Auto-control your fan speeds - SpeedFan

Firstly, you need to know about this useful little program called SpeedFan here. A search on Google or Yahoo will give better and more detailed reviews and guides, so I won't include those.

However, a lot of users do not know how to make this automatic, from turning on at startup and reducing the fan speed, to increasing the fan speed when things get too hot and reducing it thereafter. This guide is to cover this. With everything properly set, SpeedFan is far better than most fan controllers out there, and, best of all, it's free.

So here we go. Firstly, set SpeedFan to run at startup by placing its shortcut in the Startup folder in the Start Menu.



This is what you would see if you run SpeedFan without applying any settings, minus the info messages that you see on first run.

...except the speeds should both be 40% by default, and there will be much more and incomprehensible temperature readings. Depending on your mainboard, many of these will be meaningless, and you will only be interested in Core, Ambient, either one or two of Remote 1/2/3 or 4/5/6/7/8..., and HD0/HD1/HD2...

And actually there is a problem - on some systems, if a temperature of e.g. 127 or -128 (or 0 or 255) degrees celcius is detected by SpeedFan, even if it has no meaning and/or isn't connected to anywhere, the system will shut down in a minute or a few seconds, so act fast to remove the problematic readings.

You see the Speeds, but you're not going to touch them, since they will be automated after SpeedFan is configured. However, you must check Automatic Fan Speed for the speed to change automatically. It's useful to have that option so accessible, since sometimes you'll want the full or no power for overclocking/silent operation.

To configure SpeedFan, click the, erm, Configure button.



You see various temperatures and their sub-menus, which are Speed01 and Speed02. If you tick a temperature, it shows up on SpeedFan. If you tick the Speed in the sub menu, it means if that temperature is too high it will affect the speed. You can choose one or more or nil temperature to be affecting a certain speed.

When you click on a temperature, you can set the desired and warning temperatures. Plus whether it shows up in the system tray or is logged.

Your fan speeds will be at the minimum value if all related temperatures are below desired, will ramp up to the maximum value when between desired and warning, and go to 100% at warning temperature. Take note of how this works, and choose your temperatures wisely.



Next tab, Speeds, if you click on a speed, you see the minimum and maximum values they will be at. Plus whether to make it automatically varied.

The use of minimum and maximum values has just been explained earlier.



Since we're making it start on startup, it would be nice to start SpeedFan minimized so that it does not pop up and bug you. It is also nice to minimize on close since it's human nature to click close and for the case of SpeedFan, it really will close if the minimize on close option isn't checked.

Delta value for fan speeds - this allows how precise you can set your fan speed and also affects how fast the fan speed changes automatically. Lower values means a slower change.



This Advanced tab is interesting, as advanced settings usually are. You can select the monitoring chip and change it's settings. In this case I'm showing my CPU, which gives the Core reading. Are we seeing something something interesting here? Temperature offset! Good for calibrating the sensor so that the temperature is accurate.

For the mainboard H/M (hardware monitoring) block, sometimes you can even choose which sensor to use for the different Remote readings.


Update 14/08/2011 -

 

I noticed on this mobo that the PWM mode is defaulted to SmartGuardian, which when selected will not follow SpeedFan's settings. Software controlled needs to be selected.

Now, some explanations on the terms/logos:

Flame on the temperature means too hot (above warning), and all fans will be set to 100%
Red on the temperature means getting hot or a temperature increase. Affected fans will be set to maximum value
A green tick means temperatures are ok and stablized. Fan speeds will be minimum if this temperature is around or below desired temperature
A blue tick means temperatures are way below desired or decreasing. No problem here. Fan speeds will be at minimum

Core usually means the reading from the sensor inside the CPU, which will give the same reading as CoreTemp or other such programs that read this temperature
Remote1 usually means mainboard CPU temperature sensor, while Remote2 is northbridge/ambient temperature, although sometimes their roles shuffle around. I even had a Remote3 as CPU before. To know which is the CPU, just do a Prime95 and see which rises.

HD0 = first HDD, HD1 = 2nd HDD etc. Tends to be accurate because HDD temperatures are taken from S.M.A.R.T. i.e. the sensor system on your HDDs, there's no chance for non-standardized mobos to screw things up.

