 

 

I have the Coolmaster 590 case and installed 2 of these at the top.  I'm going to leave the side empty and cover up the holes.  I have the stock case fan and then 3 more fans in each drive cage.  So, 6 fans in total.  I've only put my 2 new drives in and they have been burning in for the past 8 hours.

My 1.5 TB Seagate is running at 31C

My 1.5 TB WD Green at 28C