Intro:
Fan noise driving you crazy? Do you have to sleep in the same
room as your PC? Well, you probably need a rheobus. While lots of 5 1/4"
rheobuses have made an appearance from many companies, it's still kind of rare
to find one that goes into a 3 1/2" bay now isn't it? Continue on as I take this
somewhat hard to find 3.5" aluminum rheobus through the hoops.
The Package:
On first glance a nice little retail package is seen. Opening
it up, we see the one page manual, the rheobus itself in bubble wrap, and a 4 pin Y
adaptor so you don't lose a Molex connector. Nice touch actually. You'll even
find four
black mounting screws. So pretty much everything you will need is included.
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| (1) The package |
(2) The rheobus package |
(3) Included items |
The Front and Back:
One of the things I noticed, was that it is made of out one
piece of aluminum. (The bezel and the sides.) The first thing I noticed however,
is the knobs, which you can see better in picture 4. They look like someone had
beaten them with a stick about 500 times! Ok, so I exaggerated, but it does detract from the
over all look of the rheobus. Note: The knobs look to be made of aluminum,
but they are really plastic. So I don't think you'll be able to do anything
about the bumps on it. There is no way with the bubble wrap packaging that the rheobus came in,
that it could have been beaten up in shipment. These do come all the way from
Taiwan... Maybe I don't know what I am
talking about. Either way, the knobs aren't terribly ugly, but this is a review.
Would you rather have had me not mention it?
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| (4) The front |
(5) The back |
(6) And even closer |
You can see the shots of the backside of the rheobus above.
And look ma, no cutting up fan wires! There are 4 pin adaptors on the rheobus!
Thank you, thank you!
Light it UP!:
A really neat feature of this rheobus is that the LED's on
the rheobus change intensity going from high to low and vice versa. At a glance
you can tell, if not hear what your fans are running. Even if you don't have a
fan hooked up to the channel, it still works in that aspect.
So how does this thing work? Well, look below. It is kind of hard
to tell from the pictures, so I'll show off my mad imaging skills and make an
animated Gif. (Picture 9) The camera wanted to take a bit more exposure than I
wanted. I'll give you some details that you probably want to know next.
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| (7) Fans at high |
(8) Fans at low |
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| (9) Animated Gif |
Details:
I'll begin this by giving you what to expect in voltage
output to your fans. With the rheobus being on it's highest setting, of course
you get the full 12 volts. With it on the lowest setting, 6.5 volts are supplied
to your fan(s). Giving your fans almost half voltage really does make a huge
difference. Below you can hear the 10 second clip of the fans running. They
start out on high, then I turn them down. I wasn't able to clean up some of that
background noise you hear, but by all means, if the mp3 was that horrible, I
wouldn't have included it. Please right click on the picture, and select Save
Target As...
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| (10) The sound file (mp3 -
104kb) |
So adding a rheobus definitely cuts down on the noise.
Your case temperatures should be a bit higher then, but are you adding a another
heater accidentally into your case? Huh? This rheobus uses a
variable resistor, so it will produce heat. I did some temperature readings. With the ambient room temperature of 24°
C, I put a
probe on the top of the rheobus. It was 33° C on the high setting. On the low
setting, it was an astounding 40° C! While having good airflow inside your case
will dissipate the heat coming from the rheobus fine, it is something to keep in
mind.
This rheobus supports up to 8 watts per channel. (A future
version will support 13 watts.) Make sure
you can look up, or know the fans wattage requirement. I put mine on a few 3 pin
Y adapters that you can also get from ADPmods in the 'Cables' section. So yes, you can put a couple fans, or
perhaps one high flow fan, on each of the 4 channels if the need arises. I can
actually hold 7 fans in my case. And I will be hooking them all up to the
rheobus. You may also want to pick up some 3 pin extension cables too. None are
included in the rheobus package. It would be pretty hard to run your fan cable
from the back of your case to the front now wouldn't it?
Summary:
While this is my first experience with a rheobus, I'm
certainly delighted. This is a good little unit. I can't say it is without
flaws, but for money, this one isn't too bad. You should really be asking
yourself, what is being able to sit by my computer without hearing whirring
worth? This product does that. Some aesthetic issues I have with the knobs are
justified, but it really doesn't detract too much from the overall look of the
rheobus. I'm thinking unless you had a very brightly lit room, you really aren't
going to notice it.
Pros:
Fits in a 3.5" bay. Unlike lots of other ones that take up a 5.25" bay.
Variable brightness to the LED's while turning up or down the fans is a nice
touch.
Inexpensive.
Will match your aluminum case.
Available in
Silver,
Black
(13 watts per channel),
or
Blue brushed aluminum.
Cons:
The fan knobs aren't quite as shiny as I would have liked to seen.
No extension cables, nor 3 pin Y adapters provided in rheobus kit.
Due to Variable Resistance instead of Pulse Width for controlling the voltages,
the rheobus creates heat.
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| "3.5 inches of fan controlling goodness!" |
Closing:
I would like to thank
ADPmods for sponsoring this rheobus for review. My dealings with them
have been great. Even if you live in the United States, or anywhere else for that
matter. If you want something,
ADPmods will probably get it to you, and at a fair cost to boot. I can see big
things coming from ADPmods in the future. Keep your eye on them. New
Products are coming in all the time...I know, I've been asking...
Update:
There is a newer sleeker version of this rheo available than
what you see here. The knobs have been improved and looks even better!
