OT: How to disable the lights on modern case fans

[Aryeh Friedman]

I just replaced a crashed machine with a new one (as always DIY built)
and the new one is a good replacement for a VM only host except for
one thing it has all these spinning/blinking colored lights on the
case fans (and the CPU fan). I have searched the BIOS settings to
hell and back and can't find any setting even related to this. How
do I turn the damned things off (it is making it impossible to sleep).

--
Aryeh M. Friedman, Lead Developer, http://www.PetiteCloud.org

[Steve O'Hara-Smith]

On Fri, 19 May 2023 00:56:10 -0400
Aryeh Friedman <aryeh.f...@gmail.com> wrote:

> How
> do I turn the damned things off (it is making it impossible to sleep).

Wire cutters ?

--
Steve O'Hara-Smith <st...@sohara.org>

[Aryeh Friedman]

On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 1:35 AM Steve O'Hara-Smith <st...@sohara.org> wrote:
>
> On Fri, 19 May 2023 00:56:10 -0400
> Aryeh Friedman <aryeh.f...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > How
> > do I turn the damned things off (it is making it impossible to sleep).
>
> Wire cutters ?

Sad to say the LED's seem to be powered by the same wire as the fan it
self (i.e. it is a part of the 4 pin PSU connector)

[Dan Mahoney (Ports)]

Yeah, this used to be a complicated feature that you had to add yourself, like 20 years ago, now its annoyingly common.

Like automatic transmissions.

The answer is another fan, or failing that, some black nail polish in several coats.

> On May 19, 2023, at 1:50 AM, Dan Mahoney <da...@prime.gushi.org> wrote:

> Yeah, this used to be a complicated feature that you had to add yourself, like 20 years ago, now it’s annoyingly common.
>
> Like automatic transmissions.
>
> The answer is another fan, or failing that, some black nail polish in several coats.
>
> -Dan

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 00:56 -0400, Aryeh Friedman wrote:
> (as always DIY built) [snip] How do I turn the damned things off

Hi,

you probably already know the answer. It depends and in the worst case
the answer is "You would have to go inside the fan housing and trace the
wiring".

Btw. I DIY build my PCs, too and when I bought the parts for my new PC
this year in March, I cared about the parts I bought. There are a few
pitfalls, since a lot of information isn't provided. For example, I
ensured that the firmware provides BIOS legacy mode. It does, but when I
try to enable it, it doesn't work. The culprit is the integrated GPU of
the intel CPU. It is only possible to enable legacy BIOS, when using
another GPU. This information is hard to get. The workaround is, that I
migrated from syslinux to grub and stay with UEFI. I hate grub. My new
PC case is terrible. For example, it doesn't fix in place PCIe cards at
the unscrewed end. There's no workaround for this issue. There are way
more issues with my new machine due to missing information. I don't
suffer from fans with RGB LEDs, since it's usually impossible to miss
this information. I wonder why somebody does buy fans with RGB LEDs in
the first place.

Regards,
Ralf

[Aryeh Friedman]

On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 1:59 AM Ralf Mardorf <ralf-m...@riseup.net> wrote:
> I don't
> suffer from fans with RGB LEDs, since it's usually impossible to miss
> this information. I wonder why somebody does buy fans with RGB LEDs in
> the first place.

The store (microcenter) didn't have a single case that was not an RGB
fan nor any boxed CPU's that where not also RGB fans. And since this
machine is meant to replace our main file/repo server that had a
horrible death last weekend, mail order is not an option (besides I
refuse by electronics mail order).

[Steve O'Hara-Smith]

On Fri, 19 May 2023 07:59:08 +0200
Ralf Mardorf <ralf-m...@riseup.net> wrote:

> Btw. I DIY build my PCs, too

I used to, I have pretty much switched to using 'refurbished'
ex corporate machines - they tend to be well built, practically silent,
cheap and lacking in whizz-bang graphics which I don't need.

[Ireneusz Pluta/wp.pl]

W dniu 19.05.2023 o 06:56, Aryeh Friedman pisze: How

> do I turn the damned things off (it is making it impossible to sleep).
>

use black insulating tape. If not enough, add more layers.

