AW17 R1 (Ranger) Fan Mod

Hi,

I've read a couple of posts here regarding upgrading various Alienware laptops to use a CPU fan with a greater throughput of air; I've recently upgraded my Ranger from the stock i7 4710MQ to a i7 4930MX, and found that although the system wasn't overheating at stock OR AW level one overclock that a more efficient fan would allow me to go a little further if I decide to later - still learning at the moment so will not risk cooking my laptop.....

What I did do was buy an Alienware M14x R2 CPU Cooling Fan - P/N XN0G5, and removed the heatsink, which seems to be a dual-purpose, GPU & CPU heatsink - hence the high output fan; 10.4CFM, against the 1.66CFM of the standard AW17 one.....

Having read posts that other members have made about fan upgrades, I decided that what I wanted was something that firstly did the job, and gave a better level of cooling than I was getting with the stock item, and secondly, that it looked as close to standard as possible......

The 'legs' on the 14R2 fan don't match the mounting points on the 17, so they had to go - what I did do was use the default fan as a template to cut an 'overlay' of black plasticard, which anyone who is into model railways will have used; its a styrene sheet that is available in different thicknesses and colours - I happened to have some in black so used that, and marked the mount holes with a pin-vice, drilling them out to suit the mounting holes after a few test fittings. The template was cut either side of the wiring so it sits properly, and was bonded to the M14 fan shell with high strength superglue;
The discarded legs were used as spacers under the template, also fixed with superglue, so as to ensure the fan sat in the correct attitude, and the end result looks close to stock; see picture below.

Today I have bought a spare AW17 fan, and I'll be attempting to fit the entire 10.4CFM fan into the AW17 fan shell, toto29620 has apparently managed this on a M17R2, so we'll see if it can be done for the Ranger.....

I always attempt to keep the 'stock' appearance - it's the same with my car...... discreet enhancements is the name of the game for me!



Regards

Dave

 

This is pretty awesome! How much of a difference does this make? Is there a large noise difference between the stock fan and this one?

EDIT: I looked into the other threads about this issue and it seems there isn't much change unless your using HWINFO to control the fan tables anyway's . I was hoping for less of a software fix.

Damnit Alienware...fix the damn fan tables, I don't care if my machine makes more noise...or at least give us access to it ourselves.

 

Noisewise the sound is 'different' - there's a higher pitched whistle in there; not unpleasant or obtrusive, and you can definitely feel the amount of warm air from the rear vents is greater.

Temperatures? I'm in the UK and my living room is around 70f or around 21c, and my idle temp is 48/51c. I've used a number of different stress tests and the highest CPU temp I've seen is 88c - which is about 4c down on the maximum on the stock fan - and I have the machine running on the Level 1 overclock in BIOS. Idle temp is max 1-2c lower. I set the temp alarm at 92c on my desktop gadget, and that did trigger on the stock fan.

I have not done anything in terms of using HWINFO apart from using it to monitor the temps, so for me at least, there is a small but noticeable drop in CPU temp against the standard.

I think that the only gain is at the top end of the temperature scale , and that's where we need it! The new fan is just shifting the warm air quicker than the original.

Works for me though!

Dave

 

Brother, on OT I'd say don't use that OC from BIOS, It's not optimized. Just because all CPUs and GPUs are never the same (Every chip requires it's custom voltage).
On the topic, Did you tried replacing the GPU fan too , from M17x R4 (High CFM) ??
Heard it get's fixed firmly as the dimensions and fitting are same like the ranger's GPU fan.

 

Level 1 OC now reverted to standard, while I study up on custom voltages etc; thanks for the 'heads-up' there Ashtrix;

Maybe once I have finished the CPU cooling mods I'll switch the GPU fan; do you have the Dell P/N for the high capacity fan?

