Alienware 17 R4 OC vs Stock Fan Profile

For those of you who owns a 6820HK or 7820HK system, as soon as you head to BIOS and enable OC, the fans will spin at 2300-2500RPM at idle regardless of cool the cpu/gpu temperature. Even if you dont change the multipliers etc, as long as OC is enabled, the fans will always spin. this is quite annoying..

But if you diable OC in BIOS, let it run on stock, the fans hardly turn on at idle, making the system a lot more quiet.

When im not stressing the system, like casual web browsing or listening to music, i would very much prefer the laptop fans to be silent or in OFF state at low cpu/gpu temperatures. It's not only more pleasant to the ears, it's also helping to prolong the life of the fans, not to mention keeping the heatsink and fans cleaner without constantly drawing dust in.

So my question is, is there anyway for us to enable OC in BIOS and still let the fans run at stock behaviour?

 

Yes what BIOS do you have?

I doubt the fan speeds are linked directly to whether the OC profile in BIOS is enabled it will be temperature dependant and it just so happens for your unit on that BIOS that the fan speeds threshold changes between non OC to OC profile (where the temps are low enough to have fan speed low on non OC but high enough to trigger it to a faster speed when OC is enabled).

So therefore you have a few options:

* change BIOS to a later version which generally has better fan profiles (from my experience)
* repaste laptop (if not already done to reduce temps so lower fan profiles are enabled
* override fan profiles in Windows using hwinfo with custom created fan profiles

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- i have the latest BIOS installed.
- i have done repaste and my temps are good. the fans are spinning @ 2300-2500RPM even at idle, where cpu temps is around 30C
- dont really like overriding fan profile using hwinfo unless there's no choice

Pete, try in on your unit. in BIOS, enable OC, then let your laptop sit idle in windows, doing nothing, cpu temps hover around 30C, see if your fan is running or OFF then you'll understand what im saying

 

Is Fan Performance mode enabled or not?

 

no, i never switch on fan performance mode. it will be annoying as hell if i switch that on.

 

Most users reported good fan profile for 1.0.8 bios. Maybe something is using CPU in background that's why temps shoot up during light browsing session.

 

the fans are constant at 2300RPM. if you have the same system, try it yourself and you will understand what im saying

 

I don't own 17 r4 but an older AW 15 r2. Do you use HWInfo with EC sensor turned off?

 

updated to the latest 1.0.14 BIOS. As soon as CPU performance mode is enabled in BIOS (Fan performance mode disabled), Fans are still spinning @ 2300-2500RPM at idle, cpu temps 30C+ in windows. Turn off CPU performance mode (which defeats the purpose of getting a HK CPU), the fans are completely OFF at the same idle and CPU temperature state.

Man, at this rate, those HK CPU owners who enable OC, the fans are continiously running, reducing the life span and drawing in dust that can clog up the heatsink all the time, not to mention the laptop is not completely quiet when it's idling.

 

I have HK processor and performance mode enabled in fact I'm browsing web, playing videos and OC'd to 4GHz on BIOS 1.0.14 and my fans are never past 1200 rpm

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but it's always spinning isn't it? even at under 30C, it's still spinning. try switching off your cpu performance mode in BIOS and the fans will not spin at all at the same temperature and desktop condition.

 

What happens if you try to set a custom fan curve in the hwinfo64 sensors? I am not sure if it can shut them off entirely but it seems like it can at least turn them down to 500rpm which should be near inaudible.

Edit: nevermind, it was already suggested. I guess the only recourse is to ask Alienware if this is how they intended the fans to operate while overclocked.

 

Yes exactly, when CPU performance mode is enabled, the fans will always spin regardless of how cool the CPU/GPU at idle state are. This is really unnecessary, it's bringing dust which can clog fans and heatsink over time, and it's noisier than it needs to be

 

The noise was a pretty big issue last night for me. I brought the 17R4 to a meeting but ended up having to disable performance mode in the bios to get the fans to calm down so everyone could hear themselves talk over the computer.

I tried taking control of the fans in HWInfo64 and even that didn't work. They simply spun back up to ~2500rpm after a second.

