I bought this to extend my ever growing need of space (all of my photographs are shot in RAW). Right now it’s housing 2x3tb connected over eSATA to my B3 (small home server). The first thing that struck me when I turned on the ICY BOX was how incredibly loud it was. I’m very sensitive to sound and noise, so I couldn’t possibly live with that kind of monster in my living room. So I decided to replace the fan.
Thankfully, RaidSonic (ICY BOX designer/manufacturer) has made this very easy:
- You simply remove the fan, it’s a 2 pin connector (don’t ask me).  And then you…
- Buy a silent fan. I picked up the Noctua R-8, which is incredibly silent.
- Most fans that you can buy come with a 3 pin or 4 pin connector. This might scare you, but in this case it doesn’t matter.
- Splice the cables, and use the connector from the previous fan. Be sure to check and remember which cable goes where. In my case, the yellow was the red. Twine the new fan’s cable with the old one. Put some tape around the naked metal.
- Insert new fan. Make sure that no cable end up close to the fans blade.
- Tidy up.
- Done!
For me, I would have returned the ICY BOX if I had been unable to fix the noise. Thankfully it worked out, and now the HDD’s sounds more than the ICY BOX fan. One thing that I learned from this was how analog fans are. It’s just a small electric motor, and because of this, their cables are really simple. Just like a speaker cable.
Hi
Thank you for the info
I live in Norway and got this unit today, and i must say that fan is noisy even on the lowest settings.
Going to order a new fan to replace the old noisy one.
Your post helps me to get this done more easy.
Thanks! I was having a lot of trouble living with the noise of the fan, so I bought the unit you recommend and it’s unbelievably silent. 14 euros on Amazon. Not only that, but now that I’ve changed the fan, the unit is powering down correctly in Sync mode, which it wasn’t doing before. I note that the Noctua notice says it supports this feature, which makes me think that the cheap Chinese fan that came installed doesn’t. So all good and thanks for your posting!
Thanks for the nice guide, Im thinking of buying that 80mm fan you suggested. Can you guys confirm that the 3 manual fan speed settings works as before but more silent with the new fan? and will the original black fan cover still fit at the back after the fan is changed?
The cover will not fit with this particular fan, it will look like in the final picture. Not sure about the fan speeds, but I’ll test when I get home!
Hi again, Got this fan today SilenX 80x80x15mm – 11dBA – 18CFM iXtrema Pro Fan. The 15mm should make it possible to attach the original black fan-cover back on. I will try it soon and get back with the results. Robin have you tested if the 3 manual fan speeds works yet?
EDIT: It does work.
I’ll probably buy this box myself in a couple of days, and it need to be as quiet as possible since Im going to be sitting right next to it. Therefore I’ll most likely replace the fan if it is as loud as you say. Will this procedure break the warranty?
I guess it does, but you should ask the shop. Maybe they could switch it for you?
I think Im gonna buy myself a Noctua RF-R8, make a 3pin->2pin connector of one of the cables that`s included in the package (I have some cables to spare with 2pin connector) and mount it. Then, if I should be so unfortunate that the box breaks down within the warranty period, I`ll just change the Noctua with the original fan before I send it back.
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Thanks for the tutorial. However, I still have a question: How did you fix the fan? The original screws (and the screw thread) are much smaller than normal fan screws?
[…] couple of excellent articles (by Pavel Rojtberg and Robin Jakobsson) that show how to remove the stock fan and replace with a newer, silent one, I decided to take a […]
Hey Robin, I know the article is a few years old now, but I’m at the very same stage of replacing the fan of my rb-3640su3. I want to warn about cutting and twisting the wires together , for there are brilliant adapter cables for 3 pin to 2 pin. Just search for “video card fan adapter” and you’ll find seomething like this: http://i.imgur.com/rR6a345.jpg
The solution is much cleaner and more safe to the electronics! Also buy a non-PWM fan. The original fan is powered directly by different voltages (also PWM I think), so you don’t need a fan that is capable of PWM itself. I bought a Noctua NF-A8 FLX, the R8 is discontinued. Just waiting for my adapter cable (around $2)
Great, thanks alot for providing insight on this. Very helpful! My unit is currently offline as I await a new NAS, but I’ll make the suggested changes when I’ll use it again.
Did the same thing but used a BeQuiet fan. Since the screws and the cover do not fit I secured those in place with black duct tape 😉 It was quite a hassle finding the correct cables since they were all black in my case … but i finally did it thank you so much for the article!