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  • MacPro fast fans with SSD

    J
    J

    Hi,

    SSD advice request!!

    I use an 8 core MacPro early 2008 8 core with 32GB - I know not the latest but holding out for the promised upgrade.

    I have been using 4 HDD SATA 3 drives in Raid pairs (JBOD) attached via a Sonnet Tempo SATA E4P for VSL streaming. The library is split across the 2 pairs of drives. I used the default pre-load setting.

    Performance was excellent apart from long load times.

    I've now put a couple of 500GB Samsung 830s directly in the Mac and reduce the preload to 3172. It occassionally glitched so I increase first to 4096 and now 8192. Its running fine but I notice that although the CPU meters in Activity monitor are about the same as before, if not lower, the MacPro's fan is ramping up much more when I play my Logic sessions.

    I realise both drives are now on the internal SATA bus (3Gbs) whereas the HDD were via PCI/SATA card but I wouldn't have thought this would cause the increase in fan speed.

    I'm thinking of getting the new Sonnet Tempo SSD pro card which will allow me to mount two SSD drives and not saturate the internal SATA bus.

    Any advice welcomed particularly any guesses as to why the fans should be working so much more.

    Thanks

    Julian
  • Cyril BlancC
    Cyril BlancC

    look at my configuration in my signature !
  • J
    J

    Hi Cyril,

    i know what hardware is out there but was just looking for some answers to my questions!

    Thanks

    Julian
  • Cyril BlancC
    Cyril BlancC

    this configuration is great. No fan problem !  on a raid 0 of 4 x ssd reading over 700 MB/s

    What are your questions ?
  • P
    P

    Hello Julian. 

    I can't address your specific fan issues relative to SSD's, but you may find the following helpful, along with a short-term solution.

    We have similar if not identical computers. Mine is a Early 2008 Mac Pro eight-core running at 2.8 (you did not mention your computer's speed). Presently I have 16 GB of memory. 

    Recently I had some RAM failures running at 18 GB. That knocked me to 8 GB. I ordered 8 new GB from 4allmemory. They arrived without any heat spreaders on the DIMMs. (Those are the big black fins that clip on. Some call them "Tonka" DIMMs.) Anyway, when running larger orchestrations, my Mac Pro began to howl. I assumed it was overheating memory.

    So I ordered another 8 GB from Crucial, which does have the heat spreaders. I still get the fan acceleration. It's better, but not as quiet as it had been before the DIMM failures.  

    Then I bought an SSD from Crucial, the M4 512 GB. I had hoped that it would quiet down my rig. I can't tell if it helped, which means it probably didn't. 

    What can we conclude? That Julian and Plowman are wrangling whatever time and power they might from aging computers, holding out for new Mac Pros. 

    Listen, there is some freeware on the market called SMCfancontrol. Just search it; it's all over the web. When I can't stand the fan anymore, I launch the program. It says it will not allow you to slow the fan beyond Apple guidelines. SMCfancontrol could be a patch fix to help you buy some time.

    If you get any concrete answers, i hope you share them. I didn't want to pay for tech support with Apple, as they would likely roll the blame onto the third-party memory. And, for me at least, it does seem to be a memory-related issue. 
  • Cyril BlancC
    Cyril BlancC
    last edited
    last edited

    @plowman said:

    So I ordered another 8 GB from Crucial, which does have the heat spreaders. I still get the fan acceleration. It's better, but not as quiet as it had been before the DIMM failures.  

    Did you clean the inside of your Mac ?

    Remove all your RAM and just put the original Ram and see if you still have this issue 

    Look if there is not an  Apple recall program for your Macpro for this problem

    there are a lot of people having your problem ! look at :

    http://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/13514/mac-pro-fan-makes-constant-noise-why

    look at this : https://selfsolve.apple.com/GetWarranty.do

    If you have an Apple store nearby show your Mac to a Genius 

    It is not a good idea to change the fan speed you may burn your CPU
  • J
    J

    Hi Plowman, Cyril,

    My MacPro has been absolutely solid and it seems to perform better than it should given it's age. It is the 3.2 2x Quad core (8 core) with the GForce 8800 option graphics.

