Question 3-Pin CPU Fan to 4-pin connector

[Shujee]

My motherboard is AsRock Z370 Killer SLI/AC. I have an i5-8400 with stock cooler, which is making a lot of noise now that summer is upon us here. I'm thinking about changing the cooler with ID-COOLING SE-214-XT ARGB. However, reading the description it says the fan is 3-pin, while my motherboard manual says it has 4-pin cpu fan connector. I hear that I can still connect them but I'll not be able to control fan speed; it will always run at full speed. Is that correct? In that case, should I go for DEEP Cool AK400 instead?

 

[kanewolf]

My motherboard is AsRock Z370 Killer SLI/AC. I have an i5-8400 with stock cooler, which is making a lot of noise now that summer is upon us here. I'm thinking about changing the cooler with ID-COOLING SE-214-XT ARGB. However, reading the description it says the fan is 3-pin, while my motherboard manual says it has 4-pin cpu fan connector. I hear that I can still connect them but I'll not be able to control fan speed; it will always run at full speed. Is that correct? In that case, should I go for DEEP Cool AK400 instead?

Look at 1:30 of this video --

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uTxxrv80EQ

It shows a 4 pin fan connector and a 3 pin RGB connector. That may be where the "5V 3 pin" text in the description of the fan comes from. RGB not fan control.

 

[geofelt]

Normally a 3 pin cpu cooler fan will work in a 4 pin pwm header.
Some motherboards are smart enough to detect this and will control speeds via voltage adjustments.
Otherwise, the fan would run at 100% which is not what you want.

If you want quiet, look at a noctua cooler.
They will come with low noise adapters.
NH-D9L is $54.

https://www.newegg.com/noctua-nh-d9l/p/N82E16835608068?Item=N82E16835608068

 

[Paperdoc]

In BIOS Setup look at details of the configuration options for the CPU_FAN header. Oddly the manual does NOT tell us these options exist, but maybe. There may be an option to set either Voltage Mode (aka Dc Mode), PWM Mode, or Auto. For your 3-pin fan set to Voltage or DC, and it WILL control that fan's speed.