It never fails.. I always seem to get defective fans when I order them online. Recently got two Swiftech Helix fans and both are making noises.. one of them is a horrible grinding noise. I also got a Bitfenix Pro 200mm fan to replace my Megaflow and it was awesome for about 15 minutes then got some sort of loud tick noise that follows the speed of the fan. Anyone else have my kind of luck with fans?
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Who else always gets defective fans?
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spine
2[H]4U
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Yeah, I routinely buy an extra one or two if I get a bunch, expecting to get at least one duff one.
I can't remember the last expensive fan I bought that was actually worth it. And never buy ball bearing fans, they quickly turn into rumbling machines. You want ultra cheap, and as light as possible, sleeve bearing fans, and buy extras as I said.
I can't remember the last expensive fan I bought that was actually worth it. And never buy ball bearing fans, they quickly turn into rumbling machines. You want ultra cheap, and as light as possible, sleeve bearing fans, and buy extras as I said.
Yeah, I did sleeves for a while but after a year or so they start making noise.. I am giving the Noise blocker eloop a try.. expensive but being able to throttle down to 400rpm is nice although i wont go below 600rpm or so. If I get a bad eloop ill be pissed. Last expensive fan I bought and loved was a Noctua. I did get a Nexus 80mm that would tick.. and that thing was sleeve bearing..
The only defective i got, was a Deepcool 120mm that would beat a rattle snake in noise. Lubrificating it didn't help one bit. I threw it away. I also had a Zalman 120mm case fan getting noise pretty quickly.
No problems till now with Enermax, Scythe, Nexus, Cooler Master.
No problems till now with Enermax, Scythe, Nexus, Cooler Master.
investinwaffles
Limp Gawd
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I love my Enermax twister-bearing fans.
Quiet, not too expensive, and they have lasted a loooong time (at least 3 years at this point).
By comparison my Yate Loons lasted about a year before the bearings started to go (one by one), Lian Li case fans are just terrible, Scythe regular sleeve bearing fans last about a year as wel and everything else was much more expensive at that time.
I have a pair of Scythe Slipstream fans running as intake/exhaust on my parents media cabinet, and they are so quiet and move TONS of air, no bearing noise after at least 4 years of only cleaning the dust filter.
Quiet, not too expensive, and they have lasted a loooong time (at least 3 years at this point).
By comparison my Yate Loons lasted about a year before the bearings started to go (one by one), Lian Li case fans are just terrible, Scythe regular sleeve bearing fans last about a year as wel and everything else was much more expensive at that time.
I have a pair of Scythe Slipstream fans running as intake/exhaust on my parents media cabinet, and they are so quiet and move TONS of air, no bearing noise after at least 4 years of only cleaning the dust filter.
dandragonrage
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Used to ALL THE TIME. Then I realized that people who call ANY sleeve bearing fan good are the problem. After burning through half a dozen Yate Loon 120mm fans in a year or two, I switched to S-Flex and haven't lost a single one and I've had them for years. I have an Enermax Magma for my CPU now and it's been good (also not sleeve, though it's not FDB).
FDB and Mag-Lev fans are best IMO. And again, absolutely no sleeve fan is good, regardless of the "but ___ sleeve fan is good!" responses this will get. They're all wrong. Stop buying sleeve fans and you'll see how right I am.
FDB and Mag-Lev fans are best IMO. And again, absolutely no sleeve fan is good, regardless of the "but ___ sleeve fan is good!" responses this will get. They're all wrong. Stop buying sleeve fans and you'll see how right I am.
spine
2[H]4U
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The real trick with sleeve bearing fans is to open them up, remove the plastic washer pin grip thing that secures the fan in place, and..... that's it! It doesn't need that plastic to hold it in; it'll stay there just fine with magnetism and you won't get the noise generated from that plastic bit scraping against the plastic holding.
Pro tip there.
Some fans even benefit from having the rubber washers removed as well in terms of noise, as that's one less thing creating friction. Try it on some old noisy fans, you might be surprised...
Pro tip there.
Some fans even benefit from having the rubber washers removed as well in terms of noise, as that's one less thing creating friction. Try it on some old noisy fans, you might be surprised...
I was getting bad fans all the time, and I mean NEW ones, and of all types (FDB, sleeve, ball). I've also experienced of course that sleeve-bearings will go bad sooner, especially when mounted horizontally. I didn't think the Yate Loons were a terrible deal because I knew going into the purchase - I may need to re-lube, and I prob. shouldn't mount horizontally.
I then switched to Gentle Typhoons (different speeds) all around. I was lucky - not one of them has been bad (and I have 22 or 23 of them). My fans haven't gone bad, so I'm treating them like fragile hard drives, never letting the impellers touch anything for fear of damage to the bearing. These fans turn so effortlessly - I don't want to screw up that delicate balance.
Some of my other fans have held up well = The inexpensive Arctic Cooling F12's and 2 of my 4 Thermalright TY-140 fans (the other 2 are noisier. 1 of them came that way, the other developed the noise). Most of my Sanyo Denki fans still perform well, but they have the 38mm thickness, and just don't compete (with regard to noise) with my Gentle Typhoons at the lower RPM levels. At high RPM, my Delta fans are actually superior anyway (as shown in Martin's testing). Still - I use these for various projects, often not involving computers.
I then switched to Gentle Typhoons (different speeds) all around. I was lucky - not one of them has been bad (and I have 22 or 23 of them). My fans haven't gone bad, so I'm treating them like fragile hard drives, never letting the impellers touch anything for fear of damage to the bearing. These fans turn so effortlessly - I don't want to screw up that delicate balance.
Some of my other fans have held up well = The inexpensive Arctic Cooling F12's and 2 of my 4 Thermalright TY-140 fans (the other 2 are noisier. 1 of them came that way, the other developed the noise). Most of my Sanyo Denki fans still perform well, but they have the 38mm thickness, and just don't compete (with regard to noise) with my Gentle Typhoons at the lower RPM levels. At high RPM, my Delta fans are actually superior anyway (as shown in Martin's testing). Still - I use these for various projects, often not involving computers.
dandragonrage
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Didn't actually make a big difference whether horizontal or vertical with the YLs in my experience. Both died extremely often. I did not ever try re-lubing them, but even if that were to fix it, that's too much of a PITA if you ask me.
Got 3 Noise Blocker eloop fans and none of them have issues.. very very smooth sounding fans although even at the full 1,500 rpm they dont move a whole lot of air. I think my enermax TB LED fans moved just as much if not more at 1,200 rpm.... but they don't sound as smooth as these.