Why configure fan speed control?

Fan control can bring various benefits to your system, such as quieter working system and power saving by completely stopping fans on low CPU load.

Warning:Configuring or completely stopping fans on high system load might result in permanently damaged hardware.

Things needed to be installed

• i8kutils is the main package to control fan speed. Additionally, you might want to install these:
• acpi — must be installed to use i8kmon.
• tcl — must be installed in order to run i8kmon as a background service (using the--daemon option).
• tk — must be installed together with tcl to run as X11 desktop applet.
• dell-bios-fan-control-git— recommended if your BIOS overrides fan control.

Installation

Step 1: Install git

sudo pacman -S git

Step 2: Install i8kutils package

Download package

git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/i8kutils.git

Change directory to the package folder

cd i8kutils

Install package

makepkg -si

Step 3: Install acpi

sudo pacman -S acpi

Step 4: Install tcl

sudo pacman -S tcl

Step 5: Install tk

sudo pacman -S tk

Step 6: Install dell-bios-fan-control-git

Change directory to previous

cd ..

Download package

git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/dell-bios-fan-control-git.git

Change directory to the package folder

cd dell-bios-fan-control-git

Install package

 makepkg -si

Configuration

The temperature points at which the fan changes speed can be adjusted in the same configuration file. Only three fans speeds are supported (high, low, and off). Look for a section similar to the following:

set config(0)  {{0 0}  -1  55  -1  55}
set config(1)  {{1 1}  45  75  45  75}
set config(2)  {{2 2}  65 128  65 128}

This example starts the fan at low speed when the CPU temperature reaches 55 °C, switching to high speed at 75 °C. The fan will switch back to low speed once the temperature drops to 65 °C, and turns off completely at 45 °C.

Tip: If when running i8kmon with the verbose option you notice that the state changes (example of an output: # (57>=55), state=1, low=45, high=75) but right and left fans report state 0, you might consider changing the speed value of the first state in the configuration file from default 1000 to 2000 or higher.

BIOS overriding fan control

Some newer laptops have BIOS fan control in place which will override the OS level fan control. To test if this the case, run i8kmon with verbose mode in a command line, make sure the CPU is idle, then see if the fan is turned off or turned down accordingly.

If the BIOS fan control is in place, you can try using dell-bios-fan-control-git:

Warning: Turning off BIOS fan control could result in damage to your hardware. Make sure you have i8kmon properly set up beforehand, or leave the CPU idle while you test this program.

To enable BIOS fan control:

dell-bios-fan-control 1

To disable BIOS fan control:

dell-bios-fan-control 0