Plug more than one fan?

[Nicolas Poirier]

I have one four pin plug on my mother board to plug the power supply fan but
my pc case has also its own fan. So I have to plug more than one fan on the
same plug.

Is there a kind of splitter selled somewhere to plug more than one fan? What
do people do when they have more than one fan?

Thanks
Nicolas Poirier

 

[Michael]

Well I have a board that has a square 4 pin plug on my board that is
the second plug from my power supply(it is a 12v feed for other devices
on the board), but it doesn't have the same plug as my case fan. The
plugs for fans have the connectors in a row, not in a square. I also
have other plugs on my board that are for case fans. You may be looking
at the wrong plug. I could be wrong but I have never heard of a
seperate plug for the power supply fan, because of the fact that the
power supply is giving the mother board power not the other way around.

 

[Overlord]

So far as I know the MB connectors only have the "3" pin plugs for fans.
Many motherboards will have several "3" pin connectors for fans sometimes
in odd places around the board. Read the pdf manual to make sure you only
have the connectors for CPU, chassis fan, PS fan.
Splitting a MB fan connector to run more than 1 fan I wouldn't recommend.
Too great a current draw can blow the MB fan header on some boards (A7V comes
to mind for one).
If you want more fans than you have MB connections for, you should get fans
with the larger 4pin molex connectors and connect it directly to the lines
from the PS. Those they sell splitters for.

I have one four pin plug on my mother board to plug the power supply fan but
my pc case has also its own fan. So I have to plug more than one fan on the
same plug.

Is there a kind of splitter selled somewhere to plug more than one fan? What
do people do when they have more than one fan?

Thanks
Nicolas Poirier

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[Dave C.]

I have one four pin plug on my mother board to plug the power supply fan
but
my pc case has also its own fan. So I have to plug more than one fan on
the
same plug.

Is there a kind of splitter selled somewhere to plug more than one fan?
What
do people do when they have more than one fan?

Thanks
Nicolas Poirier

It's a four pin fan plug on the mainboard? Are you SURE of that? You
should have +12V, ground and possibly a monitor (speed) line. What's the
fourth pin for?

If you are sure that it really is a fan connector, and you have two fans
that use that identical connector . . . (first plug both in one at a time to
make sure they both work)

Why not just splice the wires of the two fans together to use ONE of the
connectors? I've done that with case fans before. Not because of a lack of
connectors, but simply to neaten up the case a bit. With 2 fans close to
each other, it's neater to splice one fan into the other fan than it is to
run two really long fan wires all the way across the interior of the
ase. -Dave

 

[GuessWho]

Nicolas,

What you need is a pass through power connector. You disconnect one of your
4 pin 12v plugs to either your HDD or optical drive and insert this adapter
which has a fan connector and then plug the assembled device back into the
drive you disconnected.

I'm don't know where you can buy just the adapter, but after market case
cooling fans usually come with an adapter. In fact, it might be cheaper to
buy a fan from someplace like www.computergeeks.com than buying just the
adapter. Computergeeks has a Sunrise sale every Thursday and these fans are
usually around $2 (US). You might also find just the adapter at RadioShack.

Wayne

 

[Michael Cecil]

I have one four pin plug on my mother board to plug the power supply fan but
my pc case has also its own fan. So I have to plug more than one fan on the
same plug.

Are you sure the wire for the PSU fan isn't just to monitor or control
it's speed? Usually PSU fans get their power from the PSU.

Is there a kind of splitter selled somewhere to plug more than one fan? What
do people do when they have more than one fan?

Yes, they do make splitters like that. I think most people just plug
extra fans into the various molex connectors coming from the PSU though.

 

[Nicolas Poirier]

It's three pins, sorry...
In documentation, it's named "FM/FC connector".
I have one my power supply and one comming from my fan.

 

[Nicolas Poirier]

I've ordered a "3PIN TO 4PIN MOLEX CONVERTOR / ADAPTER" so I'll be able to
plug my case fan to the power supply and leave the motherboard's plug free
for the power supply's FM/FC connector.

Thank you for your comments
It's been a great help.
__________________

 

[Bryan Hoover]

It's three pins, sorry...
In documentation, it's named "FM/FC connector".
I have one my power supply and one comming from my fan.

Well, that explains it. Is that an Enermax? It's for powering, and
monitoring smaller psu fan. You can plug into one of the motherboard's 3 pin
fan headers, if you want to be able to monitor fan speed, or if you have an
adapter, you can adapt the 3 pin connector to a 4 pin molex, and plug into one
of the psu's 4 pin molex connectors.

If the smaller psu fan spins without pluging this 3 pin to the board or
adapting it to a 4 pin molex, and you don't care about monitoring, then you
can just ignore it.

Bryan