How to: Overcome fan whine (X220 and others)

Just want to share my method to overcome the whine from the X220's fan. It causes my ears to ring, so something had to be done. This would also work for other laptops.

Here are the steps for Windows 7. The concept is explained below.

1. Download and install TrueRTA (free, find through Google).
2. Run TrueRTA.
3. Click volume icon on task bar and select Mixer.
4. Set speakers volume to 100, TrueRTA to 10.
5. Switch to TrueRTA.
5. Menu: Audio I/O > CPU Speed Setting > 1 (safest)
6. Select Pink N button on left side.
7. Select On/Off.
8. Adjust TrueRTA volume in Windows mixer as desired.

The purpose is to flood the acoustic space in front of the laptop with pink noise. In the case of the X220, the high pitch from the fan ranges from 2 kHz to 5 kHz depending on its speed, and most laptop speakers are good at reproducing sound in this range. So by playing pink noise, we are destructively interfering with the tonal sound from the fan. (This is similar to the way cheap noise-cancelling headphones work.)

You could also try white or red noise, but I was most familiar with TrueRTA's noise generator when writing this.

I know this isn't ideal and won't work in a lot of situations, but in a quiet room it is better than being exposed to an unchecked whining fan. Hope this helps somebody.

 

... you can also try altering the fan profile with TPFanControl?

 

Sounds like setting off a bomb to put out a fire.

 

Esser Audio makes a decent noise generator too, and it has a high/low/bandpass filter.

White noise is often used for ambient acoustics. This is not very much different. Actually, I'm finding that white noise works out well in this situation too. As for tpfancontrol, if I wanted to run an 8x multiplier all the time, then I would. But I don't.

 

Making noise to cover up other noise isn't ideal, but thanks for the post anyways. I only hear it when I'm doing something intensive. I'm still looking to get the fan replaced at a later date.

 

Sent mine in to get the fan whine fixed about a month ago. For whatever reason they replaced the motherboard and fan, which took care of the whine. The shipping is free and overnighted and only took like a week total to send and get it back.

 

That is good to hear. Definitely have to use my onsite pretty soon. That was really my only complaint with the computer. Everything else is perfect. I just can't use it at libraries or any other populated quite places ha.

So even when it is highly stressed and ramped up you can't hear the whine? That is good news if so. That is really the only time I hear it anymore.

 

Exactly! Why run the fan more than necessary, and then run another program to cover up the noise?

TPFanControl does the job.