Regards

Dave

 

Yep, Here's the direct link from pchub they have it in stock too [M17x R4 Fan 11.4CFM Dell P/N -THPDJ 0THPDJ] , they even have the M14x R2 CPU one too...
I'll also be doing some upgrades to my machine, will take time though

 

I got mine through Dell by chatting with them. It will be cheaper than $40 too if they still have any in stock. I will look around and see if I can find the part number they had for it as you have to get the heatsink/fan together.

OK this is waht I had to buy. Guess the part numbers are the same... THPDJ Assembly,Fan,MXM-CARD,M17XR4, it was $13.99 for the fan and $8.99 shipping. Total w/ tax was $23.82.

 

The price is very perfect from dell, I din't think of it because M17x R4 was quite old so thought they would have exhausted the service parts, So that wtih tax + shipping $23.82 from dell or ebay ?

If I remember correctly @thegh0sts ordered from ebay and they ended up with a low CFM, so better not to buy from ebay...

 

How much difference did it make compared to your R-1 GPU fan ?

 

Yeah I bought one from eBay as well and it was a 2.3CFM model. They ship from China and they sell the wrong ones on purpose because you get to pay return shipping (~$15 IIRC) so it isn't worth it. Really scummy practice. I bought it straight from Dell, I got on the sales chat with them and didn't think they would have it, took all of 10 minutes to get it ordered and got here in like 2 days.

My 780M at stock clocks and undervolted 50mV (0.95V) sits in the high 60s at load, sometime it will push into the 70s. That's with the fans on the auto table, no HWiNFO control. I repasted with PK-3.

 

wow ... so you just ordered it from dell and simply installed it in the place of the old one with no fuss ?

Also same fan voltage, power requirement and rpm ?

 

Yeah its the same dimensions, plug, and screw layout. It looks no different then the one installed from the factory. The RPM might be a little higher (like 3700) but it is still locked down due to the EC controlling the fans. It really sucks Dell put such terrible fans (and locked the stupid max fan speed) in these laptops, it would have been amazing to have the versatility of the M17X R4 hardware in the 17 R1 chassis.

 

Normally using HWinfo the max on the default GPU fan using Dell EC is 3400RPM (Can run full blast if the fans are not turning on, hot environment only. Else they will but after the 70C mark. Can't use the custom RPMs because of EC lockdown), then my doubt is we still can't run the fan at full max of its 3700RPM due to the EC limitaton having the max GPU fantable RPM set to 3400 ??
AFAIK these EC fan tables can't be fixed even with an svl7's BIOS Hardmod...*facepalm*

A royal PITA these 2014 AW's and the 2015 lineup, those are like not even worth a stone..

 

Only consolation is that the fan profile in the new Apple "thin" AW17R2 is as bad as previously Aw17 . Only that Aw17R2 have throttle problems during benchmark tests ...

 

The EC fan tables are unchangeable, yes, and they are stored separate from the BIOS. The EC probably controls the fans using voltage (up to 5V according to the fan) so even though the fan is different the voltage sent to it from the tables would be the same. I'm guessing the higher RPM fan has a higher max RPM or a higher RPM at whatever voltage we see as "max" that normally makes 3400.

I will play around with the fans tomorrow and double check all my numbers. I can post some screenshots too if you want something specific.

 

The fan work on a pwm signal, so the power is the result of a square signal like this:



But if you plug only the ground and the power wire ( the one with a red dot and no dot on the cable ) the motherboard will send constant 5V and the fan will run at full speed, witch is 4750 Rpm ( on my m17x r2, no ec fan table and things, just hwinfos and do what you want ).

It can be a bit noisy ... You can find some pwm controller board for nothing on ebay with two button to increase and decrease the fan speed. If you have some spare space inside the case and a palce for teh two button soemwhere ...

 

Could you give me a link to one those on eBay? I've got my stock fan laying around and would love to test it out and if it works put it on the higher CFM fan to OC.

This might be the way to fix the AW 17 fans.

