I own an Asus A8N SLI motherboard. It is a very good motherboard, especially for a gamer, and has a ton of extra slots for all things gamers need, like dual graphics cards, lots of RAM slots, and so on. It runs quite well, and I haven’t had any problems with it, until I started noticing that one of the fans was acting up. It was only occasionally, so I ignored it, and kept on using the computer.
A few months back, I flew on Southwest Airlines with my desktop computer that has this ASUS motherboard. When I reached my destination, I plugged in the computer, and started it up, and immediately noticed an awful clicking noise. I restarted it a few times, and either got an awful clicking noise from the fans, or a warning message that my fan wasn’t running fast enough on my computer. Oddly enough, when I lay my PC tower down on its side, the clicking and warning message were not present, but when I had the tower up in the normal position, they were present.
I did a little research online, and found that the problem was from the ASUS mother board heatsink fan. Apparently, this has happened to many other people, and is one issue with the ASUS motherboards of the A8N SLI type. It was suggested that I replace the motherboard fan, so I called Asus, and found out I would have to purchase a $3 fan for this motherboard. I did, and received it in the mail today.
Ok, now how do you replace a heatsink motherboard fan? That was my question, and I’m happy to report that I have figured it out. First, before we start, let me make it clear-I am not, and cannot be held responsible for any problems that may occur from this procedure. This is a do-it-yourself method, and it worked for me.
Unplug the computer, and take off the tower case. Put the tower on its side, and look at the motherboard, the back electronics layout that is the mainstay of the computer. At the bottom right hand corner, you’ll see a shiny silver fan attached to the motherboard via a wire connector, and two black plugs.
Unplug the fan from the wire connector. Then, using a pair of nonmagnetic needlnose pliers, CAREFULLY snap the black plastic holders off, thereby freeing the fan from the motherboard. I’m stressing the word careful here, because it is very important to carefully do this-you don’t want to slip and scratch your motherboard in the process. Snap each connector off, remove the broken plastic parts, and free the fan from any glue on its bottom.
Now, your motherboard needs its new fan. Careful place the new fan from Asus so that each hole on the motherboard from the black plastic attaches lines up with the new black plastic parts on the new fan. Plug the fan wire into the wire attachment port on the motherboard. Finally, using a bit of force, push the black plastic connectors into the holes the fit in, thereby seating the new fan. You’ll have to press hard enough that the pieces lock in; this took a couple of tries for me. Be careful again not to damage the motherboard as you place this in.
Put the case back on, power the computer up, and all should be good. You’ll have a new fan installed, without the racket, if everything worked right.
