Absurd and arbitrary HDX fan noise

[Brandonx1]

I've never used a hdx system where the fan doesn't turn on when booting up pro tools.

[propower]

Originally Posted by Brandonx1

I've never used a hdx system where the fan doesn't turn on when booting up pro tools.

OK, But does it stay on at any annoying level?

[dwaynedelario]

Originally Posted by propower

OK, But does it stay on at any annoying level?

In my tower, once they are on they are on until you quit Pro Tools. The Sonnet has much better ventilation than my 2012 tower so people tell me they don't kick on as often.

[dwaynedelario]

OK all. I did a little experiment today. I took out 2 of the internal HDD's from my Mac Pro this morning before working. Well guess what.... no HDX fans yet. Booted up at 9am and its almost 5. Only 2 HDDs in there right now.

[Pete Gates]

Wow, very interesting, and what's the ambient temperature in your room? I'm assuming not super cold?!

Pete

[dwaynedelario]

Originally Posted by Pete Gates

Wow, very interesting, and what's the ambient temperature in your room? I'm assuming not super cold?!

Pete

Hey Pete. The ambient temp hovers around 73ºF / 22.7ºC. I worked until 10pm last night on a deadline for the director, and the fans didn't boot up once! I took out the drives in slots 2 and 3 (my samples drive is in slot 4).

I will take the 2 Hard Drive setup over a $2,000 ISO Box any day!

[dwaynedelario]

That said, I wonder if some SSDs would be cool enough to keep the HDX fans at bay?

[Pete Gates]

You read my mind, that's exactly what I'm wondering. That would be Very good news.

Thanks,
Pete

[Hugh-H]

Hello,

The fan turn-on threshold is not programmed correctly and Avid has not yet corrected it. We did thermal scanning tests on the HDX cards when the fans were off, when they turned on, and repeatedly while they stayed on, and never were any parts of any of the cards or chips running too warm. The firmware is programmed incorrectly.

Our systems all have SSDs in them, this may help a given install but it's unfortunately not a fix. It's the assumption that the fans turn on because they need to, and this is the case with many other pieces of broadcast gear we own, but it's not the case with the HDX cards.

Hugh

[dwaynedelario]

Thanks for the insights, Hugh. No doubt it gets warm inside the mac pro, but not THAT warm. You seem very knowledgable on the subject. Would it have been possible for the cards to be programmed with multiple fan speeds?

I was thinking of installing something like iStat Pro to get a guage on the temp thresholds. What were your findings as far as temps went?