 

Here is the cheapest i have found : http://www.ebay.com/itm/2A-Motor-Sp...220?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item418bfd9d9c
An other with some wire between board and potentiometer, but i has to get 6V mini ... might work at 5V : http://www.ebay.com/itm/6-28V-Pulse...708?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item58c207f61c

And an other : http://www.ebay.com/itm/5V-30V-5A-R...087?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_2&hash=item19e85ff4bf

Look if you can find enought place to put this inside the case, after that you only need a +5V and groud, those from the stock fan plug should do the trick. It will suck a bit more power than stock so i don't know, i have no doubt that my old m17x r2 can provide power for a full town from it's fan plug but on the newer model with cheaper parts i don't know ...

 

That is some amazing info, I think I might just have to pick up a spare bottom panel and that second board you linked and get to work! Thanks!

 

OK so I'm sitting here thinking about this and you seem to know your stuff. Can I cut the PWM wire and splice in a switch? If I can cut one of the wires and force the fan to 100% I should be able to put the switch in which would allow me to choose 100% or automatic right? Not sure if that works (or makes sense) but that would be awesome if I could do that. Any thoughts?

 

Looks like I opened quite a can of worms here!

I'm still waiting for my donor stock fan to arrive from San Diego, should arrive soon I hope - as I'm in the UK things can take a few days to arrive from the US

I managed to source a genuine Dell THPDJ locally, so I'll do the whole job once everything is here.

The PWM controller look like a great idea - I've done a quick eBay search and found a few bottom covers, Dell P/N 6Y5CP - sadly for me they are all in the United States....

The only one I managed to find in the UK is on Amazon - at a very scary $332! I've owned cars for less!

 

Does anyone know which wire controls what on these fans? I'm guessing they are 5V, Ground, PWM, tach but they are all black on mine so I don't know which is which.

 

Well i would not try this, i don't think the motherboard will apreciate a lot. Might be worth a try on a cheap desktop motherboard. Some mobo have a security and shutdown or beep a lot if the fan stop working properly.

 

Look a the end of the cable near the fan, you will see some smal dot , a red, blue and yellow or green one. Red is +5V, yellow rpm signal , blue pwm signal and no dot is ground. That was like that on the m14x fan.

 

I think this should be posted here, suits better

Spoiler: PWM FAN HARD MOD

 

I've now received all my replacement fans, and after a quick run with 3D Mark Vantage I recorded temperatures;

This is with the THPDJ M17xR4 GPU fan

GPU Min 46c Max 84c

CPU Min 56c Max 89c with the exception being Core 3 Min 54c Max 83c, which is interesting....

The 'standard' CPU fan arrived too - although instead of the XVXVH 1.66cfm unit DC28000CMF0 which I expected, I received DC2800099F0 GVHX3 which is a 6.5cfm fan of exactly the same size and shape as XVXVH.

I'm going to swap my modded XN0G5 M14XR2 fan with the GVHX3 and rerun 3D Mark, to see if the temps and noise are affected.

The GVHX3 is the M17xR3 CPU Cooling Fan and could be suitable for folk who are not as comfortable Dremelling bits of their expensive hardware as I am......

 

Wow bro that's amazingly good piece of information, a 6.5CFM would be much better than a whole dremelling work of M14x R2 ~11.4 (guessing ) CFM fan !!

But this 9xxM Maxwell BIOS UEFI requirements make me feel sad for my AW17, whole win8.1 crap, tbh hate that OS & Lockdown on the beast machines...

By the way on OT (sorry ) at computex the Clevo is refreshing 2 current machines and one of them is the P3xx SM-A - The SLI Broadwell refresh, Plus have a look here -> P7xxDM . These are being refreshed with Skylake support as Broadwell socket supports it, ThunderBolt 3 / USB C, Nvme PCIe SSD...oozing with latest tech !! these will rip the flesh out of Alienware, MSI, ASUS & eat em alive

 

I've now re-run the tests and the CPU temps peaked at only 1c more with the 6.5cfm fan than the 10.6 fan - that to me is within a margin of error; and consistently below the 92c+ with the stock fan.

