s-hatland
macrumors regular
Hey everyone,
A lot of people here are aware that many times, when using a non-EFI (unflashed out of the box) video card, fan speeds, notably the PCI and power supply fans, rev up after cold starts. One way to fix this has been to launch OpenGL Extensions Viewer, run a test, and fan speeds will come back down to normal. This has usually worked for me, but since the last nvidia web driver I've been having more erratic behavior. Lots of hard shutdowns. A fresh install is in the works, just waiting for my new drive.
So, I started wondering about other ways to solve (or at least put a bandaid on) this issue. I started thinking about apps like MacsFanControl and SMCfancontrol. Both have options to set fan speeds based on sensor readouts with upper and lower limits. I would like to try this out, but my question is, what are the default lower and upper limits for each fan? At what temperature does the computer tell the fans to kick in and, vise versa, slow down? I don't want to set anything too high or low and possibly fry anything. Is this just a trial and error thing or have both limits been documented somewhere?
My hopes are that, using MacsFanControl to set the PCI and PS fans to nothing other than default values and also opening it upon login, or boot, would stifle the initial fan revving that occurs. Is this just wishful thinking? Has anyone else tried it?
A lot of people here are aware that many times, when using a non-EFI (unflashed out of the box) video card, fan speeds, notably the PCI and power supply fans, rev up after cold starts. One way to fix this has been to launch OpenGL Extensions Viewer, run a test, and fan speeds will come back down to normal. This has usually worked for me, but since the last nvidia web driver I've been having more erratic behavior. Lots of hard shutdowns. A fresh install is in the works, just waiting for my new drive.
So, I started wondering about other ways to solve (or at least put a bandaid on) this issue. I started thinking about apps like MacsFanControl and SMCfancontrol. Both have options to set fan speeds based on sensor readouts with upper and lower limits. I would like to try this out, but my question is, what are the default lower and upper limits for each fan? At what temperature does the computer tell the fans to kick in and, vise versa, slow down? I don't want to set anything too high or low and possibly fry anything. Is this just a trial and error thing or have both limits been documented somewhere?
My hopes are that, using MacsFanControl to set the PCI and PS fans to nothing other than default values and also opening it upon login, or boot, would stifle the initial fan revving that occurs. Is this just wishful thinking? Has anyone else tried it?