Speed01 and Speed02 - while this depends on your mainboard and where you plugged the fans to, so far my experience is that Speed02 is usually the CPU fan while Speed01 is the system/power fan or no effect. Again, to know which is which, just test. *Hint - CPU fan is always the fastest (and noisiest)

There you go. Enjoy your automatic speed control. :)

This blog's been useless lately...?

I noticed the deviation of this blog from the original informative guide blog to a normal blog. Not good.

To make up for it, I'll be posting a guide on how to use SpeedFan such that it's fully automated and blends into the background. Stay tuned!

Anime Music on a Hi-Fi system, How's That?

I'm going to use this as my sub-title. Just to make a statement. Plus, I do listen to Anime music on a Hi-Fi (recently considered to be one after upgrades) system. In fact, I've been listening to Anime music since 2002.

Anime music actually benifits much more from having a good sound system than other pop music genres, because of its complexity. The abusive use of high notes and complex beats (which my brother hates a lot) coupled with lots of chords makes the songs very damanding on the speakers (and ears). And this complexity is exactly what I like about it. The melody may be simple, well, used to be, but there still are simple ones, but the chord progression and syncopation can get very complex. Complexity combined with simpleness, sweet, the direct opposite of Mendo-pop.

I suddenly had this thought when listening to Da Capo II ~Asaki Yumemishi-kun to~ by yozuca. Because after the recent cable upgrade some of the high notes are finally clear. So it occurred to me that Anime music actually requires a good system for optimal enjoyment. The fact that I'm noticing lots of improvement each upgrade for this genre as opposed to the other genres (apart from Classical or Neo-classical and related) already says something.

Yea, I've always been proud of this genre. Because it's technically superior and the composers/arrangers are all god-like creatures that received proper music education and can do any genre you ask. True Anime music don't come with the popular/"popular" mainstream series's btw, they come from non-mainstream shows, games (hentai or otherwise), doujin works, written by people dedicated to writing Anime-style music for true supporters of the series. There are lots more good Anime songs out there than I/you might possibly know, just waiting to be discovered.

So stand out and be proud instead of being embarrassed/having an inferiority complex. There's nothing wrong in listening to Anime music. Stand up tall and shout "I LISTEN TO ANIME MUSIC BECAUSE I LIKE IT!!!".

P.S. Mizuki Nana pwnzors lots of singers out there, even though she started out as a seiyuu (voice actress). And I've Sound pwnz the world as the best music group that's also a production group, in both singing and songwriting. And similarly they started out working for *ahem* products. Can you see the potential that lies beneath the *ahem*?

Belden 1694A

Reason for getting this: I was nearby SLT and I wanted a cable upgrade from that flimsy-looking stock coax cable.

Reason for chosing this: It's like the whole world is saying that this is THE cable for digital coax cable, else at least it's value for money by a lot.

If others are using this on their Citypulse and higher I see no reason I can't use it on my Zhaolu. Oh yea, because it's only a Zhaolu and I'm feeding it with an Audigy. Hey, cables are meant to be overkilled so you feel good, because they're cheap yet affect the sound quality.

The moment I mentioned 1694A, the folks at LHS seem to know this guy pretty well too, and also offered me the common "standard" Canare connectors. Sweet, because I didn't know what connectors to use.

After checking online, turns out those were THE connectors to use too. Famous and true 75ohm, with good quality albeit duller-looking gold for the connectors and the ground part with multiple plates bending outwards to ensure good contact with the jack. Boy I should have upgraded the crap connectors on the Zhaolu.

Crimping was very fast, and it cost me $18.50.

I didn't really expect to spend much. But $18.50 isn't much. Especially when this is said to be better than the overpriced craps selling almost a hundred.

But all this performance (or price/performance ratio) comes at a price

Firstly, a high-performance coaxial cable => thick. It is thicker than the smaller gauge speaker cables out there. It sure is hard to bend. I'm lucky I bought 1.5m instead of exactly 1m because otherwise it wouldn't reach because of the bending.

Secondly, it looks plain ugly. The external have some words like blah blah high performance video cable 3ghz 1694A blah blah. If you didn't know this cable it would look like either some crap or some industrial shytz.
And the Canare connectors, yes they are THE connectors to use, but they are at least 5cm in length. And the color part is so freaking big. I got black, and if I'd gotten any other color it would look damn GAY.
In comparison, Kaichin has lots of cool-looking echoloft-DIY-type ones at $3.50 and less. For a while I thought that I should've chosen those instead. But the Canare connectors are still THE connectors.

