Multiple fans connected to one 3 pin header?

[DarkDubzs]

Is it safe and possible to connect 4 or 5 case fans to a single 3 pin fan header on a mobo? I want to add four of these case fans to my rig, theyre 3 pin, and i dont want to spend more money on a fan controller, so i want to just connect them to my mobo and i can control their speeds via software. So, would it be okay to do that? My sad, cheap mobo, btw: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130662

Also, my mobo only has one 4 pin cpu fan header, one 4 pin system fan header, and one 3 pin system fan header. Could i connect two 3 pin fans to the 3 pin header, and two more to the 4 pin header... to keep the headers safe and last longer (and keep my mobo from frying)? Im just worried about connect 3 pin fans to 4 pin headers... is that okay and safe too? Would i also still be able to manually control the speeds of the fans connected to the 4 pin headers via software on my pc?

Lastly, if i connect multiple fans to a single header, like via a header hub(http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811997110) or splitter(http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812189063), will software be able to see the individual fans and control them individually or will i just see one fan because i am connecting multiple fans to a single header?

Please help. Thanks in advance!

 

[Azzkiker]

You would be better served to get a fan controller.

3 pin fans are ok on 4 pin headers... it is typically obvious which 3 pins are to be used.

If you connect several fans to one header the monitoring software will only see 1 fan.

 

[Saito]

I'm not running fan controllers anymore as it really screws up the aesthetic of many cases. Something like the bitfenix 3-1 fan splitter looks clean and I've never seen a motherboard complain of having 3 fans connected to one 3pin header.

Yes speedfan will only allow you to control voltage of that one header so all fans will spin up or spin down depending on the value you key in. RPM monitoring sometimes also give strange numbers like "4000rpm" and "???", this is just a quirky side-effect and won't affect performance at all. I'm assuming you are familiar with Speedfan, if you are it really is a breeze to change the speed automatically depending on certain thermal sensor inputs and get everything optimised noise wise.

One way of getting around the problem of controlling all the fans through one header is to buy fans of different maximum rpm speeds. That way when you send 100% through the header, one fan will be at say 1200rpm , and the other two at 1600rpm. You can also use those cheap inline resistors zalman usually packages with their fans to get the rpm down of a fan that might be spinning higher than you need. This will also have the effect of if you put in 60% you will see 720 on the 1200rpm and 960 on the 1600rpm. Actual values will be different and you also run into start up voltage issues below a certain level, which will cause both fans to stall possibly at different %. This setup might take some time to get right, but when you've got it down, there's no further action needed... no twiddling knobs or messing with dials. Just boot up your rig, speedfan on autostartup and on automatic fan speed mode. Sorted.

 

[Dreamerbydesign]

You just need to lookup the max amperage allowed on the fan header, and add up the amperage of the fans.

Pretty simple. And most likely driving more than 2 fans will overload the header, and could very easily mess up the board. This of course is dependent on the fans. And keep in mind fans can draw more than rated power during spinup.