I'll need to run a few more back-to-back tests and see if this pattern is repeated - for the minimal outlay I'd say that a higher capacity CPU fan is a good if modest improvement, and the noticeably lower GPU temps with the THPDJ fan even more so.

@ Ashtrix, Windows 8.1 lasted less than ten minutes on my AW17, before I extracted the stock HDD+mSATA and replaced with the SSD and mSATA from the old unit - back to good old familiar Win 7 Ultimate. I'll probably take the free upgrade to Win 10 Pro BUT I'll be making a full back-up first!

And looking for a Win7 skin or theme too.....

Trabant Dave = stubbornly resistant to change!

Sadly I think I will be deserting the Alienware brand for my next desktop and laptop; I'll build my own desktop and reckon the only serious laptop option is Clevo-based now, since AW went 'boutique' instead of 'enthusiast', so thanks for the Clevo info there.

If anyone else has done this mod please run some comparative tests and post results here.

Outside temperature where I am (near Sunny Heathrow Airport) today is 21c, and I'd estimate around 24c inside the front room

 

I use the fan your speaking of, in my M17X-R4 for the CPU. Its like 11.7CFM instead of the 4.7 I had before. A tiny bit more noisy but like 10 degree's Celsius less when overclocked and gaming for hours on end!

 

Interesting that you have a 11.7cfm on the CPU there Woodzstack; is the one you have the XN0G5? I wonder if you would mind posting the serial if it's different and even better a picture.....

If there's an 11.7cfm that doesn't require any chopping etc I'd be up for one of those, my hearing is totally shot so a couple of Decibels is not too much of an issue for me, although Mrs. Trabant reckons the current fan sounds like Concorde on take-off which is possibly a slight exaggeration.......

Anything that shaves a couple of degrees has to be like money well spent!

 

I had to chop bunch of things off, I just used a small strip of hockey tape to hold it there. Whats odd is the fan doesn't look like its much crazier then the ones before, the fins are more numerous and smaller /thinner.

 

You would have to look at the electric motors of both; the difference between high/low power fans is mainly in the number of windings (and wire's thickness) on each coil and the number of coils (3 or 4). Of course, more windings increases cost, but also space; the stator housing would have to be larger to accommodate all that copper (or it has empty space inside):

Spoiler: 45 cfm vs. 10 cfm fan

 

Hi, is M17x R4 Fan 11.4CFM Dell P/N -THPDJ 0THPDJ totally suitable to M17R1 GPU fan without any modifications? And does it lower the temperature as expected? Thank you for your answer!
?

 

Yep it is...I think the experiences are posted before, give this full thread a read

Spoiler

CPU fan - M14x R2 - XN0G5 10.7 CFM - dremel needed / M17x R3 - GVXH3 6.5CFM
GPU fan - M17x R4 - 0THPDJ - THPDJ - 11.4CFM
These are the current moddable options for AW17 R1...

 

Yea, I believe it's worth a try. I have searched M17X R3 -GVXH3 fan on ebay and other platforms. However, I can only find the 2.3CFM fan with the P/N GVXH3. It's very strange. Anyway, I will buy the M17XR4 fan to substitute the disaster original GPU fan.

 

Didn't realise this was still creating interest!

The THPDJ fan is the one I used; there's usually a few listings on eBay for not much money; if you are in Europe it is a little more difficult to find but there is currently a Lithuanian seller called dellpartsonline with 100% feedback, - see item 111697774085

 

Yeah, I'm still interested in the fan mod. It is easy for me to buy these fans since I live in Hong Kong and can buy these fans from China directly (All these fans are manufactured in China). I have used the THPDJ 11.4CFM fan. But I have problems since the maximum RPM is still locked at 3400.(With hwinfo64 I can push to 3600rpm). And the GPU temperature seems to be reduced by 2-4 degrees Celsius.

