[SOLVED] RGB fans flickering on new build

[letterk]

Helping my kid with a new build. Here's what he has going.

• AMD 3600X
• Gigabyte b450 Pro Wifi
• EVGA GeForce RTX 3070 XC3
• 32gb Trident Z Royale (4x8) RAM
• 750W Corsair RM Series 80 Plus gold PWS
• M.2 Kingston 240GB M.2 SSD
• 2x 1TB harddrives
• 9x Bitspower Touchaqua Notos O RGB Hydro Bearing fans
• Windows 10 Home

When he had 5 fans going, no issues at all. Fusion RGB controlled everything as expected. When he updated it to 9 fans, lots of flickering and the Fusion software changes didn't do a whole lot. Mostly rainbow type colors. Backed it off to 6 fans and just a bit of flicker. Wondering what we're doing wrong here.

 

[Ralston18]

You may not necessarily be doing anything wrong - perhaps just doing a bit "too much"....

My thought is that it may be power related. There is enough wattage/power for 5 fans but not enough for 9 fans,

Even 6 fans appears to be too much.

Check the fans and all applicable documentation. Read the installation information and guidelines to look for any limitations or restrictions regarding the number of fans and fan placement.

Pay attention to any fine print and foot notes.

 

[letterk]

Well, I do think 9 fans is a bit overkill, but he thinks it looks cool. We did a power consumption calculation and rounding up the system without fans should be topping out at 500W. 9 fans are less than 20W. So figured a 750W would be plenty. Unless there is a power limitation somewhere else.

The fans come with two boards.

• One is a controller board for the fan. It receives power straight from the power supply, and has a cable to the system fan header on the motherboard. All fan speed control seems to be working fine. RPM's are as they should be based on temps as far as I can see.
• One is an RGB controller board. It receives power straight from the power supply, and has a cable to the DLED header on the motherboard.

Reading the B450 manual, it states each DLED header has a max power rating of 2A and a max of 300 LEDs. The fan doesn't give power requires for the fan motors and LEDs separately. Wondering if it's possible that the LEDs are pulling more than 2A when 6 are attached?

 

[Paperdoc]

You're looking at power from too broad a view. The limit you are dealing with is the max current that can be supplied by the mobo 3-pin ARGB header (normally 3.0 A), and the max current required by each fan for the LIGHTS only (not including the fan power). And of course, 9 x that max lighting load per fan. One real problem you have here: the info I could find does NOT tell you the lighting load specs, only the motor load specs. But as a general rule, 9 lighting devices (fans in this case) is too high a load for a single mobo ARGB header.

On the web page I found, it shows that the system comes with two power Hub boards: one for the motor cables, and one for the ARGB lighting cables. Both are shown with connectors for power input from a SATA output from a PSU, and BOTH boards need that power. But I note the illustration does NOT show that it includes a cable for the lighting board for that purpose. So, do you have both those Hubs? Do you have EACH of them connected to a SATA power output from the PSU as well as to the relevant mobo header? You will need all of those connections to ensure sufficient power to all the lights and the fan motors.

 

[letterk]

Thanks for the help. We split the fans between two DLED headers with 2 LED controller daughter boards (1 system fan header to daughter board for fan control was already in place). Didn't even notice there were two when we installed them the first time. Lights work as expected now!

 

[Paperdoc]

You're welcome, and thanks for the update. Glad to hear it is working well now.