Is a fan controller needed for overclocking?

[Bidybag]

I have been looking at fan controllers and they are not very expensive so would it be a good idea to buy one? Would it help for overclocking?

 

[cnumartyr]

It won't help.. but it will let you get a much louder fan. As in you can get a 150 CFM fan and undervolt it when you don't want it up too loud.

Short answer? No.

 

[Silverion77]

^You go on THG at work.......very professional

but yeah it wont help an overclock but you can shut up your fans when you dont want them

 

[cnumartyr]

^You go on THG at work.......very professional

but yeah it wont help an overclock but you can shut up your fans when you dont want them

I'm a government employee.. I'm supervising a contractor today.

I was playing Solitaire on a Windows 3.1 Machine but I got bored.

 

[Silverion77]

You should download Steam

Edit: you actually built the OC rig?

 

[cnumartyr]

You should download Steam

Lol.. that falls under the "blocked" category of software I'm allowed to use at work.

 

[Silverion77]

Myspace and Facebook too (turrets)

 

[cnumartyr]

Myspace and Facebook too (turrets)

Yep.. and Youtube, Video Google.. all that.

Luckily www.muse.mu works so I can listen to some music.

 

[Silverion77]

lol.. you really like them a lot

But their song on GH3 is fun

 

[Bidybag]

I like the idea of being able to turn off my fans at night so the computer wont be very loud because i cant download things overnight.

 

[cnumartyr]

I like the idea of being able to turn off my fans at night so the computer wont be very loud because i cant download things overnight.

Well.. if you do that you might as well turn the computer off. The fan controller isn't useful for that. Turning the fans down while overclocked might cause temperatures to rise too high (depending on the setup).

And Silver: Yea I like them, Wirelessfender got me started on them.

 

[Silverion77]

what sort of things do you download that take all night?

 

[cnumartyr]

what sort of things do you download that take all night?

Pr0n.

 

[Silverion77]

Pr0n.

You mean p0rn**

Edit: Wow they let you listen to the whole song on the site

 

[Bidybag]

Games, movies.

 

[Silverion77]

ah...i see

 

[cnumartyr]

Games, movies.

Honestly your best bet is a mild OC with whatever you get.

Turning it down at night for DLing would require having a second OC or something like that. The Fan Controller might help if you enjoy benchmarking (which I personally do) and occasionally need the maximum cooling you can get.

Edit: By movies he means pr0n. And by games he means completely legal copies of games that he bought through Steam or Direct2Drive, correct?

And Silver: Heck yes, entire song.. it's awesome. Listen to the entire Absolution Album (best of all imo).

 

[Silverion77]

Edit: By movies he means pr0n. And by games he means completely legal copies of games that he bought through Steam or Direct2Drive, correct?

And Silver: Heck yes, entire song.. it's awesome. Listen to the entire Absolution Album (best of all imo).

My bad

 

[Solitaire]

By movies he means pr0n. And by games he means completely legal copies of games that he bought through Steam or Direct2Drive, correct?

How dare you pull your punch! Use [sarcasm] tags next time! :lol:

And a fan controller won't help your OC but you can just dial down a loud CPU cooler a notch when downloading... er, above materials... at night, as downloading puts relatively little strain on CPU, thus less heat to dissipate. Just make sure your idle temps are low enough at that fan speed before you leave it on all night...

Downloading...

 

[Bidybag]

If im only at night then the CPU load is going to be really low because it isnt going to be doing much. So would it be possible just to have 1 fan up? I just want my PC silent while i sleep and to download at same time.

 

[Solitaire]

Not great, especially in any OC'd system - that fan will be responsible for singlehandedly dragging air in, shoving it across the CPU and then back out again (not counting the PSU fan, you shouldn't rely on that for system cooling anyway!). And one noisy fan is much worse on the ears than any number of quiet ones! Much better idea is to set all fans to minimal settings (if they are variable-speed) - at low speeds most fans are virtually silent, if not then they're probably on their last legs! One of the (few) uses of a multi-fan controller is to change fan speed (via power control) of otherwise static single-speed fans.

 

[cnumartyr]

If you want a silent PC get cooling like an overclocker and don't run fans.

It's a trade off. If you want to OC it's not going to be silent unless you invest in water cooling (a GOOD setup).

 

[Bidybag]

So fan controllers have no use? Are they not useful for checking temperature?

 

[cnumartyr]

So fan controllers have no use? Are they not useful for checking temperature?

Noone said they were useless. However they aren't going to help with overclocking.

As far as temperatures go they aren't going to show you the most important ones.. Core Temp and GPU Temps. System temp isn't nearly as important unless calibrating Tcase via Ambient.