A8Js - Fan Control available !!

Guys,

I got hands on the necessary plug in making complete ACPI control available on Notebook Hardware Control. Now you can shut the device up by setting your own threshold for the fan.

Download the program at : http://www.pbus-167.com/nhc/nhc.htm#anchor_download

after installation, copy the 2 files provided in the attached zip file into the Notebook Hardware Control\acpi folder and restart the program. Now ACPI functions are available.

Temperature settings for the threshold are to be entered in °K.
Here is how you can convert into °C

48°C = (273,2 + 48 ) °K = 321,2 °K = 3212 °K/10

It works perfectly for me.

 

How much the fan noise is on an Asus A8Js ?
I might be buying one of these...

 

I would say average. The problem is more that it sometimes generates an annoying humming noise caused by the flow of air. But i think, this is a manner of perception, for most, you should worry about light leakage and vertical viewing ankle.

 

Thanks a lot.

 

Very nice. Now the fan will throttle as you'd expect. The fan will be off until cpu temp reaches 62°C after that it will run max speed until maybe 58 and after that lower it's speed a bit and go silent again at 48°C.
I don't know what asus original thermal policy is but for sure that made my fan spin all the time, no matter what I did, gaming, browsing, idling. Same speed all the time. Faulty or over precausious programming by asus I don't know? But now it's working as I'd expect it to.
What do you think about redoing the factory applied thermal paste with something like arctic silver? I know it will ruin the warranty but it might be worth it?. Anybody knows how much you can lower average cpu temp by doing this?

 

Redrum, by any means, this WILL ruin your warranty for nothing, the temperature reduction would only be marginal at most. This info i am providing is based on 4 years of experience in a notebook repair center. you can run your C2D Cpu up till temperatures of 65C without further concern.

 

Thanks. I will ditch that idea then, not worth it.
Do you know what asus original temp. threshold levels for the fan are?

 

Eprom says 42 on, never stop

 

I can't believe that those other guys that swear they can't even hear their fan spinning have the same notebook as I do. When it spins it's clearly audible.
And also... there are quite many of us that have "loud" examples of this notebook and I'm not sure we can blame it on bad build quality or faulty hardware? We're just too many. Could it be that there are different builds of the a8js?
Or is it just that some of us have a lower tolerance level for noise? I also find that hard to believe. Unluckily there is no place near where I can go have a look at/listen to another a8js. I guess I'll never find out.

 

Wonderful exxi, the fan stopped when web browsing, loaded a game, quickly came on. Q: part of the ACPI UI is in German (it seems). Know the reason for this, if it can be corrected?

I have:
Manuelle Luftersteuerung: Enabled.
Lüfter: AUS (is this turn off?)

Automatische Lüftersteuerung:
EIN: 3352/10
AUS: 3212/10

Are there default values acceptable, should I change them? Suggestions?

Further question: now my CPU is between 55 and 60 C, with brief bursts from the fan, while I am doing light work (browsing, office). Compare this versus before, when it was always at 51 C with the fan always on. Is there any setback regarding having the CPU working at this slightly hotter temperature? Is its operating life in any way diminished by this?

 

any idea if this will work on my a8jm?

 

The people who have the fan on high from the start, did you get your notebook from a european source?

 

Mine is from europe yes (model A8JS - 4S009P). And I know at least two others from this forum that are from europe and have machines that behave similar to my a8js.

 

Well im almost certain that is the difference. Its important to note then that the european version has a different fan control if people ask again.

Us versions might as well theres a new a8js with 120 gb hd for the us market now.

 

I'd rather have a noisy, cool laptop than a hot, silent one.

CPU is the last concern on my mind when it comes to heat. There are other things of higher priority such as HDD lifespan.

If you are concerned about being disruptive to other people in quiet places such as libraries/lectures, fear not because the clicking of your mice/touchpad-buttons and keyboard are far more annoying.

EDIT: Also take note that heat is not the main cause of hardware failure. On the other hand, it's the number of start-ups the hardware has to go through as start-ups are associated with large changes in temperature. So, I'd rather leave my laptop at a constant 48C than continuous cycles from 48-62-48-62. Projection lamps for TVs and projectors are a prime example of this.

 

I did a little test with this file. First of all, the ACPI controls are in German? So I didn't know exactly what the settings were for.

But I was able to copy the files into the acpi folder, and I was able to enable the ACPI Control System checkbox.

From the portion I can understand, the CPU fan kicks in when the CPU is over 58C, and stops once it lowers to 48C. And it seems to behaving so.

I monitored the temperatures with SpeedFan, it goes through this cycle like every 10/15 minutes? The fan kicks in at Local Temp 50, Remote Temp(CPU) 58 (though for some reason it sometimes goes up to 51 and 61 before the temperatures starts to drop), and stops at 45 and 48 respectively.

