Unable to control the CPU Fan Core i7 Cooler Alienware Aurora(Runs at only 5%estiamted speed)

Depends on what I'm doing.   I have Core Temp installed. When I'm playing Prius Online TW the cores will stablize at 42~43C depending on where I'm at and doing.   But when I play vindictus the CPU heats up to over 55C . Idle depending on my room temp tends to be around 33~34   I had a Peek of 59C 61C 59C 59C while playing vindictus once.

That is all fine.

It's no where near the danger point of 100c . Like I said, it has to warm up a bit before the fan really kicks in. Then it runs faster and seems to not let it ever get past around 65c . Try Hyper-PI ... I can't see anything stressing it any harder than that (so it ends up being the ultimate controlled test).

Again, here is mine (i7-930) with stock clocks (no OC)

Idle: 40c , 1200rpm
Hyper-PI (100% utilization): 64c , 1900rpm

 Change CoreTemp to only update every 2 seconds.

Post your system config in your sig. so we know exactly what hardware you have. 

I've been attempting to join the Alienware forum for weeks. I finally had to creat a new email account and try again after reading this thread.

I have never been so frustrated as I have over the past two months dealing with Dell. When I first bought my Alienware in October 2009, the CC worked fine and I had control of three fans, just as you have stated, The system fan, PCI fan, and the hard Drive fan were all controlable. However, two months ago my system fan would go from extreme high to extreme low RPM's in seconds and was completely uncontrolable. The Dell tech could hear it over the phone as well. The tech also linked to my computer to see I wasn't causing the problem.

Dell sent out all new fans and a new I/O board. The tech changed out the fans but refused to change the I/O board saying he felt that wasn't the issue. Even though I asked him to change it he refused. I called Dell back after he left and Dell said he was supposed to change the board. So I went through the process again. The new board corrected some lighting problems and the fan no longer reved up and down, but I no longer had control of the system fan. The system fan was still below the "Thermal Control" line but you could no longer adjust the rpm's. It either showed 100 percent, 50 percent, or zero, regardless of actual fan speed.

Before any tech had made a call, we uninstalled, reinstalled, did all the power drain, etc... in an attempt to get the CC to work. It all failed. After the second tech changed out the I/O board we did a lot of the same and when we did the system fan funtion changed to CPU fan but moved to the top. Knowing I had no CPU fan this bothered me. However it didn't stay long as a few more reboots led to the common configuation as you have.

All three of my ambient sensors read exactly the same. They never behaved this way. Before they varied between each other and in range as well. Now if they get off 24C it is only a degree or two regardless of ambient temperatures or anything else.

Talking to the techs at Dell again I was made out to be imagining I ever had control of the system fan. In fact one individual asked me why I would want control. We downloaded CPUID and my core temps at idle are 50,46,50,47. Any load they move up into high 60's. Mind you, I don't put a lot of load on the system (no games etc..) so there is very little cooling taking place with my system. The tech downloaded some program (extremesomething) that would load the CPU's anf the temps went close to 90C.

I began complaining that that was unacceptable but was told my fan was working fine. I couldn't believe the arrogance. I spoke to one manager that told me everything I wanted to hear, but he never followed through. I ended up speaking to another manage who was very good and offered a refurbished replacement. I wasn't to keen on this as my system is clean and in perfect shape (minus the CC issue) I finally accepted and he was going to sent an upgraded unit as a replacement.

I bought all the W7 transfer cables and a new DP video cable as the 6950 had a mini. When the replacement computer showed up it wasn't the computer I was told was being shipped and was a much less capable one at that. I wanted to crap in the box and send it back. (sorry) On inspection of the refurbished computer it was disgusting. It was scatched, dented, had food stuff on the disk drive case cover, and the inside looked like a well used toaster with crumbs and debre. I could not believe it.

I called the manager back and he apologized saying how he couldn't believe this had happed as he had supervised my shippment personally. He then escalated the event to higher management which agreed to build me a new computer as a replacement. I'm sure after 18 months I would have been upgraded nicely but I had been put through way too much by this time and said I would go back to HP when my 4000 dollar Pile of Dell  finally stopped working. Actually the case will upgrade nicely for years so I will most likely just rebuild from the inside out when necessay.

It was a generous offer but I'm not one to take advantage and considering the ordeal I had been put through I just wanted to be left alone. I told the manager I would simply leave the case open and run a floor fan into the interior. My temps drop from those stated above to the mid to high thirties with the case open an a floor fan. It is pathetic but I'm done with Dell as well.