So yea it does look ugly. But it looks like it does have lots of performance. Lets see how much it has.

I didn't expect much of an audible difference with this upgrade, at most subtle improvments in the highs, especially the extension, because it's the stock cable's weakness which I already know of.

But, the moment I plugged it in, I immediately noticed a big difference. The sound is so much cleaner like wow. Especially obvious in Shining Stars Bless. I didn't know some of the high notes reverb and is sustained for so long. Or is supposed to, because I couldn't hear them in the first place. Then switching to Reflectia, I'm getting back the correct high-frequency response, plus more.

And in general:
Soundstage seems to have increased... but I say seems to have because I'm not sure, because:
The instruments at the extreme sides are more pronounced => louder and more obvious
At any rate, I'm definitely hearing more "air", as in the "fake sounds" that's part of the recording.
But this increased "air" (what is it actually called anyway?) also sounds smoother at the same time.
Percussions are slightly more powerful now - bass is tight and puncy (although at most half the improvement I saw with the Zhaolu mod) and the cymbals and hi-hats strike with the nasty sound of hitting and ends off smoothly.
There is reduced cracking at high frequencies.
Because of better and cleaner highs performance I can hear more of the instruments' "noise" as they hit to make the sound. Like guitar, hi-hats, piano etc. (That's the "And more" in Reflectia)

And there's something interesting about the bass: It extended by 1/2 to 3/4 of a note, and the bass notes are now more pronounced also. But because of this, now instead of pure bass beats I'm also hearing the bass guitar together with it (for songs that do that of course). So it feels a bit wierd now, but I know it's good, since for that song (Megumeru ~cuckoo mix 2007~) I know it's meant to be that way, because it's half bass only and half bass + bass guitar next to each other to get that feeling.

That also means i can hear seperation between the bass beat and bass notes, as I later realized hearing other songs. Neat. That means I can now study bass notes better and hence compose better.

Lastly, one more song to add to the list that I'll always use for audio comparisons - sky ~version 2008~ by fripside. Reason for this song is because it is badly recorded and hence induces ear fatigue. A good system should reduce that (by introducing less noise and harsh into the system). And indeed now it's less strenuous to the ears.

Verdict:
This is supposed to be one of the best cables (and connectors) and there's no need for me to tell you that it's good. I'm just looking at how much the improvement it would bring to my setup. And for this amount of improvement, $18.50 is a steal. And I haven't even upgraded my analogue interconnects yet.

Small Zhaolu D2.5 mods... removed

I removed the jumper wires on the output caps because I found that they make the sound too harsh and overpowering. Sure it seems more dynamic and the highs are much more clear, but it's hurting my ears and I don't want that. Furthermore I didn't like the sound signature.

Removing it I confirmed and missed the much tighter bass and more realistic instruments it gave, but it's a tradeoff.

Apparently I'm not the only one that hates the sound of the DAC with the output caps jumpered:
http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=77992&perpage=25&pagenumber=10

Well, my LM4562 are going to arrive, that should solve the problem with the highs, although I don't know if it will give the punchiness that jumpering the caps give. Well, at least the LM4562 should give it more air and soundstage instead of destroying it. And it is a highly recommended upgrade by many so...

Plus, the reason I chose LM4562 instead of AD or BB is because of the price - $6.90 each, $13.80 for 2. If I bought $12 or $18 chips I'd be spending ~$30 or more on this DAC, which is stupid considering the price I paid for this. Even though OPA2107 with jumpered output caps would've been the best combination.

Another reason for removing the wires (along with mod 4) was to leave the product as professional as it was instead of being defiled by me. But there's always still the feeling that I've left some cosmetic imperfections, like specks of Blu-Tack, a bit of burn marks (from poor wire contact), rounded the screws a little trying to remove the PCB... I'm just me, a perfectionist at the wrong time and places.

Because of the above, I'm definitely not going for the electrical destruction by the pro in the link above. Seems like if I carried it out it would do more harm than good. Plus the LM4562 seems to make the most significant improvement anyway.