 

glad im not the only one experiencing this ïssue" and yes it is very annoying the fans will continuously spin at 2300-2500RPM as long as CPU performance mode is turned on in BIOS, regardless of how cool at idle the CPU temps are. this happens to both Skylake and Kabylake

 

Are you sure? I'm gunna double check this because often I look at hwinfo where the fan rpm is and its blank until I start a game or something. How long does it take from booting up cold for your fans to start spinning whist just leaving the laptop alone?

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As long as CPU performance is enabled in BIOS, the fans ramp up to 2300RPM constantly. dont even need to wait. if your fans are not spinning while idle and cool, your cpu performance is not enabled in BIOS

 

What did you use to overclock it Pete? Just bios oc profiles?

 

Hi there !

I confirm that when in CPU perf mode (regardless the level of OC), fans are at 2400-2500 rpm even when idling. I'm on the latest BIOS but what I can tell is EVERY BIOS beyond 1.0.9 (included) will give me a +10°C on the PCH and will get higher temps on my SSDs too.

 

Have you tried resetting the bios, save then test? Then try oc again.

 

have u tried it?

 

If you reset, and the fan coolers persist at 100% then there is a fault. If there isn't, then try tweaking it with a single change. Or you could call dell

 

The concern is having fans at 2500+ rpm while temps barely go above 35-36°C (not that I really mind, i'm more concerned about my boiling PCH...).
When the CPU performance mode is disabled, I get low rpm (around 1000) and even 0. However overall temp increases as the system is less cooled.

I've resetted numerous times while up and down-grading BIOS (as you need to disable CPU perf mode before doing anything) and it changes nothing.

 

Are you saying your fans are 2500rpm permanently? Because if so you system has fan performance set to high/on etc, if it's intermittent, then it's either bios or hardware.

The only setting in the bios I had an issue with was the fan performance. It wasn't connected to cpu OC. Resetting it / or again setting it to default set it to auto performance.

What system do you have?

You could reset you mboard - reset the bios again, then remove all power (brick&battery), leave it for a couple of minutes.

 

i dont think you understand what we are talking about. For 6820HK or 7820HK laptops, as soon as you enable cpu performance / OC mode in BIOS, the fans will never stop spinning. even at a cool 30+C system idle state, the fans will continue to spin at 1800-2300rpm. that creates unnecessary noise, wear and tear and dust build up. If you disable cpu performance mode, the fans will completely stop at the same idle temperature, even up to almost 50C.

 

So it isn't continously at 100%, rather over compensating for cpu & gpu. There is/was a known issue with enabling the fan performance in bios, enabling it resulted in permanent 100% fan output.

I've always ran my systems in OC mode 3, and never notice the issue of over compensating fan speed when not necessary.. and that's for r3 6820hk/980, r4 6820hk/1070 & 7820hk/1080 however I mostly use my amp. I did see analysis where a guy identified the heat-sinks for cpu/gpu coverage for alienware r4 are badly designed due to not covering each enough causing some cores to work more than others and causing unnecessary heat issues. Maybe that's what your talking about..

 

No it was a combination of bios, xtu and throttlestop

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you have to turn on the CPU performance mode to unlock the TDP, I tried to do it via only XTU, it is still locked to 45W even though i set to 100W. A workaround is to use hwinfo to set fan to 500rpm when idle or just light usage, and turn back to system auto when gaming

 

If you have Optimus, you have to turn it on. Because the dGpu is turned off, there is no need to cool HW except the cpu.

 

AW let's the 7820 HK run stock 4.2 on all cores. Do you underclocked your cpu, not overclocked. Overclocked is 4.3 Ghz. On all cores. Stock profile level 3 is already 4.2 all cores, so 4.0 on all cores cannot be an overclock.

 

7820HK stock is 3.9GHz single core and 3.6GHz 4 core

 

Yes but AW factory OC's it. Just like how the 8950HK has a boost to 5Ghz (although on one core) none of the other manufacturers have it.

But you're still greeted with it when selecting the i9 when you're ordering.