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paulej

32 Posts

1560

March 11th, 2020 17:00

XPS 8930 PSU Fan Going Off and On

I noticed today that the fan on the PSU will turn on, run for a few seconds (anywhere from 5 to 25), then turn off again.  It will remain off for a while (again, variable time in seconds) and turn on again.  This seems to repeat constantly.

The two CPU fans seem to run continually, but I assumed the PSU fan to do the same since that's how my previous Dell PCs behaved.

Is this normal for the PSU fan in this model?

 

Anonymous

5 Practitioner

 • 

274.2K Posts

March 11th, 2020 18:00

@RoHe   EDIT: @Dell630i  types faster than I do... 

My answer was shorter

. . . but seriously, my PSU fan has never come on in a year-and-a half. I have a Seasonic Focus 850 watt modular sitting outside the case and keeping cool, and switched to 'silent mode' (or something).

Anonymous

5 Practitioner

 • 

274.2K Posts

March 11th, 2020 18:00

@paulej   Is this normal for the PSU fan in this model?

The PSU fan should not be running at all unless you are under extremely heavy loading. I have never seem my PSU fan spin at all.

RoHe

10 Elder

 • 

44.3K Posts

March 11th, 2020 18:00

The PSU fan in most new PCs goes on and off, as needed, to save power.

The case fans run continuously to keep the system cool.

Reboot and immediately press F12 and look for the option to run the diagnostics. There should be a CPU fan test which cycles the CPU fan from its normal (slow) speed up to a higher speed, as it would do automatically if/when the CPU is heating up.

EDIT: @Anonymous  types faster than I do... 

savvy2

2 Intern

 • 

2.5K Posts

March 12th, 2020 08:00

wow del630

PSU vast there are, endless. come like this,

  • fan HARD wired to 12vdc full time , 39 years of PSU made just like that.. endless.. and noise..
  • 12v fan is on thermal switch inside turns on when hot, even PCs in hot CABAN,  yes,  not all PC are 72F room parked, no really
  • 12vdc fan has smart controller inside the PSU, and sees watts go to over 25% of total and turns on.
  • 12vdc fan same as above but runs fan speed in linear ram,  from 100watts up to max,. load,
  • Dell PC that the MOBO controls some DELL PCs from BIOS. controls PSU, remote via 1 wire.
  • and more far more I have DSP  (dsp processor based )PSU from Thermaltake and is totally programmable by me for the heat or watts and RPM by me..(love it)
  • so yah, PSU are not like say a 100watt light bulb, heck even those are LED now.\
  • do as you like and must but do know that Heat kills all electronics made and for sure lowers life spans. learn that first.   that is how milspec tests chips for example (huge heat and fast clocks)

RoHe

10 Elder

 • 

44.3K Posts

March 12th, 2020 10:00

@paulej   I have Dell's OEM 850W PSU in my XPS 8930 and I've never heard the PSU fan run either...

paulej

32 Posts

March 13th, 2020 19:00

I've never heard my fan, but I just happened to notice it didn't run but intermittently.  I did check (as suggested) to ensure the other fans were operating properly.  Everything on the machine checked out, but the PSU fan does not have a test that I can see.

In any case, it sounds like it's not really an issue.  I just had never investigated this before.

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