Fan Speed With Power Adapter

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cerealkeller

Distinguished
Jul 30, 2009
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I recently bought a set of Corsair SP120 High Static Pressure fans for my radiator. They're PWM fans. However, I don't have any 4 pin fan headers or even any 3 pin fan headers within range of my fans, as the cables are pretty short. I don't have any fan controllers at the moment, and even if I did there's really nowhere to mount it, not any kind of traditional method of mounting one anyway. So what I did was just use a couple 4 pin Molex to 3 pin fan power adapters. As I have no experience with these fans, I can't tell if they're running at their full 2350 RPMs or not. It's hard to tell, but it seem to me they're running slower than that. I don't know for sure.
So, the question is, does anyone know if using one of those 4 pin Molex to 3 pin fan power adapters will only allow the fans to run at a particular speed or if they'll run at full speed all the time? I thought they were supposed to run at their maximum speed with those, but I guess I don't really know for sure.
I think the adapters I have came with a set of Rosewill 80mm fans I bought a few years back. If that means anything.
 
Solution
basroil
4 to 3 pin adapters work by simply forwarding the PWM or voltage signal forward. Most motherboards will default to set voltages if no return signal is found, so it will be set at whatever your motherboard has. Basically, it will run at some speed, but you can't know what speed it's at (and it won't run at minimum or maximum speeds since those usually need synchronized pulses to achieve). It's pretty easy to make your own cable though, it uses the same pin sizes as servomotors and arduinos, so with a solder and some parts you can have a decent extension cable.

You can also buy a stand alone fan controller, they aren't too expensive. (by stand alone I mean literally separate from your computer)
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basroil

basroil

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Oct 19, 2013
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4 to 3 pin adapters work by simply forwarding the PWM or voltage signal forward. Most motherboards will default to set voltages if no return signal is found, so it will be set at whatever your motherboard has. Basically, it will run at some speed, but you can't know what speed it's at (and it won't run at minimum or maximum speeds since those usually need synchronized pulses to achieve). It's pretty easy to make your own cable though, it uses the same pin sizes as servomotors and arduinos, so with a solder and some parts you can have a decent extension cable.

You can also buy a stand alone fan controller, they aren't too expensive. (by stand alone I mean literally separate from your computer)
 
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