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Macforth · ‎09-25-2012

When planning a new water-cooled build, I read thoroughly the manuals and sales documents in relation to most Asus motherboards. One of the features I was looking for, was the the ability to control all radiator fans and water pumps via PWM. As a result of the clear pinouts on page 1-46 of the MVE MB, and the fact that it also satisified other criteria, I made the purchase.

I now am having difficulties running the total system's fans and pumps via PWM. I have been able to run the signal and PWM connections to my pumps from the CPU_FAN outlet.....and run the power and earth directly to the PSU. However I cannot do the same from any other fan outlets, even though they are all clearly marked as having the classic PWM pinout; and further, there appears to be a duty cycle that can be set in the bios. The Bios duty cycle options for the fan outlets OPT_FAN 1, 2 and 3 are minimal.

I do not have an Oscilloscope to assist me to check, so I decided to ask others who I believe must have the knowledge. I sent a message to Raja who replied to the effect that not all outlets can be controlled by Fan Xpert 2. That was not the answer that I was seeking, and further, I have since discovered by testing that in fact all outlets can be controlled by fan expert 2......with either 3 pin or 4 pin PWM fans, I just don't know what type of control is being used on the non CPU fan outlets. I then spoke to Asus ROG Sydney (I am in Australia, and Raja mentioned in his reply that I should not be seeking assistance from his office, but my local office). Unfortuately they were not able to assist, but one thing that was mentioned was that all four pins have to be plugged into the board for control.....which would be contrary to a true PWM outlet.

I then framed an email to technical support (this is able to be done through support), and received a short reply:-

Dear Valued Customer,

Thank you for contacting ASUS Technical Service.

Please use Fan Xpert to control fan speed.
Please refer to chapter 4.3.5 in the manual.

Sorry for the trouble. Wish you a good day.

In describing the reply as useless would be a waste of time. Let me rehash what it is I am trying to do. I need to control my PWM pumps as a group, my radiator fans as a group, and the general case fans as a third group. I cannot use the only true signal I can find from the CPU_FAN outlet for all three groups. The reason is that the pumps min/max revs are completely different from those of the rad fans. At an acceptable quiet mode the pumps need 25% duty cycle. On the other hand the rad fans are super quiet at a duty cycle of 80%, and clearly if they are quiet at that, then at that setting I will also obtain great cooling for quiet running.

When controlling ten PWM radiator fans as a single block, it is obvious that they cannot have their power running from the motherboard, rather, it must come directly from the PSU. However, I cannot get a true Pwm signal from any of the other fan outlets to assist. I am surprised at how difficult it has become to discover this information, considering that top ASUS ROG boards have clearly been designed with water cooling in mind, that PWM control is growing in popularity, and that the only literature that can be sourced clearly shows these outlets with a classic PWM 4 pin pinout.

Any thoughts?

Just finishing TJ 11 WC.. trying to control cooling via total PWM
Asus Max V Extreme
Intel 3770K
Corsair 16gig Platinum 1866
2 X GTX 690 (EVGA) with aftermarket EVGA water blocks and backplates
Samsung 830 Series 512GB + 3 WD mechanical HD's
Swiftech Apogee Drive II
Swiftech MCP35X2
Alphacool NexXxos UT60's quad, triple and single 120's
Rad fans 11 x NF-F12 PWM
Corsair 1200i PSU
Swiftech Maelstrom
AFT Pro-57U card reader

Macforth · ‎09-26-2012

UPDATE:
As a result of receiving the above email from Asus Technical Service, I wrote back stating that this did not answer the question....and again tried to succinctly outline the information I am trying to obtain. Simply put, if the MB is designed such that I cannot control the fans the way I had planned and expected, ......OK, then I will build a controller. But before that I would just like to know if that is the case.

Anyway, I received an answer as follows:-
"Dear Valued Customer,

Thank you for contacting ASUS Technical Service.

Please contact your retailer for RMA (Return Material Authorization) service.

Sorry for the trouble. Wish you a good day.

If you continue to experience issues in the future, please do not hesitate to contact us again.
Best Regards,
Cherry
ASUS Global Technical Support Center"

On receipt of this email, I shook my head.........what was being said........was it not working as designed?...... To say I was a little peeved would be an understatement. I requested that the email be forwarded to a higher level. When a motherboard is working in a system extremely well, one just doesn't spend hours taking it apart for an RMA unless there is a good reason for it. At this stage I am yet to be given any reason. I am sure the retailer would ask for a reason.