[Steve O'Hara-Smith]

Copper or aluminium tape is far more effective.

[Ireneusz Pluta/wp.pl]

W dniu 19.05.2023 o 08:31, Steve O'Hara-Smith pisze:

> On Fri, 19 May 2023 08:24:37 +0200
> "Ireneusz Pluta/wp.pl" <ipl...@wp.pl> wrote:
>
>> W dniu 19.05.2023 o 06:56, Aryeh Friedman pisze: How
>>> do I turn the damned things off (it is making it impossible to sleep).
>>>
>> use black insulating tape. If not enough, add more layers.
> Copper or aluminium tape is far more effective.
>

but not safe so close to the electronic stuff.

[Aryeh Friedman]

On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 2:39 AM Ireneusz Pluta/wp.pl <ipl...@wp.pl> wrote:
>
>
> W dniu 19.05.2023 o 08:31, Steve O'Hara-Smith pisze:

Besides not an option in the OP's (me) case since the led's are built
into the center cylinder of the fan and thus I would need to find some
way to snake the tape through the blades

[Ralf Mardorf]

Insulating tape doesn't stick forever, a kind of duct tape probably
does, but also does look more disgusting than insulating tape already
does. If it's not possible to open the fan housing, then I agree with
Dan Mahoney, trying black nail polish in several coats. It might not
hold, flake off, but while insulating tape that gets into the fan could
damage it, dry, flaked off nail polish will not. Should the nail polish
hold, it was also easier to apply and looks better than any kind of
tape. Related to tape or polish I can't comment on smoke or burn. I just
suspect that this isn't a risk.

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 02:48 -0400, Aryeh Friedman wrote:
> the led's are built into the center cylinder of the fan

Paint must not run between the cracks of moving parts and cause drag.
There must also be no external imbalance on moving parts due to
different thicknesses of paint application, which could lead to
vibrations in the fan. The risks are improbable, but not impossible.

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 09:27 +0200, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 02:48 -0400, Aryeh Friedman wrote:
> > the led's are built into the center cylinder of the fan
>
> Paint must not run between the cracks of moving parts and cause drag.

^^^^^^probably the wrong word, maybe
"gaps" is the correct translation. Perhaps "drag" should read "grind".

[Eduardo Morrás]

On Fri, 19 May 2023 07:31:29 +0100

Steve O'Hara-Smith <st...@sohara.org> wrote:

> On Fri, 19 May 2023 08:24:37 +0200
> "Ireneusz Pluta/wp.pl" <ipl...@wp.pl> wrote:
>
> > W dniu 19.05.2023 o 06:56, Aryeh Friedman pisze: How
> > > do I turn the damned things off (it is making it impossible to
> > > sleep).
> > >
> > use black insulating tape. If not enough, add more layers.
>
> Copper or aluminium tape is far more effective.

Use nail paint. Use a black one. A minimal layer is enough. Let it dry.


--- ---
Eduardo Morrás <emor...@yahoo.es>

[Tomek CEDRO]

On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 6:56 AM Aryeh Friedman wrote:
> I just replaced a crashed machine with a new one (as always DIY built)
> and the new one is a good replacement for a VM only host except for
> one thing it has all these spinning/blinking colored lights on the
> case fans (and the CPU fan). I have searched the BIOS settings to
> hell and back and can't find any setting even related to this. How
> do I turn the damned things off (it is making it impossible to sleep).

These "RGB" fancy pancy devices usually have some sort of "RGB
CONTROLLER" that is a separate device somewhere where cables come in
(unless it is onboard rgb controller). Follow the wires and see if
there are some sort of regulators / buttons / knobs that would allow
light control :-)

On the other hand, these lights can be used to communicate some
important events, cpu load, network load, etc, well, if its already
out there :-)

--
CeDeROM, SQ7MHZ, http://www.tomek.cedro.info

[vagabond]

Never tried this, but ...
Might drilling out the lights work? You'd have to actually destroy the
led, or at least break one of the wires / contacts.
Kind of drastic compared to nailpolish, but more permanent...

