power supply fan: how important

Well, I asked this question in the arcade section, but that place seems to be dead. I cut the wire to my power supply fan because it was making a real annoying noise. I only play this cab for an hour at a time. Will I be alright, or should I replace the fan and all that? How long is too long without a fan? Thanks,

Spike Spiegel said:

Well, I asked this question in the arcade section, but that place seems to be dead. I cut the wire to my power supply fan because it was making a real annoying noise. I only play this cab for an hour at a time. Will I be alright, or should I replace the fan and all that? How long is too long without a fan? Thanks,

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I really don't know how long "long is too long without a fan"..but IMO I'd replace it since it's there for a reason..
Better safe then sorry..

You may be able to lubricate that fan and make it work again..

True, but how long before one gets too hot? Honestly, these suckers are on for hours and hours and hours. What's one hour without it?

I won't say not to replace it because if something happened I would not have wanted to be the one who said not to..
But:

Curious,is the Fan in the Power Supply..... or Connected to the wood in the cab itself.?.......A seperate fan..

My Big Red and Neo Gold have Fans in the Power Supplies..If these go I will replace them.
The Klax mini cab has no fan in it though It did have one as I can see..
I have a fan for it that I'm going to install(only because I have the fan and the cab is not well ventilated)..The power supply in that cab is fanless..

The Tekken 3 has no fan and I'm not putting on in it because it has a lot of ventilation..(..The power supply in that cab is fanless)

The Candy Cab however has a spot in the back for a fan so I took advantage of that and installed one that blows the air out..
That cab never felt warm inside but this fan really keeps it cool..

My Big red after and hour gets warm inside and I'm glad that it has a blowing out fan in the power supply.
At one time I had a big Fan inside that cab cooling it down because I was in fear something would heat up and blow out..(A nervous noob).

I'd say if your not leaving the cab on for long and the Fan is not in the Power suppy then you may be ok..

If you’re running it for an hour or so at a time there will be no problem without the fan connected imho, if you are running it all day like in an arcade, then it may be a different story. There are other factors like ambient temp also to be taken into account and other vents in the cab.
Many cab fans I’ve seen are pretty inefficiently placed anyway.

After running for a while check the psu casing to see if its getting real hot, you will probably feel or smell something wrong if overheating is likely to be a problem.
Hot particle board has a nice reminiscent sweet smell however isolation transformer winding insulation melting does not

The noisy fan maybe just a rumbly bearing, have you tried a squirt of WD40 in there ?

anything with electricity running through it without a fan usually means things will get hot after a while.

It's summer time I wouldn't tempt the fate. If for any reason you're playing more than the usual time and the PSU burn, you'll feel weird to have cut the fan just for the noise.

Try to lubrificate it instead to make less noise.

buy a computer case fan or a computer powersupply with Silent fans. and then you wont hear half as much noise.

Spike Spiegel said:

Will I be alright, or should I replace the fan and all that? How long is too long without a fan? Thanks,

Click to expand...

Order a new fan and play the cab for limited periods untill it arrives. You can then sleep easy after its fitted, whether it really needs it or not, a cab can never be too cool