PNY GTX 780 Fan Stuck On High

jazzmac251

Distinguished
Apr 23, 2011
135
0
18,690
This is the 3-fan version of the card. The one on the end of the card (above the VRM?) is stuck on full blast. My god it's annoying. No idea what's going on. Tried rebooting. Tried full system shutdown. Tried pulling the system power. Tried pull the card out of the machine completely.

Still stuck on high. Sounds like a friggin vacuum cleaner. SO ANNOYING.

This happened once before, almost a year ago, IIRC. It fixed itself completely randomly and hasn't been a problem since...well, until now. Last time I was literally 1 restart away from performing a risky VBIOS reflash in an attempt to muzzle the bastard when it randomly stopped. Maybe it was just the threat that did the trick...

I can hear it randomly dipping for a fraction of a second, almost as though it wants to spool down.

Please, help! Save me from this godawful whine!
 
Solution
That is an interesting problem. As far as I've seen, no video card can control its fans independently, although I shall not deny the existence of cards that can. If your card only controls its fans independently, then that means a VBIOS flash cannot fix it, though I like your idea of the threat of it quieting it down.

This suggests a wiring issue. Have you carefully inspected the fan wiring? You should first check if the fans' connector is connected to the board, and, even if it is, disconnect it, and connect it once more.

If that doesn't do it, then it's time to go further: on my old Sapphire Radeon HD 7850 1GB, there is an easily-visible cable that the two fans connected to. If your card has something like this out in the open...

racecar56

Distinguished
Sep 13, 2010
56
4
18,565
That is an interesting problem. As far as I've seen, no video card can control its fans independently, although I shall not deny the existence of cards that can. If your card only controls its fans independently, then that means a VBIOS flash cannot fix it, though I like your idea of the threat of it quieting it down.

This suggests a wiring issue. Have you carefully inspected the fan wiring? You should first check if the fans' connector is connected to the board, and, even if it is, disconnect it, and connect it once more.

If that doesn't do it, then it's time to go further: on my old Sapphire Radeon HD 7850 1GB, there is an easily-visible cable that the two fans connected to. If your card has something like this out in the open, disconnect it, and connect it again. Otherwise, you will probably need to carefully take the cooler apart, checking the wiring as you go.
 
Solution