I believe this whole issue is a reults of BIOS changes and CC upgrades. Our ability to control the functionality of the fans was literly taken from us for no reason and I suspect our cores will suffer as a result.

I would also stay away from any refurbished replacement should one be offered. Mine may have been the extreme disappointment, but just be cautious in accpting such an offer.

However, two months ago my system fan would go from extreme high to extreme low RPM's in seconds and was completely uncontrolable.   The new board corrected some lighting problems and the fan no longer reved up and down, but I no longer had control of the system fan. The system fan was still below the "Thermal Control" line but you could no longer adjust the rpm's. It either showed 100 percent, 50 percent, or zero, regardless of actual fan speed.

Not sure if you wanted help ... or just to vent your frustrations. I will post anyway

You didn't say what model you have, but just to be clear ... the system fan is not manually controllable.

It adjusts itself based on the temp. of the CPU cores. The MIO Board and/or the temp sensor in the heatsink/pump is the radiator (system) fan speed controller. While you have to use CC to program the MIO-Board initially, it can do it's cooling duties without constant communication between the two (it's micro-controller based). There are other programs that you can run to make sure the system fan is working properly.

Between 2 separate MIO-Boards, at least one was likely working properly. They just needed to be re-initialized (reset), have the latest firmware loaded, or  programmed properly with the latest CC.

Dell sent out all new fans and a new I/O board. The tech changed out the fans but refused to change the I/O board saying he felt that wasn't the issue. Even though I asked him to change it he refused. I called Dell back after he left and Dell said he was supposed to change the board. So I went through the process again.

Some of 3rd-party techs are bad (some are good). I understand why Dell does troubleshooting over the phone, but when a tech. is actually onsite ... for them not to do what Dell asked them to is inexcusable.

I would also stay away from any refurbished replacement should one be offered. Mine may have been the extreme disappointment, but just be cautious in accpting such an offer.

Agreed. Refurbished is not NEW (it's used). You paid for new.

That is why myself and others try to help AW owners fix what they have (it's usually just minor problems) and not go down this path.

But it's too late for you ... you have already started down the path. What you need to do is finish your journey

You need to accept the offer for the new machine. Double check and verify the exact config they will be sending you. It should work fine, but it you have any problems, post a message and we will do our best to help you.

However, two months ago my system fan would go from extreme high to extreme low RPM's in seconds and was completely uncontrolable.   The new board corrected some lighting problems and the fan no longer reved up and down, but I no longer had control of the system fan. The system fan was still below the "Thermal Control" line but you could no longer adjust the rpm's. It either showed 100 percent, 50 percent, or zero, regardless of actual fan speed.

 You didn't say what model you have, but just to be clear ... the system fan is not manually controllable.

It adjusts itself based on the temp. of the CPU cores. The MIO Board and/or the temp sensor in the heatsink/pump is the radiator (system) fan speed controller. While you have to use CC to program the MIO-Board initially, it can do it's cooling duties without constant communication between the two (it's micro-controller based). There are other programs that you can run to make sure the system fan is working properly.

Between 2 separate MIO-Boards, at least one was likely working properly. They just needed to be re-initialized (reset), have the latest firmware loaded, or  programmed properly with the latest CC. 

If you look at the screen shot of the Thermal Control where the individual explains he had control of three fans, you will see those that were manually controlled were:

1) System Fan

2) PCI Fan

3) Hard Drive Fan

My setup was exactly the same. I could open anyone of those three listed above and "manually" adjust them. Just as the other poster claims. If the system fan was the radiator fan so be it. It was still manually adjustable.

There was never a system fan on the top portion of the Thermal Controller. Just a CPU fan that never registered. And there was never a CPU pump read out that simply said :Running".

My Thermal controller looked exactly the same as the screen shot posted and I had control of all three fans...system/radiator...pci...and hard drive.

My system is the Aurora

i7 950

12g memory

500g HD

W7 64 bit

and I check every day for new drives, updates, etc...

It really is something to continuously be told I never had control of the system fan. If that system fan was controlling the radiator fan but is called the system fan on the Thermal Controller I don't care. It allowed me to control it until recently.

I believe it to be a software issue. Either the CC or BIOS or a combination of the two. The sensors seem to have been completely reconfigured so as to register a constant range of 23 to 25 forcing the radiator fan to never increase in speed. This may have been a work around for any number of issues CC was causing.