    The fan has always ramped up gradually (never howling) during processor intensive tasks - like off line bouncing in Logic.

    However I replaced the Raid HHD drives that carry the VSL library with SSDs  and since then the same session that I was working on before the swap causes more fan activity than before - the only variable being the SSD swap.

    I suspect it is down to the SATA busses being saturated - I was using HDD's as a 2 disc raid on the internal for Boot drive and as 2 pairs of 2 discs raids on an external SATA 3gbs card. So the load is spread.

    The new discs I've got (x4) are the Samsung 830's 512GB which are rated at 520MB/s faster even than the OWC 6Gs Ibelieve. Of course these will only negotiate at 3G with my current set up.

    So I guess to get the best results I'm thinking of using drive 1 on internal Sata for my boot. Drive 2 as VSL A on an external SATA card and drive 3 as VSL B on a Sonnet Tempo SSD pro which is a 6G SATA/PCI disc mounting card. I can also use the 4th disc on this unit for sessions. Currently as a first install I've just got 2 SSD drives on the internal.

    I'm not certain that this will stop the fan ramping though as it may be speeding up due to the greater I/Os that are being processed rather than the data bottlenecks.

    What I would like to know is people's experiences in what pre-load cache works best for them.

    Thanks

    Julian
  • Cyril BlancC
    Cyril BlancC

    I will revert back to be sure that is the PCI bus that is saturated !

    your solution may be to buy the Same Rocket raid card I have ! it has 4 Sata III out
  • P
    P

    Thanks much, Cyril. I carefully read all the links. 

    Heretofore, directions to clean the fans for better performance reminded me of a Dilbert cartoon I have quoted before. In a computer manual, Dilbert reads, "Always defrag your hard drives to give you a false sense of hope." I put the act of trashing Logic's preferences in the same category. 

    BUT. Prompted by these links, I disassembled my Mac Pro today, pulled both front and back fans out and hand-cleaned each blade with alcohol pads. Then I hit the CPU heat-sinks with compressed air. 

    And the verdict is, it actually helped. What was once 2300 RPM has come down to about 1200 RPM. It's still noticeable and not welcome, but it is not that "something's really wrong here" howl. It's more like what Julian described, a slow and reasonable (if unwelcomed) ramp of the fans under increased loads. 

    My 8800 GT died this past winter. I took it apart and applied fresh thermal paste. It came back to life, only to really die in the summer. Poof. The computer was on one minute -- I didn't even touch it -- and it just stopped. I couldn't reboot. 

    That fan was always problematic for me. It would pulse, which is even worse than a steady roar. 

    I replaced the 8800 with a second ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT 256 MB. They have their own fans too. One whirs annoyingly when I use Screen Share. But as a rule, they have behaved better than the NVIDEA. I know, I'm sure they don't have the firepower for big gaming. Don't care. Just give me more screens with that fabulous shade of VSL blue. 

    Cyril, I can't do that memory swap and check for a couple of reasons. A. that memory failed -- the original 2 GB from Apple (most of which comes from Crucial, I'm told) -- so I can't use it as a diagnostic. I get RAM errors on start-up when it's installed (the blinking white power light). And B. the fans behave no matter which memory I use on small loads. It's only when I cross the 8 GB threshold that things seem to get touchy. 

    None of this helps Julian. Thanks for letting me hitch-hike on the thread. 

    I was never happy to slow the fans with a third-party software. But in some sessions, you have to choose your battles. 
  • Cyril BlancC
    Cyril BlancC
    last edited
    last edited

    @plowman said:

    I was never happy to slow the fans with a third-party software. But in some sessions, you have to choose your battles. 

    All your troubles could come of that ; as the components of your Mac Pro has suffer of this

    You can move your Macpro out of the room or buy a cabinet to put it !