Today we have the MaxZero from NesteQ. This is an 8 channel fan controller which slots into a standard optical drive bay. As well as being able to control the fans it also includes a temperature monitor which allows you to measure temperatures of 4 areas in your case.
What’s in the Box?
The fan controller itself with all of the power cables, fan connectors and temperature probes attached. (The controller is powered by 1 molex connector).
4 Screws for mounting the fan controller in the drive bay.
The manual.
Watch the Unboxing video here:
This is a good bundle including all that you will need to get up and running without having to buy any extras, apart from the fans of course. This will support all but the most extreme air cooling with more than 8 fans, not including those attached to your motherboard.
The main use of a fan controller is to keep your computer quiet while doing non-intensive tasks such as web browsing, being able to quickly monitor the temperature and the rate at which the fans are spinning.
The Fan controller has three buttons on the front and is fairly simple to use. It has a nice, large display showing the 4 temperatures and the rotations per minute of all 8 fans. The aesthetically pleasing design is a great positive and also is very functional. Actually changing the fan speed requires you to scroll through all of the fans and could be a little quicker, but still takes only about 10 seconds. You adjust the fans speeds in the pairs and cannot set the individual speed of each fan.
The fan controller also features an alarm system notifying you if your fan speeds are causing a high temperature which could potentially damage your components. You have the option to turn this alarm on and off.
The negative of this fan controller is that its connecting cables are not modular. This means even if you do not have 8 fans to connect you still have tidy the extra cables away. The cables are also yellow and red making them quite visible, which is not what you want when you are trying to achieve a case with good cable management. If the leads had been in black it would have been asy to disguise them.
The fan controller has a 0dba mode in which it slows down the fans so they are inaudible. This is a fantastic feature for the particularly sound-conscious among us. It also allows you to crank your airflow up to full when trying to achieve maximum performance and results in a benchmark or overclocking situation.
In conclusion, this fan controller looks great and performs fantastically. It is ready to go out of the box and really helps you tame the noise of your fans. The only problem is its non-modular cables, but if this is not an issue to you I can highly recommend this controller.