So, the only mod I'm going to give it is the LM4562. Not a very nice "mod" although it does give significant sonic change, but still not good to pass it off as a "modded" product at the next DAC shoot-out. Especially when it's going to go against it's modded cousin, a Zero. Maybe I should give them the option to hear it with or without the jumper cables (although Lm4562 + jumping would give horrible results).

But... it does sound really dark and lifeless now... Like when you adjust the tonal control... wait... doesn't jumpering the capacitors remove the capacitance, and doesn't capacitance affect the tone? Now it all makes sense now. Except jumpering the caps have the advantage of cleaner sound, but the designers definitely put it there for a reason, and that reason is not DC offset, else they would've skipped it and get better sound at the same time.
The highs are also softer, disappearing, and slightly distorted now, as it originally was. Stupid Burr-Brown, stupid lousy cables and system.

Small Zhaolu D2.5 mods...

I was bored and couldn't wait for the LM4562s to arrive, so I took apart my Zhaolu ahead of time and proceeded with some small mods:

Here is the list of mods to be done:

1. Fixing grounding issues
2. SPDIF transformer coil
3. Shorting output caps
4. Staples on crystal (lol...)
5. Disconnecting the headphone amp
6. LM4562/OPA2107/2132/2134
6a. AD823
7. Belden 1694A
7a. Belden 89207/89259

Without purchasing any extra material, I proceeded with 3 and 4.

I didn't want to resort to soldering, because that is irreversible (well.. semi), leaves and ugly mess, and I do not have a good soldering iron.

So an idea struck me and come a fixer's best friend: The Blu-Tack

Although it is called Blu-Tack, mine is white in color.

Why Blu-Tack? It is elastic and hence has more holding strength than silicone and tape. Furthermore, it's very to clean up and leaves no trace whatsoever.

But, without using solder, there's the problem of bad connection. How will that affect? I'll find out soon.

So, about half of my remaining 15cm or so of Belden 16AWG is sacrificed for this job. Boy they are tough to bend, real thick solid copper strands.

I also used the Blu-Tacks to surround the clock crystal with a bunker of staples. That should give it a bit of shielding. Shouldn't have any negative effects.

And the first thing I did after opening the casing was to disconnect the headphone amp. It is supposed to make the power supply cleaner, but I did it also because it was heating up in the system.

The immediate audible effect: Treble is... I dunno... more harsh but at the same time more clear with more details, but somehow I can feel that more notes are missing, and the instruments sound smoothed-out. Either my bad connection has killed the high frequencies, or it is a combination of the bad effects of the OPA2604's poor quality and typical Burr-Brown laid-back sound, and the poor high-frequency performance of my subwoofer + speakers setup. Perhaps the soon-to-come LM4562 and amp + speaker upgrade will solve the problem.

Another thing is that there are a few more instruments at the highs that can now be heard. That is an improvement I hope, at the expense of lowered smoothness, soundstage (air?) and high harsh, yet somehow it feels a tad more natural. Why the soundstage is reduced beats me.

EDIT: I realize why it sounds more natural yet has less air. It's less warm now, and the instruments are right where they should be. In short, it's more accurate, but I think I prefer the warmer, more spacious, laid-back sound. Have I reached my max in audio detail enjoyment? and focusing on the sound signature that I like instead.

Another distinct and good improvement is the lows response. The bass is more punchy, and it extended downwards by half a note more. The bass drum now sounds more like a real-life bass drum. These are expected improvements from shorting out the output caps.

Overall it has more goods than bads but I'm not used to the sound. After a while I'll get used to it and there's no turning back, as usual. The instruments definitely sound more real. Though I'd love it if the soundstage didn't become smaller.

But the bass... this is reminding of the Belden cables, but this case it's more punchy than mid-bass heavy. How, my subwoofer dial is already at 3/10 and too much deep bass is bad for my tinnitus.

I also wanted to fix the grounding issues while I'm at it, but couldn't find out where exactly to connect the wires, so had to abandon that for now. Else it would've been a small improvement without negative side effects. I know there will be an audible improvement coz the standoff-to-standoff through the chassis resistence is very significant. It was 1ohm or 0.1ohm, can't remember, but those are high values nonetheless.