Using a Dell R330 as a firewall appliance and it’s great, except for the fan noise. I want to have a go at replacing the fans with some Noctua PWM’s I have but it seems Dell doesn’t like to provide wiring schematics for their fan headers
I’ve done a bit of research but can’t find any examples of replacing them in this unit (each group of fans is a pair of two and connected to the mobo using an 8 pin header which I assume is 2 x 4 pin pwm).
I’ve seen plenty of warnings that Dell likes to swap pin order and wiring color so am proceeding with care.
Anyone able to point me towards the pin out or give a little advice on how I could test with a multimeter?
I’m sure you’ve already found this. Scanning over it didn’t seem to hit the detail you seek, but I just did a quick glance.
Alternatively are there any markings on the fan itself that you could lookup? Years ago we had a popcorn machine that had a short and would do weird things if you touched the kettle the wrong way. This was an amateur unit with little supported documentation. Doing a similar search I found the part online at a huge electronics store of small parts. They were less than $1 each and had diagrams, etc. I ordered 2, bookmarked, etc. Shipping cost more than the parts, lol. Took about 5 minutes to replace once I had the info. The pain a popcorn addict will go through for their fix!
Anyhow, I’m envisioning something similar for that fan or wiring. By chance, have you called Dell and asked for a wiring schematic? I’ve found them to be pretty chill on stuff like this from past experiences.
Hi @sledge - thanks for the reply and suggestions.
I tried Dell via their forums but they can’t/won’t provide wiring details. I also thought to look for compatible off-brand fan units to see if another manufacturer had a compatible unit and published the pin out but no joy.
Seems to be a quirk lots of Dell users run into (plenty of material online about fan wiring, just not about this particular model).