Schrodinger's Broken (fans)

[MC.Morrado]

My STGAubron (chinesium garbage) PC has been used heavily for gaming, almost a year actually, and the fans are gradually starting to sound like a diesel engine when I put my ear up against the top of it. I can faintly hear the diesel engine noises across the room when everything else is silent and the fans are spun up, and while playing anything that spins up the fans like Dying Light.

 

Sometimes I hit the PC or aggressively tap two fingers on it until the noises temporarily stop. regardless of all the unpleasant noises and now diesel engine sounds coming from the fans, they somehow just keep working in spite of being chinesium. It's gotten to a state that I'd like to call "Schrödinger's Broken" where the fans sound like they are about die and make unpleasant noises from time to time but somehow they don't slow down and keep working.... Somehow.

 

Any explanations for these strange noises? Advice maybe?

[manikyath]

broken bearings. time for some fans that arent garbage.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Sometimes putting lube in them can help, but generally the fans aren't designed to be fixed, and cheap enough that if they have issues just toss them.

[Skiiwee29]

<-- moved to troubleshooting -->

[CasualExtremist]

Epic title for the topic BTW. 

 

I have a laptop cooling pad that I converted to be a side panel for a tower PC. It is literally going on like 10 years of active use. the first 6-8 years were for a laptop, then I got bored and taped it to the tower. If it ever stops (power outage), startup is some intense screeching, but you can toggle power and hit it enough to get it to act right and then it'll go for another indefinite amount of years.

 

I say all that to advise that you definitely look into new fans, but just know if the noise doesn't bother you and they still blow air, they could potentially do that for years and years before actually dying and needing replacing. Depends on how cheap you want to be and if you really want to risk thermal damage of your hardware.

[CasualExtremist]

It just dawned on me that you could also potentially extend what ever life they have left in them by configuring the fan controls to always be running (even when pc is powered down). I think that is the secret sauce to the fans in my laptop cooling pad still being alive. "Objects in motion tend to stay in motion" or something like that. Which is why it is now powered through my UPS backup to ensure they just keep going no matter what.