 

That's close to my figure; not a bad reduction IMO and together with the higher CFM fan on the CPU a pretty worthwhile upgrade - even in our very warm spell currently in the UK my machine has remained under alarm temp under test/use.

I haven't used any external cooling measures either, although I'm waiting for a Thermaltake Massive TM to arrive from the USA - probably just when the weather deteriorates......

 

Are there any fans that will work in a 17 r1 that don't require a lot of modification?


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For the GPU the 0THPDJ/THPDJ is a straight swap; unplug, unscrew, and fit the new one, IMHO a worthwhile low-cost low effort mod that does work.

I've thus far not found any CPU fans that have the 10/11 cfm capacity and don't require chopping...... however, GVHX3 which is a 6.5cfm unit that is the M17R3 CPU cooler and is a straight swap for your default fan - XVXVH 1.66cfm; no chopping required.

This 6.5 fan does move more air than the default, and on testing was more effective than standard and only a degree or two behind the modded unit

 

That's exactly what I needed to know, thanks. My cpu fan spins up to 3800 rpms or higher with just 25 percent usage. Have done countless repastes and cleaned the heatsinks but it still persists. Hopefully the higher cfm fans will help. Does anyone know an place that sells them or is it exclusively eBay at this point?


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ive looked on ebay at CPU fan GVHX3 and they all state that they are 2.3 cfm. Anyone know where I can find the 6.5 CFM unit?

 

So i decided to try this Fan mod but instead of using from r4, i used mine from an r3.

So the aw r3 was given with:
CPU: 2.3CFM
GPU: 3CFM,
so it's only a little difference from R5 but it is also Plug&play.

For comparing results, i used hwinfo64 both with3dmark2011 in 17 r1:

Original Max CFM temp:
CPU oc lv1 ( it reach 3991MHz info from 3dmark results):
-cpu package: 80°c
-cpu IA cores 80°c
-cpu GT cores 65°c
GPU: 72°c

Custom Max CFM temp:
CPU oc lv1 (it reach 3891MHz info from 3dmark results):
-cpu package: 80°c
-cpu IA cores 80°c
-cpu GT cores 63°c
GPU: 70°c

 

Interesting about the GVHX3 anomaly; I have just checked my fan and it has the number DC2800099F0 in the white strip label, and on the round yellow one it has Forcecon DFS531105MC0T F789 DC 5V 0.5A 6.5cfm...... The original XVXVH has DC28000CMF0, and on the yellow spot label FCN DFS531205HC0T FC7U DC 5V 0.5A 1.66cfm; thus the mystery deepens..........

The fan pattern is as the higher capacity GPU fan; the vanes are more closely spaced than the XVXVH 1.66 unit.

 

So anyone know where I can order the 6.5 cfm, or is 2.3 pretty much all that's out there?


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Does anyone know if the m17x r4 cpu heatsink will fit in the 17r5. I have an extra r4 heatsink laying around and after trying everything to keep my cpu temps down, im thinking my r5 heatsink might be warped or something so wanted to do a quick switch and check.

 

finally decided to order the GPU fan that frackin' matches the listing so will see how that goes. very tempted to get the CPU fan too.

i swear that for the CPU fan that only 1 of the 3 mounting points fit but that you could still use the remaining 2 points to hold down the fan. unfortunately the bottom of the fan insert is the inside of the keyboard/touchpad panel so using double-sided tape might be tricky.

 

Hi friends, where can i get the 6,4cfm fan??? i cannot find anywhere

i found the 11,6cfm cheapest here
http://www.aliexpress.com/item/NEW-...601605HB0T-FB6A-in-Computers/32333850501.html

 

why do you want a 6.4 CFM fan when an 11.4 CFM = more air flow?