I recall when my 5870 fan went bad. Whenever you removed the computer case side while it was running the radiator fan would go to max rpm. The tech guy that came out to replace the 5870 said the alienware was real sensitive to airflow and taking off the cover would disrupt the airflow causing the fan to go high rpm. Now when you take the cover off the fan does nothing. In fact when the system heats up the fan does nothing.

Dell has made obvious software changes that affect the fans and the sensors and how they operate while taking away the ability to control the system/radiator fan manually.

If you look at the screen shot of the Thermal Control where the individual explains he had control of three fans, you will see those that were manually controlled were:   1) System Fan 2) PCI Fan 3) Hard Drive Fan   My setup was exactly the same. I could open anyone of those three listed above and "manually" adjust them. Just as the other poster claims. If the system fan was the radiator fan so be it. It was still manually adjustable.   There was never a system fan on the top portion of the Thermal controller. Just a CPU fan that never registered. And there was never a CPU pump read out that simply said :Running".   My Thermal controller looked exactly the same as the screen shot posted and I had control of all three fans...system/radiator...pci...and hard drive.

How the old CC software worked is irrelevant (it was broken ... that's why we got a new version). All desktop owners should be using v2.6.1.0 and the included 2.x firmware. Notice in his pic that the "CPU Fan" rpm was 0. It was confused or displaying wrong.

The Aurora doesn't have a 3rd case fan ... only the Area-51 has that extra manually controllable (3rd) case fan. On the Aurora, only the PCIe Fan and HDD
Fans are manually controllable. My CPU fan has always been called "System Fan" (even in the old software) but it's the CPU fan for the radiator. I guess they call it "System Fan" because it also exhausts air from the case out the back. Of course, on the Area-51, the CC screen looks a little different.

Dell is very tight-lipped about how the MIO-Board/AlienFX/CommandCenter (Alien Technology) all works. However, myself and others have figured out quite a bit about it. You are new here, so maybe you don't know. Try searching my posts.

The heatsink/pump/cooler/radiator/fan unit is an OEM Asetek unit. The older units controlled the radiator fan speed with a signal from the motherboard (measuring processor temp). That's how the similar Corsair branded units work. Even though ours are physically connected to the MIO-Board instead, that is still the parameter that controls the fan speed . The new Asetek units, have a temp. sensor in the pump itself that does the fan speed control. However, those are new and I doubt we have those (these Alienware Desktops have been on the market since 2009 ... and in development long before that). But bottom line ... the computer controls the fan speed based on processor temp. (what else could it be).

If you are interested, I can help you make sure yours is setup properly and working. Or, you can read my messages above to the other user.

No, I don't need you to see if my system is set up correctly.

This will be my last post to this thread as I'm obviously not knowledgeable enough to understand.

You may believe other CC were "broke" but those of us that like the controlability of the system fan want it back. I can determine what speed I want for the sysetm fan just like I can for the pci and hard drive fans in manual mode. Why is that so difficult to understand? If I want additional cooling of the cpu's I should have that function like I did before it was taken away. You seem to think additional functionality is bad or equates to broken.

Sure, there was no need for the CPU fan readout that registered zero because there was no CPU fan, I agree. But Dell did not have to disable our ability to control the system fan just to delete the unneeded CPU fan read-out.

My temps at idle are around 50 and with very little load go into the 60's. Before Dell "broke" my CC with their new and improved CC, I could manually increase the speed if I felt the automatic feature wasn't sufficient. Now I can't do that. In fact I knew when it was time to clean the radiator when the radiator fan would increase in speed due to dust restricting the radiator's cooling ability. Now I can place a cardboard box sheet in front of the radiator restricting the airflow and the fan does nothing.

I'm sure there will be a new version of the CC eventually and this so called improved CC will be replaced. It would just be nice if developers listened to users instead of telling them repeatedly they don't know what they are talking about or that less functionality is better.

@ AAA737Flyer

This is what an old WORKING CC v2.5.x installation (on an Aurora X-58) looked like back in the day (9-2010)

Your control of the "System Fan" (or radiator fan) was likely an illusion ... due to the fact that is was incorrectly detecting your system partially as an Area-51. Maybe you WERE controlling it (as NOT designed) and then the cooling unit couldn't ... who knows. What is important is that it works NOW ... on this machine.