The HD and GPU temperatures aren't affected, they stay at 48 and 57 constantly.

Anyone else wants to give this a try and see what your readings are like?

 

I've got noisy A8Js from american source (PortableOne). How about that?

 

Mine is european, from Spain, fan was always at max until I installed this.

 

I am working on the translation of the file right now. As for the lifespan of hardware effected by letting the cpu run hot. I am ABSOLUTELY not concerned about shortening the lifespan. As mentioned before, hdd and GPU temp. are not affected by cpu temp. the cpu can handle temps up to 85C before it shuts down. And even then, there will be no damage. As far as the theory about different builts and fan noise goes, YES there is a difference between the EU version and the Slightly older American one. I dont know what the difference is but one thing is sure, the E.U one has a different fan which makes a more audible noise. The inconvenient truth but i think now that we have a tool to control the fan, this should not be an issue anymore And yeah, i am working on the A8jp/m version

 

Translation is done just download the attachment again and replace, now you have the settings in English. Have fun

 

Translation works fine. Thanks again exxi, this is great for me - when I am not playing, but studying or reading on my computer, I do so in a silent room, and the fan was very noticeable for me. Was not driving me crazy (as others) but its nice to enjoy the silence now.

 

I am glad it helped, how did you set the treas hold? and how long does it take until the fan has to cool it down to "Fan Stop" ?

 

With the values you set (I think 62 and 48) I got it cycling something like this.... silent/fan off for maybe 6 minutes. Then it would kick in att max speed for I think 1 minute until it reaches 58 and lower it's speed a notch for 2 minutes and it would be back to 48 again. So a cycle would be around 10 minutes (doing nothing more than surfing the net and cpu set to dynamic). I actually found that to be a bit annoying as well so I think I'm back to constantly on. But it's nice to have the alternative if I want. Thanks again Exxi.

One more thing. Do you know if it's possible to control tha actual speed of the fan? Now it's either 3200 rpm (and one more level above that) or nothing. If it was possbile to have it running something like 1500 rpm I think that would reduce the soundlevel a lot while still keeping the cpu cool enough. Cheers.

 

i am working on it boss. I think i will have fan RPM control ready by tomorrow

 

You're the man!

 

I have a question..

my brightness seems to always reset back to the lowest setting when windows restarts or i go into battery mode. is there anyway to setup brightness profiles?

 

haha Exxi, you got this file from my post in the NHC forum! =P

ahaha, i didnt know ppl wanted this so bad, cause i had it for a while...

i just didnt enjoy using it so much..cause i was having the same issues like Redrum..

the fan would turn off at ..39degrees...even browsing, word processing or what not, low intensive CPU activities would still have my CPU temp go up slowly (obviuosly, since the CPU fan is off)...then when it hits 51 degrees, my fan goes on...cools it to 39degrees again...and off the fan goes..

as u can see, its just a repeating cycle...so the fan will turn off...slowly go to 51, turn on again..then back down to 39 and turn off..
ahahha
i found this kind of annyoing ..so i just turned off the option and kept the fan on constantly now =P
hahaah

if there are any other solutions then feel free to post =D

 

oh oh, and if anyone has values for optimal undervolting for the A8Js, could you post them?

cause im sure keeping the CPU temp at a low is probably best for this fan control not to be kicking in every 10 minutes

 

What do you use to undervolt, NHC?

 

hey venturello,

yup, i use NHC to undervolt

but right now im just using the default undervolt values that were preset in NHC

basically i just checked off the multipliers and clicked "set"

ahah
thats it!

i didnt bother testing out other voltages

do u have any suggestions on stable undervoltage settings?

thanks =D

 

Has anyone experienced this problem?

Sometimes when I turn ACPI on, the fan control doesn't seem to work, the cpu temperature just keeps going up. One time I was away for a bit, and my wife was using the computer, and she told me it shut down on itself and the computer was really hot. So the computer must have reached like 100C and caused a forced shutdown.

Also, would this hurt the computer/cpu at all?

 

I can confirm that this DOES work for my A8Ja. All I had to do was go through those two files and change all instances of "A8Js" to "A8J".

This should work for the A8Jm too.

Also, is there a way to set it up so the LCD automatically turns to the lowest brightness while on battery, and returns to the highest brightness when it is plugged back in?

Another question: since the fan control is based on the CPU temperature, it it possible that my hard drive or GPU may overheat?

 

I have a problem with this new NHC ACPI settings - the notebook always reverts to minimum LCD brightness. So, I plug it in, it goes to minimum. So I have to put it back to max. Plug it off power, goes to min. Put it to middle where I like it. Plug it in, goes to min, put it to max, plug it out, put it to middle, etc, you get it.

