GIGABYTE FAN CONTROL CODE
Of course, now the EC is unable to respond to temperature variations automatically, so we need code to run to constantly monitor temperature and modify the fan speed appropriately. If we simultaneously write 0xFF to the fan control, the fan will turn off. The temperature can be written here by writing 1 to offset 0x22 (CRZN), then the fake temperature to offset 0x26 (TEMP). The trick depends on the fact that if you write to the EC offset normally reserved for reading CPU temperature, you can trick the EC into thinking that the current CPU temperature is 31C (or lower). But it is possible to control it directly.
Of course, unless the ambient temperature is very low, seeing the fan off in normal use is fairly rare. So unless your laptop idles at less than 31C, you will never see the fan go off in automatic mode. That is because 0xFF represents off when the current CPU temperature is 31C or lower. You might notice that there is no speed for off. We all wish the slowest speed was a little slower, unfortunately there is nothing we can do about that. If you write a value other than 0xFF it indicates the speed. Normally this byte is set at 0xFF, which is "automatic mode" for the fan. This is the byte at offset 0x2F (known as FTGC in the DSDT). What the method does is write to an offset within the EC that has some control over what the fan is doing. But our version does a bit more - it controls the CPU fan as well.
The purpose of this method is to report the CPU temperature so HWMonitor can display it. This device is bound to ACPISensors.kext, which registers the ACPI sensor with FakeSMC. The current code resides in the TCPU method in the SMCD device (name FAN00000). Let's start with how the current fan control works in the current DSDT. I don't have a system with a faster CPU nor do I have one with dedicated graphics. In particular, I've only tried this on my i3-2310 HD3000 system. I do however expect that it will require more testing, so I hope some of you will want to help with that. My solution should work on both Lion and ML, although I've only tested it on ML (Edit: Now tested on Lion too. And fortunately, I was able to follow all the information about the ProBook's EC such that I could develop a solution on OS X.
GIGABYTE FAN CONTROL WINDOWS
Instead, I've been reading various forums for a solution and a pretty good one has been developed for the Windows side of things. Although the ideal solution would be to find a different fan, or use a resistor to reduce the voltage going to the fan (thus reducing it's speed overall), at this point I didn't want to attempt that. First of all, it runs when it doesn't need to (IMHO) and it runs faster than it needs to for the given temperatures. One thing that has always bugged me about HP laptops is the noisy fan. That's a C-Pro's 2 channels and another 2 from a LNP.Building a CustoMac Hackintosh: Buyer's Guide I always thought that was excessive, but here I am with fans, strips, a CPU block, and water pump that all need one.
GIGABYTE FAN CONTROL PRO
They can be chained into the Commander Pro to create more RGB channels. You will get a LNP in the triple pack of LL120s along with a RGB lighting hub. This is true for 99% of motherboard headers as well, although every now and then CPU Fan (and OPT) might be PWM only. the Commander Pro can set each of the 6 control headers individually for PWM or DC control. If you want to look at it from a narrow perspective, check the number of available fan headers on your board versus number of fans you plan to use and if those can be paired via splitters.Īlso, just FYI.
Always super helpful when putting together a new system. Obviously making changes from the desktop is a lot easier and you can make subtle tweaks as you go. Running your case fans from CPU temp in these days of highly reactive processors is really maddening. Choices are very limited, except sometimes on the top tier boards that have add in temp sensors, etc. The main limitation is control variables.