NZXT GRID+ Fan Controller
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2015-05-07
·
1,428 words · ~7 min read
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the Jazz mini phone and tablet stand from Cooler Master is now available in a
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variety of cool colors from these great retailers click now to learn more the
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original grid from ncxt alleviated cable management and fan power headaches by
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allowing users to plug all of their fans into a single Molex connector the issue
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with it is that it only splits 12v power
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rather than allowing the fans to be controlled so the only way to run it
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anything other than full speed is to figure out a highquality inline fan
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controller solution or rewire the connector to 7 volts or 5 volts so
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that's where the grid plus comes in it costs double or triple depending on the
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retailer you shop at for the same 30 wat power limit but it adds DC fan control
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to the capability of the original grid through nxt's cam software which is
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available for your PC or smartphone although why you'd ever need to control
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your fan speed from an iPhone is far beyond the capabilities of my very
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obviously too small brain to comprehend anyway physically it's a fan controller
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so there's not a lot to say it's got a white top power LED six side mounted
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three pin fan headers and a slight plastic overhang so you don't have to
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stare at the wires even though the included ones are thankfully all black
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it's got a USB input and a power jack and included in the box you'll get a
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micro USB to internal header as well as
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a MOX 2 power cable for for the ports that I just mentioned you'll also get
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five zip ties a 3M dual lock Square for
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stealthy mounting and two fan extension SL y cables that allow a four pin and a
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three- pin fan to be connected to a single power port at the same time which
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demonstrates NZXT is aware that some folks plug four pin pwm fans into three
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pin sources and use DC control on them which raises the question NZXT why
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didn't you address my original complaint about the grid and make them all four
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pin this this time anyway and off stalling for time here let's cut to Luke
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to tell you guys exactly how it works so setting up the unit is fairly simple you
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plug in the USB cable you plug in the Molex power you plug in all your fans
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but then you need the software so I went to NZ xt's website and clicked on the
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downloads button under the grid Plus's product page and it brought me to a
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download section of wallpapers not cam software what anyways
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you can go to the cam section of their page and download it there because it
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works for all of your devices I guess they didn't decide to have it under the
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download section of individual devices but I would like to maybe see that in
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the future next up is fan curves they have a few default ones like performance
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or silent and they also have manual where you can kind of just set
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everything to a very specific speed that it will always run at or like I expect
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most of you to use they have a custom curve and setting up the custom curve is
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actually pretty nice whenever you plot a point along the graph and you try to
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move it it's very clear as as to what you're moving it to you know exactly
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what percentages you're running at and that's nice because I've seen with fan
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software in the past you're kind of guessing like uh I think that lines up
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with whatever percentage that might be and you're not really sure so it's actually kind of nice how clear it is
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that being said it goes in increments of 5% so if you're trying to be extremely
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specific about something the smallest number you can get down to is an
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increment of five another thing to note about the fan curves is that the ramping
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is not smooth so it will jump from point to point so if you're setting up a
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custom curve and you want your fans to slowly increase in speed you're going to
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want to set a lot of points along the graph so it has a lot of bumps like a
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lot of different increments that it's going to go up as it speeds up instead
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of having one point and then another point which is much higher because it
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won't change until the temperature hits to that much higher point and then it will change the entire way up it will
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not smoothly change to that speed just something to note if you're setting it
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up on your own another thing that caught my eye was a switch where you can change
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whether or not you're monitoring your CPU temperature or your GPU temperature
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temper I thought when I first saw this due to it being a fan controller that
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the custom graph or whatever speed ramping graph you have for your fans
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would reflect the temperature that you're currently monitoring so CPU or
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GPU so you can position your fans differently around the case that is not
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the case at which point I don't really understand why it's a switch and why
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they didn't just have both of them being monitored at all points in time the fan
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info on the right side of the software is very clean and very easy to read I
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liked that a lot you can see all of your fans at all points in time you can see
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what voltage they're running at what speed they're running at it's it's nice
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I would actually really like to have this on my um radiator testing station
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so that I can make sure all my fans are running properly all the time I do that
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anyways but it's just slightly more of a laborous process I personally am waiting
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to see something as featur rich as a tea balancer but then as aesthetically
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awesome as the cam software that's running on these because T balancer
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software is not awesome at all speaking
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of whatever it is Luke was just talking about I have no idea I scripted this
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before he did his thing so uh Intel is going to be at nerdhq which is starting
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today July the 24th they have some awesome promotions going on during the
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event this year with a couple of their Hardware partners and Operation Smile
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first up at newegg.com from July 24th to 28th you can get 25 bucks off select
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Acer products with offer code nerd hq2 and second up you can save 50 bucks off
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select ASUS products with offer code nerd HQ 50 so head over to the bitly
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link below to see the list of qualifying products now discounts are great but
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free is even better right if you tweet ad Intel USA that's their Twitter handle
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during the event and tell them why nerd HQ and ComicCon make you smile and
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include # Intel nerd scene in your Tweet
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you'll be entered in a drot in an Intel Core i7 processor but wait there's more
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for every tweet that ad Intel USA receives with # Intel nerd scene they
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will donate $1 to operate smile up to a
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maximum of $5,000 so guys get on Twitter
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and enter in the draw to win an awesome Intel processor and help Intel support a
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great cause for full terms and conditions check out the link in the video description all right guys thanks
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for watching this video about the NZXT grid plus like the video if you liked it
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dislike it if you disliked it leave a comment if you have something to say and
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as always check out the support us Link in the video description you can buy a sweet t-shirt you can give us a monthly
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contribution to help us make videos like this and then I'm sure there's a last
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Kickback whenever you buy hair gel or
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sure that's hair gel whatever peace