Just finishing TJ 11 WC.. trying to control cooling via total PWM
Asus Max V Extreme
Intel 3770K
Corsair 16gig Platinum 1866
2 X GTX 690 (EVGA) with aftermarket EVGA water blocks and backplates
Samsung 830 Series 512GB + 3 WD mechanical HD's
Swiftech Apogee Drive II
Swiftech MCP35X2
Alphacool NexXxos UT60's quad, triple and single 120's
Rad fans 11 x NF-F12 PWM
Corsair 1200i PSU
Swiftech Maelstrom
AFT Pro-57U card reader

Mithos · ‎04-06-2013

Man... I know that this post is nearly 2 years old, but I have to say - it's been enlightening.

I have been looking to do these same thing with my setup, in regards to controlling different groups of PWM fans and a pump!

4x radiator fans = Noctua NF-F12 (120mm PWM)
3x front case fans = Noctua NF-S12A (120mm PWM)
3x exhaust fans = Noctua NF-A15 (140mm PWM) or Scythe Kazemaru 2 (140mm non-PWM)

And a PWM water pump.

So in all, I'd have 3 different groups of PWM fans, and a PWM pump.

I would combine each of the 3 fan groups onto a Swiftech 8-way PWM splitter.
Each splitter is powered by the PSU molex connector, so the motherboard PWM connector wouldn't be drawing power at all.

So I would simply have 3 PWM splitters for OPT_FAN1, OPT_FAN2, OPT_FAN3, and the CPU PWM would connect into CPU_FAN.
After wards I would control everything with FanXpert.

That's how I had imagined it in my head.

But after reading your post, it sounds like the Asus board was not able to sufficiently manage those PWM connections and your replies from Asus tech support... Oh my god. I would flip out. That's ridiculous how you were jacked around!!! Unless, did the board RMA actually help?

Did you ever come up with a solution? How did you end up controlling everything?

I hope all turned out okay!

Macforth · ‎10-10-2013

Hey there Mithos.... many apologies for a tardy reply

To answer your questions. Asus motherboards actually use a chip that gathers the different sensor information for the motherboard. Sadly, although the chip has the capacity to run and control PWM fan outlets, Asus is not taking advantage of it's full potential. If you are interested, my inquiries revealed that the MVE runs a Nuvoton NCT6779D super IO chip. Further reading showed me that this chip has all the ability to control just as we enthusiasts would wish. Check https://github.com/groeck/nct6775 . Reading through that (and I also picked it up elsewhere), there appears to be a dual control ability for fans....either DC 0-12 volt ...or PWM. Clearly these linux drivers have an ability to set for either "PWM[1-5]_mode .. =0 for DC and =1 for pwm"

This is almost what I am seeing in this motherboard. Although there is clear mention and abilty to adjust a PWM signal, (including duty cycle) for each fan outlet in the bios....what I am seeing from the MB is more a DC control actually coming out of the fan pinouts. I can find no mention anywhere of a choice between DC and PWM, however.

How did I get over it? .......... Eventually, I used the PWM signal from the CPU 4 pin outlet to run my pumps.......... I run 11 PWM radiator fans at full throttle. They are NF-F12's like you have mentioned. With the sides on the TJ11 case, I cannot hear them. All other fans are controlled by Asus software... AI Suite II. It works.......but not my preferred option.

There is another answer that I found. As a result of no PWM controller being available on the market, that will control one or lot's of PWM fans as a group, or many groups, a discussion group has had a forum thread going since 18th April 2010, and it's still going strong today. Check :- http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=641111

I have read this total thread on more than one occasion, and you can catch some of my input some where around page 75. I think there are some photos of my rig as well. The longevity of this thread and others similar, clearly show that there is a demand for the type of PWM control that you are looking for.

Again, I apologize for my tardiness, but Mrs Mac and I lost a 30 yo son over in Afghanistan, and it kind of stopped life for a while. He was with the US army stationed with the Cacti group out of Hawaii.

Cheers

Just finishing TJ 11 WC.. trying to control cooling via total PWM
Asus Max V Extreme
Intel 3770K
Corsair 16gig Platinum 1866
2 X GTX 690 (EVGA) with aftermarket EVGA water blocks and backplates
Samsung 830 Series 512GB + 3 WD mechanical HD's
Swiftech Apogee Drive II
Swiftech MCP35X2
Alphacool NexXxos UT60's quad, triple and single 120's
Rad fans 11 x NF-F12 PWM
Corsair 1200i PSU
Swiftech Maelstrom
AFT Pro-57U card reader

Maximus V Extreme - PWM control - Fan outlets