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Cooling a RAID card with a small noctua fan (lemmy.world)

submitted 2 years ago by Krafting@lemmy.world to c/homelab@lemmy.ml

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Hi everyone,

I have a DL380 G8 server with a pretty hot raid controller, which crank the fans up in the server;

I would like to add a small 40x10 noctua fan on top of its heatsink but I don't know how can I power the fan in such a server.. I thought about USB to PWM connectors but it doesn't feel right...

There are 10pins connector inside the server, but buying a 10 pin to molex then molex to pwm feels weird too... maybe

Did any of you did something similar ? What are your idea to power the fan ?

Thank you!

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[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

What kind of card is it?
Depending if it's on the PCIe riser or on the motherboard there are different possibilities.

Depending on how adventurous you are maybe repaste the heatsink?

[–] Krafting@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

It's the P420 from HP it a PCI card, I will probably repaste it as well when adding the fan.

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

Well: A very quick phone research brought me to that forum post and page: https://community.hpe.com/t5/proliant-servers-ml-dl-sl/dl380-g8-fans/td-p/6273923/page/3?nobounce

Seems like the question of "anyone else?" was solved with: "Yes, had the issue with the P420 controller." 9 years ago.
You could try to see if the comments on Page 2 and 3 are of any help.

Hope I could assist your issue at least a little bit.

[–] Krafting@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Hope I could assist your issue at least a little bit.

Thanks for your help, but no one seems to answer the question about how to power the fan...

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Seems like either repaste and/or change slot or a usb to pwm adapter could do it.

Maybe a PCIe powered PWM card? There is surely some kind of that on AliExpress for cheap. You should probably have enough spare pcie slots to do it.

[–] Krafting@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I could not find any PCIe card that take power from the slot and transfer it to a fan header... this seems so logical but no one makes these...

If you find something on aliexpress let me know

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I think this is the best I could find:
https://www.xcase.co.uk/products/asus-ipmi-expansion-card-w-dedicated-ethernet-controller-vga-port-pcie-3-0-x1-aspeed-ast2600a3-oem-packaging

https://www.newegg.com/en-labs-pcifanco8spr-metal-fan-speed-controller/p/376-0067-00009

But those two are not really what you are probably looking for.
I think you last and least janky solution outside of designing your own PCB would be a PWM to USB adapter.

Besides that, I saw some fan Hubs powered by Molex. If you have any sata or molex power in thr back of the server it might fit there and look more proper.
Remember though: If the airflow of the server fans are too great on the fan it could turn the fan and induce an electric energy into the circuit.

[–] Krafting@lemmy.world 1 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Yeah, the first one is a whole IPMI card, it's so overkill ahah

the second one require external power, I've seen this design a lot yeah...

I'll do the USB to pwm route I think, I don't have molex or sata at all either yeah...

[–] Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 years ago

Wish you the best of luck!