Alphacool Announces the ES Guardian Powerfan Hub

[btarunr]

Server and industrial fans have a very high power consumption due to their enormous performance. For that reason, they can usually only be connected directly to the power supply unit, since the existing connections on the standard mainboards cannot provide the necessary power. The problem is that the function of the fans cannot be checked, monitored or controlled via the motherboard. For this, Alphacool offers a smart and efficient solution to this problem with the ES Guardian 4-Port Powerfan Hub.

The ES Guardian 4-Port Powerfan Hub is placed at the desired position in the server case, connected to the server's power supply and connected to the mainboard via PWM cable. 4 industrial fans can be supplied with sufficient power and monitored and controlled via the BIOS. If a fan is defective, an error message can be issued by the mainboard and the problem can be quickly rectified. The Guardian Powerfan Hub also has 2 CAN bus connectors, which allow additional functions when using a CAN bus controller and the associated software.



MSRP: EUR 49.99, including taxes.



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[DeathtoGnomes]

I get it targeted for enterprise/servers. 16a max is nice, but the number of fan connectors is not. Y cables will be needed to add on more than a couple fans, usually not a problem but it depends what size wire is to not melt insulation for too late of a load.

 

[Chrispy_]

I'm curious who Alphacool are marketing this towards.

Fans that require that much power really are the realm of rackmount servers and would make so much noise in a domestic environment that you'd need them to be at least a couple of rooms away with good door seals for them to not be obviously audible.

Rack server motherboards are almost always propriatary to the chassis, or at least the chassis will have a vendor-specific board with the rignt number and position of headers for each fan capable of high currents and individual fan monitoring.

If you're building your own server in a 3U case or something with a generic ATX consumer board then I guess this is a niche that could apply but how many people do that these days? The only reason I can imagine is almost dead (rackmount GPU farm for mining) and there's no point cheaping-out on the chassis and trying to jury-rig everything into a consumer ATX board when 6 or 7 GPUs worth rackmounting cost $10000+. If that's Alphacool's target market their timing is terrible!

 

[Ferrum Master]

Putting a linear vreg that debuted in 1972 in consumer device in 2022 instead of a efficient PMIC...

They are weird or amateurs...

 

[TechLurker]

It looks like it's capable of powering just 1 DELTA GFC1212DW (12V 8.2A 120x76mm behemoth) or 2, maybe 3 Nidec Servo G1238B12BBZP (12V 4.45A 120x38mm), if the 12V 12A continuous power output is split across all 4 headers and 16A is only initial start-up "burst" limit.

The bigger thing of interest to me though is if it can actually PWM control such fans, since industrial/enterprise-grade fans use a different PWM signal band than regular consumer fans (the Servo has a PWM frequency range of 500 Hz～5000 Hz).

A regular PWM controller like the Noctua NA-FC1 cannot work with them (I've tried). Sanyo Denki offers a very pricy PWM controller clearly marketed for the industrial side, while there used to be a few hybrid PWM controller-hubs that converted a PWM signal to voltage control (Phanteks' old model -01 4-fan hub was capable of PWM controlling non-PWM fans through voltage control). Lamptron, which used voltage control for many of their older controllers, originally planned for a more powerful version to their legacy CF525 5.25 Bay Fan Controller (5A per channel), as well as their legacy CP436 4-Channel PCI Slot Fan Controller (3A per channel), but that fell apart during the downturn where many tech companies died for awhile in the late 00s-early 10s.

 

[EddyAlphacool]

Since here seems to be some inconsistencies regarding the target group.....Especially this controller was developed for our direct server customers and their needs and demand to control and configure our fans on our server water cooling kits. And there the demand is extremely high for us.
The mounting is adapted to our server housings, as well as the PWM control to our server fans which are definitely controlled by PWM and not by DC. And no, the 16a is not a "burts" limit, but permanent.

 

[diatribe]

Molex... in 2022?

 

[Voodoo Rufus]

Molex... in 2022?

My thoughts as well. Couldn't use a superior Sata power cable at least? Or maybe a GPU 8pin?

 

[vvkvvkvvk]

My thoughts as well. Couldn't use a superior Sata power cable at least? Or maybe a GPU 8pin?

SATA is good only for single 72 W connection. 12 A at 12 volts exceeds this by double.

 

[ebivan]

Well, the fans in my rack run on mains power. Arent yours?

 

[Chrispy_]

SATA is good only for single 72 W connection. 12 A at 12 volts exceeds this by double.

Not even 72W.
If a SATA cable is used for 12V power like in this instance, it's limited to 1.5A per pin in the connector and there are three 12V pins in the connector, so 54W total.

The Molex power seen here can in theory handle 14A (so 168W) but I wouldn't want to put that to the test. Common sense says to assume the worst (22AWG wiring) and call it 84W max.

 

[Voodoo Rufus]

Guess people haven't seen molex melt and smoke....

 

[EddyAlphacool]

Molex... in 2022?

This is a server product, so SATA does not play a role for various reasons.