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 06:41 -0700, vagabond wrote:
> Never tried this, but ...
> Might drilling out the lights work?  You'd have to actually destroy the
> led, or at least break one of the wires / contacts.
> Kind of drastic compared to nailpolish, but more permanent...

I like this idea! If the OP has got a drill with a flexible shaft I
second your idea, _but_ there is a risk of a short circuit/leakage
current which cannot be detected with a multimeter, as the motor should
still be connected. Even worse would be an unlikely series connection of
RGB LEDs and motor or a chip expecting both LED and motor intact.

On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 15:32 +0200, Tomek CEDRO wrote:
> These "RGB" fancy pancy devices usually have some sort of "RGB
> CONTROLLER" that is a separate device somewhere where cables come in

Related to the word "usually" Google proves you wrong. Aryeh Friedman
seemingly suffers from the worst case + 1 "since the led's are built
into the center cylinder of the fan and thus" the OP "would need to find
some way to snake the tape through the blades", this wouldn't result in
good vibrations, but much likely just vibrations. There is probably a
controller inside of the fans housing, but there's nothing outside of
the fan's housing. The fans are just connected by the 3 or 4 pin power
cables.

I guess the situation is like this, Aryeh Friedman decided, before he
starts crying, since he already is aware about his worst case + 1
situation, as a last resort to send a request to this list.

The workarounds are drastic and risky. The less risky bet is probably
nail polish or replacing the fans.

I'm crying too because of my new hardware :D. We cannot rule out odd
issues when buying new hardware. It's a PITA.

[Ralf Mardorf]

Do the led's built into the center cylinder spin? Or aren't the
spinning? I hope they don't spin! I can just imagine two terrible
construction methods and one of them would be totally crap.

[Aryeh Friedman]

On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 11:00 AM Ralf Mardorf <ralf-m...@riseup.net> wrote:
>
> On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 06:41 -0700, vagabond wrote:
> > Never tried this, but ...
> > Might drilling out the lights work? You'd have to actually destroy the
> > led, or at least break one of the wires / contacts.
> > Kind of drastic compared to nailpolish, but more permanent...
>
> I like this idea! If the OP has got a drill with a flexible shaft I
> second your idea, _but_ there is a risk of a short circuit/leakage
> current which cannot be detected with a multimeter, as the motor should
> still be connected. Even worse would be an unlikely series connection of
> RGB LEDs and motor or a chip expecting both LED and motor intact.

I normally have butter fingers to the max (my wife/co-developer did
the actual physical work of putting the machine together for these
reasons and neither of us remember seeing any short of control). Her
immediate comment on the idea of drilling into it was something along
the lines of not the smartest idea and one of the dumber ideas we have
heard in a long time.

>
> On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 15:32 +0200, Tomek CEDRO wrote:
> > These "RGB" fancy pancy devices usually have some sort of "RGB
> > CONTROLLER" that is a separate device somewhere where cables come in
>
> Related to the word "usually" Google proves you wrong. Aryeh Friedman
> seemingly suffers from the worst case + 1 "since the led's are built
> into the center cylinder of the fan and thus" the OP "would need to find
> some way to snake the tape through the blades", this wouldn't result in
> good vibrations, but much likely just vibrations. There is probably a
> controller inside of the fans housing, but there's nothing outside of
> the fan's housing. The fans are just connected by the 3 or 4 pin power
> cables.

Every time I do a DIY there is also some part or an other that never
quite fits/works/etc. since for the first time in the last 15 years
(before then it was easier in general) I/we managed to do it with out
this or one of us getting cut by something sharp on the case or other
such incident I think the RGB fans are this DIY's "we should asked
about X".

>
> I guess the situation is like this, Aryeh Friedman decided, before he
> starts crying, since he already is aware about his worst case + 1
> situation, as a last resort to send a request to this list.
>
> The workarounds are drastic and risky. The less risky bet is probably
> nail polish or replacing the fans.
>
> I'm crying too because of my new hardware :D. We cannot rule out odd
> issues when buying new hardware. It's a PITA.

