ryangoan

Hey all,



So I decided to post over here instead of at other notebook forums (in support of Nando4). nuff said.



specs

probook 4330s

i7-2820qm hd 3000 graphics

16gb ram

wd scorpio black hdd

intel 520 ssd



I originally bought this machine for music production and wanted something fairly compact but upgradable to a quad core+16gb ram, dual hard drives, etc. This is the perfect machine, except for the loud fan. you can google and see what I mean. After months of searching and buying a new fan (did nothing), I stumbled upon this post and thought I should try it out. Short story is it worked and my laptop is super quiet :)



Background on the fan issue:

Normal operation: 1st fan level starts around 40C and fan about 3000rpm and stays like this for most of the operation where the fan pretty much never shuts off. Its almost impossible to work in a quiet environment aka studio or a library.



Solution:

1. HPfancontrol (note: at that website, you need to scroll to bottom of page to get the hp version). this prog will allow you to adjust the fan steps based on temperature and works awesome for control over your fan but it cannot change the lowest rpm setting for your fan. This was a good temporary solution but I needed better.



This is where my mod comes in (NOTE: MOD AT YOUR OWN RSIK, I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE IF YOU FRY YOUR LAPTOP):

I bought a bunch of diodes for about 2$ on ebay (model # 1N4001) and I put 2 of them on the orange/red wire on the fan. this reduced the first fan step from 3000rpm to about 2150rpm and its pretty darn quiet.

The effect of the 2 diodes is that it also reduced the top fan speed to 4237rpm (i didnt check what it was without the mod). During testing I also, accidentally found out that there are more fan control settings than those in the HpFancontrol.ini file. Pretty much any value between 0-128 changes the fan speed so I have been playing round to get the speeds that I want.



How to do the mod:

• Take 2 of the diodes and solder them together. Make sure you note the polarity. Do not connect the stripe side of 1 to the stripe side of the other. it should be [blank-stripe]-[blank-stripe] NOT [stripe-blank]-[blank-stripe]. if you have a soldering iron, I would solder them together. Also tape or heatshrink the connection. Remember that if the wires touch anything inside your computer, its fried.
  
  
• Unplug and take out the battery, flip it over and press the power button to release the charge.
  
  
• Ground yourself by touching some metal.
  
  
• Open up the bottom cover and remove the fan (see hp removal guides here)
  
  
• NOTE: this step is optional, if you are careful, go to next step.....NOTE: BE CAREFUL NOT TO BREAK THE PLASTIC CONNECTOR. Carefully remove the RED/ORANGE wire from the connector housing (my wire looked orange but it could be red also). I used a small safety pin and pushed it into the connector until the wire released. The top of the connector has small slits in it and that is where you want to push the safety pin into. Push the pin in at the same direction the wire entered the connector. There is a small plastic flap that holds the wire in place, the goal is to lift the plastic clip so that the wire can come out. Do not break the small plastic flaps as these hold the wires in place!
  
  
• Cut the red wire somewhere in the middle so that you have enough wire to work with. Connect the diodes where the stripe side is connected to the fan and the blank side connected to the small plastic clip (laptop side). Connection should be: plastic clip-[blank-stripe]-[blank-stripe]-fan (red wire). Again, solder and heatshrink making sure the polarity is right and all wires are protected.
  
  
• Put the red wire back into the connector.
  
  
• Reinstall fan.
  
  
• Done
  
  

I tested with 1,2,3 diodes and wrote down the temps. I didnt discover that the HPfancontrol settings until I got 2,3 diodes connected, so I am missing some values there. The max temp spike I am seeing with 2 diodes is 83C while on top load (ableton live with 16 vst tracks & 5 audio tracks, 8 youtube tabs in firefox, media monkey, virus scan) where the average is about 77C. I tried doing the same test with 3 diodes, but my computer crashed, not because of temps but I think because of power draw, I pretty much hit 40Watts.



Anyhow the table below gives the HPfancontrol setting, and the corresponding rpm. Notice that by adding diodes, the highest settings lose granularity.

HPfancontrol setting	255	128	110	100	90	82	74	67	65	63	61	59	49	0
1 diode rpm	0	2400	x	x	x	3000	3365	x	x	x	x	4265	4750	4800
2 diode rpm	0	2137	2254	2480	2730	3000	3366	3723	3840	3900	4096	4237	4237	4237
3 diode rpm	0	1935	2254	2457	2730	3000	3276	3276	3276	3276	3276	3276	3276	3276

Good luck and happy modding.

hey guys,

thanks for having this great forum where you dont ban people.

i was directed here due to the Tech Inferno Fan ban issue and am showing my support by making this my new home and i deleted my 2 threads that i started regarding upgrading an hp probook 4330s to an i7 quad.

ill repost here. cheers!

ryan