What did I damage

[Grimuls]

Hello Gentlefolks.
Here's my story. I really hope you can help.


Some time ago, I made a simple little mod for my PC motherboard (model seen below)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowIm...%20Motherboard

It was simple really.
What I did, was to get faster speeds from the CPU FAN by bypassing the fan's thermal diode (by bridging it)
It spun at 6000RPM then (really loud)

so then use the motherboard's PWN (fan control) feature to control how fast it went in ratio to how hot the system got during gaming.

I also connected another larger fan to the same Motherboard CPU fan header, and made provisions for the negative voltage of BOTH fans to be run from the POWER SUPPLY and NOT the motherboard (to lessen the load of the motherboard, and not cause it to die overtime as they often do when too much load is drawn from them)

It worked lovely.


Then, (and here's where it gets bad)
I decided to clean my machine.
I did that, but I also redid the mod.

Just what nature of zaniness, drunkenness, deliriousness and or carelessness struck me then, I am not sure.

But when I redid the mod.

I RAN the 12 volts line from the PSU, against the 12v output of the motherboard CPU header


It worked fine for a long time. my huge mistake didnt even come to mind.
But I noticed something DIFFERENT happening in the fan control util I use (speedfan).

NORMALLY, it would boot with the fans blaring load and fast, then drop IMMEDIATELY after speed fan loaded (and started controlling the pwm).

But after my suicidal mod mistake, it would slow down GRADUALLY to the 50% (speed) mark showing the increments of fall.

I ignored that.
But now that I think of it, it was like there as a fight going on.

Anywho - sure as the sun.
SOME TIME after (which as applaud-able on MSI's part) the speed the fans were spinning at began to fluctuate.
AUDIBLY! I could hear it fall in and out.
Then it worsnened - which led me too look. And lo and behold;


THE HORROR :| - I had FED the motherboard 12 volts into the header.

I changed the cap nearest to the header.
Now this happens
:

It doesnt fluctuate now, but it isnt as fast as when it was good.

Guys, WHAT did I damage?
I MUST REPAIR THIS BOARD. I LOVE IT.
and I'll buy a dead one even, to scrap what I need!

[Grimuls]

Re: What did I damage

I dont seem to be able to edit my own first posts.
So I'll have to DP

Here's what the mod SHOULD look like, vs what I did.

(I tried replacing with a cap of the same values to get the right frequency for the PWM, didnt work)
Close by are a set of resistors, an IC and a three legged component, I think is also another IC, or transistor)

I want to know which I probably damaged by running 12v (NEGATIVE- I THINK) into the board.

[Grimuls]

Re: What did I damage

P.S

The system now detects a hoard of new sensors!!??
Weird.

Speedfan Also continually gets error messages from the SM bus. (popping up in its status window.)
It brings the CPU up to 45% load in increments each time it does this!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObWDwPDKtsA

[Grimuls]

Re: What did I damage

Bump.

I'm thinking the damage is around here.
It SHOULDNT be hard to isolate if someone with a bit more knowledge in electronics could help out.
This is where the components that make up the PWM are: (in the red circled area)

[Grimuls]

Re: What did I damage

help?

[Grimuls]

Re: What did I damage

wow. 107 views. n nothin'

[zandrax]

Re: What did I damage

Sorry Grimulus, likely nobody know how to fix your problem so nobody answers you.
Said so, the Smartfan continuous rescan can be or a bad setting (IIRC the autorescan option was recently added in version 4.37: check settings or try an older version) or a damaged PWM fan controller: since the controller is usually part of the chipset (in some boardspart of an external hardware monitor chip) this is a bad news.
If I were you and the board were fine except for the header issue, I'd forget it, connect the two fans to two potentiometers and feed them through a molex: you lose the rpm monitoring but you can control temps and adjust fan speed by hand.

Zandrax

[kikkoman]

Re: What did I damage

no.1 in my picture is the fan driver, and no. 2 is the i/o chip.
since no.2 reports the SMBUS devices and usually has fan control too, it's probably the culprit.
replacing it probably isn't worth the hassle (and that chip will be hard to source anyway).
so, as zandrax said, using a hardware fan controller is probably the cheapest option.

[Grimuls]

Re: What did I damage

Said so, the Smartfan continuous rescan can be or a bad setting (IIRC the autorescan option was recently added in version 4.37: check settings or try an older version) or a damaged PWM fan controller: since the controller is usually part of the chipset (in some boardspart of an external hardware monitor chip) this is a bad news.
Zandrax

Are you suggesting a older bios flash?
----------
From my reading on PWMs and the model# of the components found close to the CPU fan header on this board, they are most definatly proponents of the PWM.

no.1 in my picture is the fan driver, and no. 2 is the i/o chip.
since no.2 reports the SMBUS devices and usually has fan control too, it's probably the culprit.
replacing it probably isn't worth the hassle (and that chip will be hard to source anyway).
so, as zandrax said, using a hardware fan controller is probably the cheapest option.

well. Thats just the thing.
NOW, theres the problem of the SMBUS causing 40% CPU spikes.
I need to check whether or not this only happens in speedfan or not.

BUT HERES MY QUESTION FOR YOU

Would the fan controller for the CPU fan be THAT far???
That one is right beside the CHA_1 header, which, works fine.
I'm thinking that it would be closer to the area I outlined.
Please just entertain/oblige me a lil more with this one.
I can understand that it seems completly redundant/hopeless to you but..

If thats the damaged header's driver.
Where is the other one's?

And, How would I use my meter to test which is which?
Because certainly, their are other components that would output 12/5 VDC.

[zandrax]

Re: What did I damage

[QUOTE=Grimuls]Are you suggesting a older bios flash?[QUOTE]Sorry, my mistake: I wrote Smartfan instead of Speedfan.
I think CPU spikes are related to Speedfan's continuous scanning so I suggest trying an old version which may not exibit the same behaviour: install e.g. version 4.36 or older and watch if new SMBUS devices appear again and again.

Zandrax