Hi,
I'm building a computer case with 16 fans - 3 on each of 4 radiators, and 4 general exhaust fans. I'd like to be able to control the running speed of the fans in 5 groups - 4 groups of 3 on the radiators and a group of 4 exhaust fans. I'd hoped to use a commercial 5 channel fan controller but the one I want to use is only rated at 4W per channel and each fan has a rating up to 1.8W so I'm concerned I will overload the controller - especially with a bank of 4 fans connected in parallel. The controller will adjust fan supply voltage independently on each channel over the range 7v to 12v.
I was wondering whether I could connect just one fan from each bank to the controller and then have an auxilliary power supply detect the voltage supplied to that fan and feed the same voltage to the other fans thereby bypassing the load on the controller. The auxilliary supply could be powered by a discrete PSU if more than 12v is required to get a 12v maximum output, or it could perhaps use the computer supply 12v rail if that doesn't affect the maximum output reaching that level.
So I'm not entirely clear how to approach the problem. I do know the auxiliary voltage regulation should be reasonably efficient (I don't want to be be dumping heat into the case unnecessarily) so I'm guessing some sort of switched mode solution, but I have no idea how to begin designing this. Can anyone point me in the right direction for a solution please?
Thanks,
John
I'm building a computer case with 16 fans - 3 on each of 4 radiators, and 4 general exhaust fans. I'd like to be able to control the running speed of the fans in 5 groups - 4 groups of 3 on the radiators and a group of 4 exhaust fans. I'd hoped to use a commercial 5 channel fan controller but the one I want to use is only rated at 4W per channel and each fan has a rating up to 1.8W so I'm concerned I will overload the controller - especially with a bank of 4 fans connected in parallel. The controller will adjust fan supply voltage independently on each channel over the range 7v to 12v.
I was wondering whether I could connect just one fan from each bank to the controller and then have an auxilliary power supply detect the voltage supplied to that fan and feed the same voltage to the other fans thereby bypassing the load on the controller. The auxilliary supply could be powered by a discrete PSU if more than 12v is required to get a 12v maximum output, or it could perhaps use the computer supply 12v rail if that doesn't affect the maximum output reaching that level.
So I'm not entirely clear how to approach the problem. I do know the auxiliary voltage regulation should be reasonably efficient (I don't want to be be dumping heat into the case unnecessarily) so I'm guessing some sort of switched mode solution, but I have no idea how to begin designing this. Can anyone point me in the right direction for a solution please?
Thanks,
John