My Antec P182 Case fans will not start on silent [low]

hsd · Post by **hsd** » Thu Apr 24, 2008 11:44 am

I have just finished putting together the following system...

Case: Antec P182
CPU: Intel Core2 Quad Q6600
CPU Fan: Zalman CNPS9500 AT (using Arctic Silver 5)
MB: Asus P5K-E Wifi-AP
Gfx: MSI NX8800GTS 512Mb
PSU: Coolermaster Real Power Pro 750W
RAM: 2x1Gb OCZ Titanium XTC DDR2-800 (PC2-6400) 3-4-4-15
Drives: WD 320Gb SATA+Memorex DVDRW
Monitor: Viewsonic VX2235wm

Nothing too fancy but OK for my needs...everything runs fine.
With all fans on silent and Q-Fan enabled for the Zalman I get reasonable idle temps from PC Probe II (25C) and Coretemp (~40C) and under full load (Prime95) the cores hover around 62C with occasional peaks of 66C
The temps are a little high, but a lot of that is because my ambient temperature where I am assembling the PC is around 28C! Once it moves to its permanent home everything should be 4-5C lower.

However...(you knew one was coming didn't you)...

When the system is powered on, the case fans that came with the P182 will not start when they are switched to low speed. I have to either turn them up to medium then back down to low or give them a gentle push to get them going.

The problem is somewhat intermittent in that occasionally they do start up on their own, but not often.

I am getting a solid 12V from the PSU so I am at a loss to explain this.

I could live with it because Antec were smart enough to put the speed controls for the rear/top fans in a good place, but I moved the 120mm fan from next to the PSU and put it in front of the upper 3.5" drive bay.
It is a real pain to have to dig out the speed switch for that fan every time I boot the system!

I would greatly appreciate any suggestions.

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Thu Apr 24, 2008 12:19 pm

Hello & welcome to SPCR,

I wonder if a capacitor could be installed to provide a startup "burst"?

hsd · Post by **hsd** » Thu Apr 24, 2008 12:41 pm

Thanks for the quick response.

Nice idea on the capacitor (and I will probably give it a try if I can't resolve the problem), but the OCD engineer in me can't help feeling that I should keep trying to identify the problem rather then just working around the symptoms.

WRF_PE · Post by **WRF_PE** » Sat Apr 26, 2008 5:24 pm

I'm having the same trouble with an Antec p182. I've noticed it is worse when I have more than one fan connected to the same 12V rail. It will start one fan, but two, no chance. Also, the PSU voltage seems to rise under this condition, 12.5 - 13V! (I'm using a 425W ENERMAX MODU82).

hsd · Post by **hsd** » Sat Apr 26, 2008 9:21 pm

Sorry to hear you are having the same trouble but also glad to hear I am not going crazy. I suspect the quality of the stock fans is not good and given they are relatively inexpensive I will probably just replace them with something better. I'm finding the case is running a little hot when I have them on low anyway so something that moves more air whilst staying quiet would probably be a good move.

I did try separating them across 12V rails (I even patched one into the spare video card connector (which is on rail 4 on its own) but with no luck.

WRF_PE · Post by **WRF_PE** » Sun Apr 27, 2008 7:35 am

I took the fans out to verify with a benchtop power supply, to rule out the Enermax PSU. I'm seeing the same results with the benchtop. Works fine with one fan, but when I put two fans together they won't start and the power supply completely loses regulation (set at constant 12V, it jumps to 12.5V with both fans running), although it only reads 0.1A (On a 5A, 30V supply). Makes me wonder about Antec's quality control, or engineering practices.

cpemma · Post by **cpemma** » Mon Apr 28, 2008 7:18 am

Try running the fans at medium/high for several hours, might loosen up the bearings a smidgeon.

lptrp · Post by **lptrp** » Sun May 04, 2008 2:42 pm

I have the exact same problem...

Im running the p182 with a Corsair 520HX PSU and a Gigabyte P35-DS3 mobo. From reading your post im glad to, I hope, realise that its not my motherborad or PSU that is at fault here. I would assume its bad quality control from Antec? Which is cool as the case was so cheap? Or wait was it?

Anyhow I have made a post about this in another forum where you can see some pictures at the end (its in swedish thou, sorry).

http://sweclockers.com/forum/showthread ... genumber=1

Have you reached any luck with the fans?

ilratman · Post by **ilratman** » Mon May 05, 2008 2:44 pm

I've two antec case, the Fusion and the P182 and I've no problems with fans.

I've connected all my 5 tricool fans on 5V an set all to medium and they spinning all the time.

At 5V and medium setting we have about 3.5V on the fans, tricool has 3.2V of starting voltage.

Have you checked your connections?

May be your voltage is low than 12V and at low setting you have less than 3.2V on fans?

My Antec P182 Case fans will not start on silent [low]

My Antec P182 Case fans will not start on silent [low]

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