Graphics card fan too loud
I'm beginning to notice that the fan on my graphics card is too loud. I messed with things today and accidentally forgot to plug the fan back in. (I was wondering how my computer became silent.)
Since then I began to focus on the noise that it produces. What could be the problem? Is it failing and in need of replacing? Can I fix it somehow, e.g., by lubricating it with oil?
Also, if I had to replace the fan, how hard would it be to replace it by myself? It just seems like there are three screws that I need to remove in order to put on the new fan.
The model discussed here is Radeon HD4850.
Loudness can have several issues. Rik already mentioned one. If the cooler is dusted up, the card gets hotter and thus the fan runs faster, so cleaning the cooler can help lots.
The fan can also get louder if the ball bearings are giving out. That usually causes not just an increase in loudness, but a rather distinct sound that goes beyond just the fan being loud.
You can "oil" a fan if it has a sticker in the center of the fan blade that covers access to the ballbarings. Check out this link to see how it's done: http://www.dansdata.com/fanmaint.htm
Also, you can lower the speed of the fan by using software such as Nvidia Inspector. Many manufacturers also supply tools for this. Usually, you can't go below a certain threshold. You can combine this with undervolting the GPU for the card's 2D-mode which will result in creating lower temperatures allowing you to speed down the fan even more. This makes my GTX260 with dual fans basically silent. It should be a given to always use a temperature monitoring tool for this procedure and read up extensively on how to do that before attempting it!
To lower the fan speed for ATI cards open CCC and enable overdrive. Create a new profile. You can find the newly created profile here:
XP: C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Local Settings\Application Data\ATI \ACE\Profilename.XML.
Vista/7: C:\Users\USERNAME\AppData\Local\ATI\ACE\Profilename.XML
Open the file in a text editor.
<Feature name="FanSpeedAlgorithm_0">
<Property name="FanSpeedAlgorithm" value="Manual" />
</Feature>
<Feature name="FanSpeedRPMTarget_0">
<Property name="Want" value="0" />
</Feature>
<Feature name="FanSpeedPercentTarget_0">
<Property name="Want" value="60" />
Change the value for FanSpeedAlgorith to manual. Then you can set FanSpeedPercentTarget to provide a new target speed that overrides the card's BIOS setting. Save the file and re-load the profile to activate it. You can also copy the above example. It will run the fan at 60% and thus slower and less noisy. This has been confirmed as a fix by Radeon 4850 users on the following forum:
http://www.tweakpc.de/forum/tutorials/57531-ati-radeon-hd-4850-fan-speed.html
Before you are going to replace the fan you can use compressed air to blow it clean. Usually this makes a lot of difference. Just make sure you don't rotate the fans blades because doing so can cause significant current spike down to your motherboard.
You can buy a can of compressed air from most hardware stores.