I was only offering to help you (as I've been trying to do all along) to show you that the radiator fan is working (or not). If your system is over-heating is should be fixed.

I don't do development work for Alienware ... (nor do I or others ) ... get paid to spend countless hours on this board trying to help other AW users. However, if you would like to request some functionality be added to Command Center, I'm sure the Alienware development teams would like to hear your suggestion.

Stable but I find it Odd that my processors temps dropped and dont go about 56C now, but the internal temps rose quite a bit. They usually just hovered at 32~36C, but now hover anywhere from 34C to 44C.   Any explination for this?

Probably because of the new HDD, RAM, and ESPECIALLY the 460.

@ Picture. If i saw temps like that on my system I'd faint.

Anyways late update, I've desided to keep that minifan jury rigged into my system(consumes 1 USB port >_>)

I recently upgraded my system with an EVGA Nvidia GeForce GTX460 Superclocked(Fermi), 12Gigabyte Corsair Vengence DDR3 1600Mhz RAM, and a WD Green 2Terabyte HDD.

I pushed my fans up to 60% fixed.

But I noticed an Odd occurence though.

MY Core i7's average temperatures dropped about 5C but the internal ambient sensors read off 5C higher.

Stable but I find it Odd that my processors temps dropped and dont go about 56C now, but the internal temps rose quite a bit. They usually just hovered at 32~36C, but now hover anywhere from 34C to 44C.

Any explination for this?

Anyways I guess I was making a big deal out of something that really didn't matter, However I do remember being able to control the raditor fan because I used to do "Forced Cooling Bleeds" whered I'd turn all the fans to 100% power for about 5minutes to force the temps to drop below 29C.

But unless I can control that fan I won't overclock the processor at all.

If there is anyway to force the fan to run at at lest 2200 RPM, i'd like to know because then I'd feel more comfortable about cooling management.

Anyways, I've desided to buy an Alienware Mx11 R2, the prebuilt with the corei5 and 4GB RAM. Im just wondering about the cooling systems on it now.
Intels page says the Core i5 UM has 4 threads(4 logical cores) in a Duo core. And I've heard of overheat issues.

Can I set my own coolling profiles?

I mostly plan on Playing 3 MMOs, Prius Online(TW until the English version), Vindictus, and Tales Runner, and a few other games. So i'm a little concerned about cooling management. (since Prius and Vindictus are very graphically heavy, but Tales Runner is low but the better FPS and smoothness you have the better you can play the game)
And I do want to test a bit of Overclocking.

I saw in a review that the battery isn't removable, that's kind of a bummer. But I'm rather excite to have a Mobil platform again.

Also very important, Dell community is spamming my email inbox like crazy, I'd like it to stop, how do i make it so i wont get notices EVERYTIME someone posts in this section?

It's driving me mad.

That doesnt really explain the temperature flipflop.

Why would the CPU run so much cooler now?

Well an increase in ambient temp would not really effect a liquid cooling setup. You said you increased fan speeds from what I understand? So therefore your CPU will be cooler and your ambient will go up despite the fan increase with the new performance parts that create more heat. If you did not increase the fan speed of the radiator then that doesnt really make sense and I have not a clue.

This entire thread was to figure out how to get the fan speed on my alienware back under control so I could increase its speed.

Could it possibly be the GTX460 is offloading more of the games from the processor?

I'll wait for teslas post. :D

This entire thread was to figure out how to get the fan speed on my alienware back under control so I could increase its speed.   I'll wait for teslas post. :D

I posted that pic to show that (on my Aurora) I have never been able to manually control the radiator fan (nor was there an indication in CC that it was possible). I think I have also adequately explained why it is not possible (or even should be).

Hyper-PI is the best test I have found. I think if you saw (and heard) the radiator fan being controller under heavy stress, you wouldn't worry as much. If you want more (manually controllable) case fans, you will have to add them. The mesh top might be a good place.

I don't use nVidia any more, but I remember my 9800gt ran really hot (even at idle). I've hear the new cards run hot also, so why wouldn't it increase the inside temp?

Just a suggestion, but it might be better to start a new m11x thread (instead of burying it here).

@ AAA737Flyer

Before you cause a spark and blow one of your boards ... why don't you install a proper fan controller?

The singles are inexpensive, and you will have better control (effective but not so loud running at 100% all the time). And even at 100%, it will be connected properly.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Order=BESTMATCH&Description=fan+controller

The reason your solution works is because the tachometer or speed control pins are not making proper contact.