The most practical solution we have come with is block the view somehow

[Ralf Mardorf]

Keep in mind, each €1 shop (1$ shops probably, too) sells LED disco
bulbs. To generate light you don't have to screw it into the lamp socket
and put it under electricity. You can pick up the crap and spin them
with your hands and they will glow like bouncy balls, sneakers and other
crap do. No sliders, just dynamos/contactless impedance, no power
required just movement, kinetic energy. See all those shuffle dance
girls.

[Aryeh Friedman]

Since the edges are a little blurry I can't tell for sure but they
don't seem to be rotating.

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Fri, 2023-05-19 at 11:25 -0400, Aryeh Friedman wrote:
> Her immediate comment on the idea of drilling into it was something along
> the lines of not the smartest idea and one of the dumber ideas we have
> heard in a long time.

If she doesn't have black nail polish at hand, than probably dark read
or brown ;). Some of my former girl friends "usually" didn't polish
their nails, but still had some nail polish at hand. Let alone that we
can buy it in every supermarket. I already bought nail polish as a
temporarily replacement for LOCTITE and pantihoses as temporarily
replacements for microphones pop protection.

[Ralf Mardorf]

OT²

Instead of using the write protection sticker in the early days around
the home computer stone age, I more often tend to use a floppy disk
perforator to make a single sided floppy disk a two sided writable
floppy disk.

https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Datei:Diskettenlocher.jpg

[Olivier]

> Instead of using the write protection sticker in the early days around
> the home computer stone age, I more often tend to use a floppy disk
> perforator to make a single sided floppy disk a two sided writable
> floppy disk.

In France we used to use a tool that was designed for the tickets of
betting on horse races. it makes a nice U shape slot on the edge of the
ticker/floppy:

https://i.pinimg.com/736x/45/97/b7/4597b71ea53f9fbb768da8a3d398806f--grand-bazar-adolescence.jpg
--

[Ralf Mardorf]

:D

In order to get closer to the original concern, a friend had the idea of
​​replacing the resistors in front of the blue LEDs with higher-
impedance resistors when these were still new territory and glowed far
too brightly. On the other hand, an annoyance of my new hardware is that
the beeper connected to the motherboard is too quiet. Wherever signals
are needed, they have been abolished and replaced with useless shit that
flashes, babbles or annoys people, e.g. by loudly pretending to have a
fat combustion engine or by PC RGB LEDs on fans.

Gene Roddenberry was a prophet:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nh7gqSJq8Vg

The first guess is, that those grotesque sounds were a SiFi filme genre
stylistic device, but actually they were prophecy.

Instead of keeping something useful, like the power-on self-test
signals, for example, we omit those signals and instead get RGB LEDs
that are annoying and don't make any sense.

[Tomek CEDRO]

Well it is still possible to replace both fan and speaker right?

For $10 you will get really decent fan that will work silently for 10
years. Any type and size you need.

Speaker also can be replaced by piezo buzzer with generator and/or
adding trivial amplitier to the speaker will also do the job :-)

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Sat, 2023-05-20 at 04:46 +0200, Tomek CEDRO wrote:
> piezo buzzer

I ordered piezo buzzers. Non of those buzzers does the job. If I connect
the build in buzzer of my old computer case to the new mobo, it's loud
enough. If I connect one of the new buzzers to the old mobo, they are
loud enough, but the combination of a new buzzer and the new mobo is a
PITA. "adding trivial amplifier" isn't a sane option.

[Ralf Mardorf]

PS: I managed to get audible POST signals by using a selected buzzer,
but a

sleep 15; printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a"

is barely audible. "sleep 15" because pushing the enter-key is way, way louder than the "click" produced by printf "\a".

