can anyone help me figure out what this is?
 

What we are supposed to be looking at is the little triangular black thing to the right of the pwr fan header. It's supposed to be square, but the corner popped off 1 day and I'm not exactly sure how.

The pwr fan no longer works. And since there is 1 of those next to almost every other fan header I figure that is the cause.

Does that thing have any other purpose though? The board works fine except it has a cold bug and dual channel doesn't seem to work with long term LN2.

Anyways I need to know because I have to sell some stuff and don't want to be selling junk.

Thanks for reading :thumbsup:

Its a MOSFET

Controls the power to the fan header.

I was hoping that was all it was.

I forgot to mention it's the CHIV.

Yuck. How did it break off?

Also could you get me the numbers off of one of the good ones? I would be interested in seeing the maximum wattage it supports :)

I try to NEVER hook fan headers to the mobo, dunno if its my luck or not but seems like them stupid fan headers kill mobos faster than a -192c 2.ovolt Overclock does.

Interesting Kal, ty.

One day, IIRC, I was unplugging the fan maybe from a weird angle and it just popped off of there. I don't see how I physically touched it, but I know that was what I was doing when it popped off. I see no signs of electrical burn there. It was weird.

The#
F90
P02
DCA0018

Fact. I don't use them either. Most headers will only support 1/2 an amp for fans even though most manufacturers say they're good for 1 amp. I've killed too many good boards because of this. I make it a point to hook all fans directly to the PSU or a controller now.

From now on I'll not hook them to the board. How many volts do regular fans need?

12 for full speed. Some will run under 5V though. Usually the ones that run very low still need a higher startup voltage.

Most fans will fall into the .15-.25 A range. with beefier ones hitting .25-.6

Then of course you have the "never designed for a PC" Fans that people like to strap to heatsinks and stuff the Amperage can really shoot up on them :)

I use a little 400w psu I cannibalized out of my old dell for fan duties. Don't plug anything into the motherboard headers anymore.