Arch Linux

dger

Member

Registered: 2010-07-25

Posts: 4

High GPU fan speed before starting X

The GPU fan speed on my desktop is very high during the boot process and remains high until I start X.

I have an Nvidia card and use the proprietary driver.

Has anyone else had this issue? Perhaps there's something I need to add to rc.conf to fix it?

craw

Member

Registered: 2005-01-06

Posts: 29

Re: High GPU fan speed before starting X

Hi,

the fan's speed is controlled by software, and can thus be configured from your X-Server. This behaviour should be absolutely normal (same thing appears when booting Windows).
nvidia-settings should enable you to configure stuff like this, and afair there is a great section on configuration of nvidia cards on the wiki.

Please correct if I am wrong at some point.

muffinss

Member

From: united states

Registered: 2011-02-07

Posts: 54

Re: High GPU fan speed before starting X

This is normal. The reason why the fan doesn't slow down until X starts is because Nvidia driver doesn't kick in until X starts. Due to this, the fan is set to automatically run at its max speed if no driver is present controlling the card. This is to help prevent overheating.

Last edited by muffinss (2011-03-10 01:57:56)

dger

Member

Registered: 2010-07-25

Posts: 4

Re: High GPU fan speed before starting X

Thanks for the responses. It makes sense that the fan runs at max speed before the driver is loaded.

I was wondering if there was some way to load it without starting X, but maybe there's not.

bluepumpkin

Member

Registered: 2009-08-28

Posts: 58

Re: High GPU fan speed before starting X

Thanks for the responses. It makes sense that the fan runs at max speed before the driver is loaded.

I was wondering if there was some way to load it without starting X, but maybe there's not.

This is a shot in the dark, as I've never tried this before, but what happens when you do:

modprobe nvidia

before X starts?