[Aryeh Friedman]

On Fri, May 19, 2023 at 11:23 PM Ralf Mardorf <ralf-m...@riseup.net> wrote:
>
> On Sat, 2023-05-20 at 04:57 +0200, Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> > On Sat, 2023-05-20 at 04:46 +0200, Tomek CEDRO wrote:
> > > piezo buzzer
> >
> > I ordered piezo buzzers. Non of those buzzers does the job. If I connect
> > the build in buzzer of my old computer case to the new mobo, it's loud
> > enough. If I connect one of the new buzzers to the old mobo, they are
> > loud enough, but the combination of a new buzzer and the new mobo is a
> > PITA. "adding trivial amplifier" isn't a sane option.
>
> PS: I managed to get audible POST signals by using a selected buzzer,
> but a
>
> sleep 15; printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a"

Now for the real phone pipe the output of catGPT (not chatGPT) through
the buzzer

[Tomek CEDRO]

On Sat, May 20, 2023 at 5:24 AM Ralf Mardorf wrote:
> is barely audible. "sleep 15" because pushing the enter-key is way, way louder than the "click" produced by printf "\a".

That may have to do something with spkr(4) or mixer (8) or xset(1) ?
Have you tried spkrtest(8) ? :-)

[Ralf Mardorf]

On Sat, 2023-05-20 at 13:24 +0200, Tomek CEDRO wrote:
> xset(1) ?

Hi,

the tested operating system is an Arch Linux install, since one is on my
old computer and an identical copy of this Arch Linux install is on the
new computer. On the old computer the default beep is an audible beep.
On the new computer the default beep is a very silent click. Both are
using the same settings.

However, I haven't tested xset. Thank you for the pointer. I'm doing it
now.

• rocketmouse@archlinux ~
$ xset q | grep bell
bell percent: 50 bell pitch: 400 bell duration: 100
• rocketmouse@archlinux ~
$ xset b 100 800 500
• rocketmouse@archlinux ~
$ printf "\a"
• rocketmouse@archlinux ~
$ printf "\a"
• rocketmouse@archlinux ~
$ xset q | grep bell
bell percent: 100 bell pitch: 800 bell duration: 500

• root@archlinux /home/rocketmouse
# xset q | grep bell
bell percent: 100 bell pitch: 800 bell duration: 500
• root@archlinux /home/rocketmouse
# sleep 1; printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"
• root@archlinux /home/rocketmouse
# sleep 1; printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"
• root@archlinux /home/rocketmouse
# xset b 100 400 100
• root@archlinux /home/rocketmouse
# xset q | grep bell
bell percent: 100 bell pitch: 400 bell duration: 100
• root@archlinux /home/rocketmouse
# sleep 1; printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"
• root@archlinux /home/rocketmouse
# sleep 1; printf "\a"; printf "\a"; printf "\a";printf "\a"

The room's window is open. To hear anything from the PC speaker I have
to knee down to the opened computer case. What ever I do, I only get a
way to silent click noise.

The bell signals played by grub are very silent, but still loud enough
and not just click noises. FWIW if somebody of you should ever be forced
to migrate from your favourite bootloader to grub, too. There's no need
to configure the configs that generate grub.cfg or to learn how to write
those endless cryptic menu entries. Users are still free to write a
simple and clear grub.cfg.

• rocketmouse@archlinux ~
$ head -30 /boot/grub/grub.cfg
play 1920 440 1 0 1 880 2 0 1 880 1 0 1 440 2
set timeout=60
set color_normal=light-gray/black
set color_highlight=white/light-gray
set menu_color_normal=light-gray/black
set menu_color_highlight=white/light-gray
set default="1"
insmod efi_gop

menuentry " -- HAL 9000-m1 -----------------------------------------------------------------" {
true
}

menuentry " MemTest86 V10+ Free" {
search --set=root --no-floppy --fs-uuid 3F5B-F698
chainloader /EFI/memtest86/memtestx64.efi
}

menuentry " -- Arch Linux ------------------------------------------------------------------" {
true
}

menuentry " Arch Linux threadirqs" {
search --no-floppy --set=root --label m1.archlinux
linux /boot/vmlinuz-linux root=/dev/disk/by-label/m1.archlinux ro threadirqs ibt=off ipv6.disable=1
initrd /boot/intel-ucode.img /boot/initramfs-linux.img
}

menuentry " Arch Linux" {
search --no-floppy --set=root --label m1.archlinux

Regards,
Ralf