Any ideas how I can solve this?

 

This is happening to me too... I would like to set specific rightness profiles when using the battery or while it's plugged in.

 

i am looking into it

 

I just experienced this problem for the first time. I freaked out because i thought my backlight burned out or something.

I never had this problem before I put nhc in so Im sure its nhc.

I THINK whats happening is you unplug while its shutting down it sets the brightness to minimum.

 

Thanks exxi - it's been a great contribution to the community!

 

Venturello, thanks for your gratitude. This is a great community and i think everyone is contributing to it.

Cheers

 

if you guys want to change the brightness settings (this will ALWAYS keep the brightness level at the setting you put in, wether you are plugged in or not)

you need to edit the A8JS.cs file...
i use Notepad2 (you can just serach for it on google and download it)

open the file using notepad 2

fine this section:
"
public static class BRIGHTNESS_LEVEL
{
// Properties of the value class
public const string description = "Current LCD brightness level"; // Description of current value
public const bool nhc_visible = true; // true -> value is visible in NHC

// Value
public static int brightness_level = 1; // It must have the same name as the class (case are ignored)
}
//
#endregion

// Function to set the brightness (it must have the name set_brightness)
public static bool set_brightness(int new_level)
{
ACPI.METHOD.SetValue("_SB.ATKD.SPLV", 1);
return true;


the places I bolded where you see the "1", just change them to the number setting for brightness you want your laptop to always be set to

the reason i dont bother with this (I turn it off in the ACPI settings), is because i want different brightness profiles (like Power4Gear when you're unplugged)

hope this helped

cheers

 

**** i wish there was something like this for the W3J

Look at my post here

http://forums.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=78668&page=2&highlight=w3j+fan+noise

What I ended up doing (was too lazy to take pics, can take them on request)
was solder a variable resistor onto the fan wires. I can now adjust the fan speed up and down to my liking. I've got it right now to where its not audible and my temps stay right around 55 degrees idling wordprocessing ect. Then when gaming the 2nd stage kicks in and my temps only get to a maximum of 70c.

Not an elegant solution, well acutally it is on mine but it sure wasn't fun, I really wish asus would make the W3J compatible with fan control software.

 

Bakedbread, looks good

 

Is there go way to get it to automatically adjust the brightness level based on whether the laptop is plugged in or not?

 

Hi everyone. This seems a good solution. However is it possible to implement a solution as the following:

- from 45 to 50/55º put the fan in low but at a lower RMP (ex. 1600/2000 rpm instead of the 3200 rpm. This is just guessing as I don't know what would be stable temperature of the CPU at a lower rpm setting. It would be higher, but don't know how high.
- from 56-60: low setting (3200rpm);
- 60º - upwards: high setting.

This would allow for the fan to be on all the time, but at a lower setting (thus less noise) when doing low CPU tasks thus keeping it always refrigerated, instead of the off-on setting.

All the best

 

You can adjust the temperature settings from within the ACPI control panel inside NHC. There are two values: one to set the temperature below which the fan is off, and one to set the temperature above which the fan is running at full speed. I'm not sure whether the fan goes through speed adjustments within the range you set. The values you input are in a derivative of Kelvins.

Let C be the value in degrees Celsius, and K be the number you input; then:

K = (273.2 + C)*10

Edit: it's not *100, it's *10. Corrected above.

 

Hi Yan,

I don't know much about programming but I've read the Asustek.cs file that came by default with NHC:
(...)
// TAC3, 8, // 48°C <- FAN ON low level
// TAC2, 8, // 68°C <- FAN ON middle level
// TAC1, 8, // 78°C <- FAN ON high level
// TAC0, 8, // 86°C <- FAN ON maximum level
(...)

// Value
public static int fan_middle_speed_1 = 146; // It must have the same name as the class (case are ignored)
public const string unit = "*rpm"; // unit of value
(...)

etc.


I thought that this would allow to control fan speed.

 

Hi,

Do you think it would be hard to create fan speed control for A8H as well? Maybe if A8Js is used as a reference somehow? I guess it's a totally different motherboard though...

I really need to reduce some noise - neither my CPU or HDD temps goes over 40 degrees c with regular use. I figure I could lower the fan speed considerably before temps become a problem. Do you think this could be done?

 

By the way, fan control also works great for the A8JP. I had to specify "A8JP" in the smaller text file and edit the larger one to read "A8J" but that was it.

 

I`m searching for A8H ACPI control too. Could you help me?

 

Did you try searching the NHC forums? Try searching their German forum, because that where most activity seems to take place.

 

Thank you! But where i can find this forum?Could you give me the site name,please?