NUC11BTMI9 loud power supply fan at idle

[Alzatan]

Hello, posting my question/issue here as a new thread.
I am experiencing a loud and unexpected behaviour from the FSP power supply of my NUC 11 EXTREME. My system has a discrete gpu nVidia RTX 3080ti.
At system idle on the windows desktop the total consumption is about 70W, but the power supply fan suddenly spins up to what seems full rpm and is the only source of noise (all other fans are stopped). I am surprised by this, as it should be a very efficient unit (certification 80+ gold), and in older systems that I had with lower efficiency, the power supply fan never operated at system idle.
Can you please clarify what is the expected behaviour of the power supply fan on my NUC11BTMI9 system? Thank you

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello @Alzatan

Thank you for posting on the Intel® communities.

In order to review this further, could you please confirm the following details?

1- Is this a new system? When did you purchase the Intel® NUC?

2- Did you notice this behavior since the first day that you have the device?

3- If the "loud power supply fan" behavior is recent, was there any hardware or software change that may relate to the point when you first noticed this behavior?

4- Please elaborate more on "how loud" is the fan at idle. Perhaps you may share a video or audio file to illustrate better the behavior.

5- Run the Intel® System Support Utility (Intel® SSU) to gather more details about the system:

• Download the Intel® SSU and save the application on your computer
• Open the application, check the "Everything" checkbox, and click "Scan" to see the system and device information. The Intel® SSU defaults to the "Summary View" on the output screen following the scan. Click the menu where it says "Summary" to change to "Detailed View".
• To save your scan, click Next and click Save.
• Once you have saved the file (.txt file), please attach it to your reply.

To upload and attach a file, use the "Drag and drop here or browse files to attach" option below the response textbox.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Alzatan]

Hi Andrew,

going through your questions:

1. New System, purchased on November 2021, but essentially started using it a bit more in the last two weeks.

2. I noticed since beginning

3. No change, there is no hardware defect in the PSU fan, the noise is purely aerodynamic due to fan operation, and not due to defective bearing, blades or anything in the airflow

4. attached the a video I just made, at the 1.20 minutes mark you can hear the difference when the PSU fan goes off. System was at idle the whole time with only one Chrome window open. CPU and GPU temperatures in the 30 degrees range.

It's not obnoxious, but definitely a worse PSU fan behaviour to my previous 600W ATX PSU with "just" 80+ standard.

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello Alzatan

Thank you very much for your response and for the video.

Please allow us to review this further and we will be posting back in the thread as soon as possible.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Decca · Accepted solution]

I refer readers to my posts in Nuc 11 Extreme NUC11BTMi9 Bios issue for the reason for this issue and a possible solution.

Do these "Intel Customer Support Technician" folks really understand this system?  Why keep asking people to submit a diagnostic report via the System Support Utility when there is no fault to investigate?  This noisy fan is not a fault. It is how the system is designed.

And what exactly are they going to "review"?

[Alzatan]

Hello Decca, indeed in the end I also ended up replacing the fan with a Noctua A9-15 PWM fan, I passed the pins through the PSU air vent grid and then connected to the headers.

 Now I can control the fans directly, much better!

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello @Alzatan

Thank you for your patience in this matter.

We will send you an email to the email address associated with your profile in order to provide you with some information and options to continue working on this request.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello Alzatan

We are glad to know that you were able to find a solution for this scenario and we would like to thank you for all the feedback you provided via private email and here in the thread.

Since the thread has been marked as "Solved" we will proceed to close it now. If you need any additional information, please submit a new question as this thread will no longer be monitored.

It has been a pleasure to assist you.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician