Question GPU Fans completely CRAZY!! Stuck at 100% - 3 PC restarts is only fix.

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k@rt

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Apr 17, 2012
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So I transferred my PC into a new case and since then my GPU fans have gone crazy. They will ramp up to 100% when gaming or under other load, then just get stuck there.

ALL monitoring software (HWinfo, GPU-Z, HWmonitor etc.) tells me the fans are at running at 0% speed. Control software such as Aorus Pro & Afterburner fans have NO effect on the fan speed at all. And the only way I have found to fix it is to restart my PC... THREE times in a row!!! With each restart the fans ramp down a bit until on the 3rd restart they hit their normal quiet idling speed.

I thought it may have been a bios problem, but I flashed the bios this afternoon & loaded optimized defaults and it's made no difference whatsoever.

One other thing, I did have this problem very occasionally before I rebuilt the PC in the new case, they'd ramp to 100% and get stuck, but it only happened very rarely and was fixed by a single restart - now it seems that every time they ramp up they get stuck every time. The only hardware "change" I made with the new rebuild was to add an M2 SSD hard drive.

What on Earth is going on? Can anyone please help? Any ideas would be hugely appreciated because I am at a total loss to understand what is going on, why it's suddenly started happening, or how I might be able to fix it.

I've browsed all through the bios but I can't find any settings that would seem to be related. Why would Aorus & Afterburner be unable to affect fan speed and why do all monitoring programs say 0% fan usage? They seem to report all other parameters correctly.

The card is a Gigabyte GTX1080Ti running on Aorus Z390 motherboard with windows 10.

Again, any help would be so hugely appreciated... I have no idea what to do. I can't even find anyone having any problem like this.

Thank you!
 
stonecarver said:
Have you pulled the GPU out of the PCI-E slot and than tried to re-seat it. Weird things happen.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I did that yesterday and it seems to have made things worse tbh. I didn't want to confuse the original post but one of the fans also broke yesterday so I took it out.

Prior to that I was able to sometimes slow the GPU back down using Aorus software, putting it in "auto" mode and applying (sometimes it would take a few tries to work) Now it seems that won't work at all and restarting the PC is the only way the fans decide to slow down.

I didn't mention the broken fan before b/c it only broke yesterday and I've been having the basic problem of the card fans ramping up and getting stuck for a few days now.

The only thing you have made me think of is that the card was dusty with a lot of fine dust inside. I cleaned it when I moved it to the new case but gave it a better clean yesterday and got a lot more dust out when I took the shroud off to remove the fan yesterday.

Is it maybe possible a speck of dust inside the PCIe slot could cause this? I didn't think PCIe connections were that sensitive.
 
stonecarver said:
https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/computer-doesnt-turn-on.3822219/ Yes PCI-E slots can get testy.

Skip to the end of the thread a see his video. Can it fix your speeding fans IDK but it also can't hurt.
Click to expand...
Okay, thanks for the advice, I guess it can't hurt to try. I'll give it a manual clean with alcohol tomorrow and if that doesn't help maybe try ordering some of that contact cleaner on Amazon.

I'm so at a loss to know what to try otherwise... I did find a firmware update for my card, but it's only supposed to allow the card to use 1.3 & 1.4 gen display port so I don't see why on earth that would do anything for the fans.
 
stonecarver said:
Just an FYI.
Click to expand...
Thank you, I've already found a replacement, but as I'm in the EU I am getting a single fan by itself from a more local dealer rather than waiting weeks for a 3 pack from the US.

However pretty sure that has nothing to do with the speed problem as it was happening with 3 fans as well a now with just the 2.
 
So, I fixed this problem... by replacing one of the fans on the card. Although it was there and still "worked" (i.e. it would spin with the others) one of the three fans developed a wobble where it was clearly no longer held 100% correctly in it's housing (the fan seems to be centered with a little circular plastic collar, a small part of which I think broke off allowing the fan to wobble).

However for some reason this one wobbly fan caused all of the problems with ALL the fans no longer responding to the fan curves and simply ramping up to 100% as soon as the card was put under any load. I am no expert but I never thought that one slightly wobbly fan would cause an error that would stop ALL the fans from responding correctly, but the moment I replaced the wobbly fan with a new one the issue resolved itself.

I wish I understood why but I doubt I ever will unless some genius here can explain why that might happen - seems crazy to me.

Thanks again for the help/advice!
 
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Reactions: thestryker and stonecarver
Most likely an electrical issue since they're just PWM fans so if you have a fan misbehaving it'll throw everything off. In your shoes I'd just replace all of the fans though it's good to hear it was resolved.
 
thestryker said:
Most likely an electrical issue since they're just PWM fans so if you have a fan misbehaving it'll throw everything off. In your shoes I'd just replace all of the fans though it's good to hear it was resolved.
Click to expand...

Well I though PWM fans just received variable power from the controller (GPU/Mobo) that control their speed and how fast they turns depends on that - didn't think they communicated with the controller at all.
 
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