Radeon HD 4890 fan dying...

[Grall]

I've heard a faint rattle from inside my PC case lately for a couple mins after powering on the system. It has always gone away after - I assume - the bearings heated up a bit and tightened up. Today however all hell broke loose...

Are ATi reference cooler fans really ball bearinged? Coz the horrific rattle I heard from the fan today sounds exactly like sleeve bearings do before they finally seize up for good. Fortunately I finally managed to convince the fan to shut up for the moment by doggedly tapping the video card PCB with my finger. Meh.

Guess it's time to dig out the ol' receipt and carry it off to the place of purchase, meh. Lucky me I don't do mail order so I don't have to package it up and send it off at my own expense. I have a PC store where I'm on fairly good terms with the owners. Fortunately I currently run crossfire, so I won't suffer much really in the way of performance until I get a replacement.

Strange though, the card/fan is barely a year even! I didn't expect it to give up so easily. Oh well, what can one expect from something that's made by the lowest-cost bidder in China? Anyone else have had their ATi reference fans conking out on them?

 

[Kyyla]

The reference fan on my 4890 was so loud I installed an aftermarket solution. Haven't looked back.

 

[swaaye]

My 4670 has its original cooler, but that's only because it's very quiet with a Arctic Cooling-designed cooler. My 3850 and 8800GTX both have aftermarket coolers. AC and Thermalright.

Grall, I hope they let you return it. It would cost probably ~$50 (or more) to get a cooler that could handle a 4890.

 

[Grall]

Oh, I have a 3-year warranty, it's mandated by EU law.

I'm not terribly fond of aftermarket coolers, because some of them are too thick to fit two cards next to each other (like with Arctic Cooling's and Thermalright's coolers) which leaves me SOL, and even those that are the size of the original cooler typically dump all the hot air inside the case, bringing temps up A LOT.

I prefer a cooler that vents the air outside, hence the original units are good enough for me even thoughh they're not terribly quiet.

 

[swaaye]

The thing is some of those coolers that vent outside of the case only partially do so. The 8800GTX OEM cooler, for example, has additional vents that cause a lot of the air to stay in the case anyway. I think they do that to prevent loss of airflow due to overly negative airflow.

I'm just after quiet, really. Anything to get rid of coolers that sound like small hair driers when the GPU is doing anything significant. Both my 8800GTX and 3850 got really annoying playing games.

 

[Grall]

The 8800GTX OEM cooler, for example, has additional vents that cause a lot of the air to stay in the case anyway.

Yeah, I have 2 of those also in another PC. However, the fans on these cards aren't nearly as powerful as the blower on the stock 4890s, there's some serious air pressure coming from that thing on higher revs. You'd need incredible negative pressure in your case for that thing to choke.

I have a small micro-atx case, so I can't really afford having heaps of heat dumped inside, it would raise case temp too much. I can cope with the noise, and I don't think the 4890 is all that bad really. If I listen to music the fans bother me sometimes, but not when just surfing the webs or gaming.

 

[stevem]

IIRC, the 4890 centrifugal fan is a double ball bearing NTK Tech unit. These tend to be rattley. To relubricate, remove the fan via 3 screws on the back of the heatsink assembly & carefully peel back the sticker. Re-lubricate with motor bearing oil or mineral oil. A few drops will do. Work the fan slowly & leave face down to get oil to the bottom bearing.

 

[Grall]

So just lubing it up will stop it from buzzing? Interesting. It would certainly be preferable to being without one of my GPUs for one/a couple weeks while it goes through warranty...

Btw, to lube the bottom bearing I could just pop off the little clip-thingy that sits on the shaft and lift the rotor clean off. That should give easy access to both bearings.

 

[stevem]

Correct. However, removal of the retention clip can be fiddly & if deformed too much may get damaged. Sometimes it's worth trying to lubricate without disassembly. To easily peel the sticker, just warm it up & use a razor blade to lift slowly.

I've also had success obtaining replacement fan units directly from distributors under warranty. RMA the board for a noisy fan is a waste & a PITA for everyone concerned.

OT: I think the 5800 fans are sleeve units. Ceramic sealed for life bearing, Dave?

 

[Grall]

I've successfully removed the clips from fans before, so I know somewhat to expect. I'll be careful.

Just as an aside, today the fan started up just fine without complaining. Weird...

I'm a bit wary of all types of sleeve bearings really. There's a lot of them around these days under different names from various manufacturers, and often they claim (sometimes very) long life for them too. I'll believe it when I see it, meh.

 

[swaaye]

Arctic Cooling's "ceramic bearing" comes to mind. I had their coolers for the 9700 Pro and the X800 series and each had its fan bearing wear out and become noisy. It's a gradual thing, and for awhile the noise will subside after a warm up period, but this is temporary of course. I even got replacements shipped from China for free once, taking advantage of their touted 5 year warranty (took weeks to get here), but the replacements wore out too.

 

[Grall]

I've heard a bunch of people complain about AC's ceramic bearings, I have some AC fans myself and all of them has run successfully for years. Then again, they've been retired now mostly, there's still one in my old Dell XPS that I use as an exhaust, but that PC barely runs anymore now. It creates too much noise and waste heat, and is slower than my current box.

 

[Grall]

Dammit, the fan started rattling again today and refused to stop no matter how much I tapped it. I even tried varying the fan speed via the CCC and it'd settle down at minimum RPM, but less than a minute after going back to auto control it would start making noise again.

I just checked, and I'm gonna assume the bearings are shot; there's a fair amount of lateral play in the rotor.

Card pulled, will go see the store tomorrow...