Those who take cooling seriously—but haven't yet gone the liquid-cooling route—have probably installed quite a few fans in their cases. But if you're one of those people, are you sure that all those fans are properly keeping your components at safe operating temperatures? Or are you just so paranoid that you feel compelled to check that everything inside your case is cool and collected? If either of these traits is part of your personality,NZXT's Sentry LXE ($59.95 list) fan controller might be what you're looking for.
Simply put, the Sentry LXE is a two-piece system that lets you monitor the temperature of up to five components and adjust the speed of up to five fans, all using an external touch-screen unit. The device couldn't be easier to set up and use, but a few niggling little annoyances keep it from being a flawless addition to your high-end PC.
Hardware and Configuration
You'll need to crack open your case to set up your Sentry LXE, but that's about the hardest part of the installation process. Just pop the included battery into the temperature controller, then install that in any free expansion slot. (Whether it's PCI or any version of PCIe doesn't matter—you're not plugging it in, just securing it in the vertical space above the slot.)
You'll need to crack open your case to set up your Sentry LXE, but that's about the hardest part of the installation process. Just pop the included battery into the temperature controller, then install that in any free expansion slot. (Whether it's PCI or any version of PCIe doesn't matter—you're not plugging it in, just securing it in the vertical space above the slot.)
Tape any of the five temperature probes onto the components you want to monitor, then hook up your three-pin fans to the five connectors extending from the card. Plug the controller's four-pinMolex connector into an appropriate cable from your PSU, and then the provided eight-pin cable from the back of the temperature controller to the back of the touch screen. Turn your computer on, and you're in business.
The external touch screen, which measures 4.25 by 6.6 by 2.3 (HWD) inches, displays the five fans and temperatures as well as the current time and date. You can press one of the numbers to select that channel to modify the temperature alarm, or switch between Celsius and Fahrenheit readings on the display. To change the date or time, press the button corresponding to the value you want to change (such as the day or the hour) and cycle to the proper number with the "+" and "-" buttons. The display is certainly intuitive; you'll get the hang of what you're doing after just a minute or two (which is good, because aside from general installation instructions, the included documentation is on the skimpy side).
You have two methods of controlling the fan speed using the Sentry LXE, both of which can be selected from the touch screen. "Auto" mode sets the fans to 50 percent, and will adjust all the fans' speeds as the temperature increases. In "Manual" mode, you can set the fans' speeds to any value from 30 to 100 percent.
If you want to be warned when the temperature reaches a certain level, you can set an alarm to alert you that you're entering the danger zone. Just press the appropriate number to display a temperature value, then use the "+" and "-" keys again to adjust it to whatever temperature you want. (The default is 70 degrees Celsius.) Fan speed is adjusted in basically the same way, using the "RPM" readings on the right side of the display.
If you don't want to look at all the data on the screen, you can push the virtual "power" button in the lower-left corner to turn off the display, though the device and the fans will keep running. (The Sentry LXE only completely shuts down when you power off your computer.)
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