mCubed T-Balancer Fan Controller

**Jason** · Last edited by Jason on Mon, 01 May 2006 22:49:32; edited 1 time in total

Rarely does a product emerge that is truly new and different. The T-Balancer from mCubed is exactly that. There are many ways to control the speed of fans on a computer. The most common involves some sort of a fanbus or rheostat with knobs on the front... The T-Balancer is nothing even remotely close to a fanbus. - The Review

ragzilla · Rated PG Joined: 31 Dec 2004 Posts: 1

the zener is not a temp sensor, it's most common use in a circuit like this is as a voltage regular, a zener is rated for a certain amount of reverse voltage breakdown at which point it avalanches and starts to conduct in the reverse direction as described at http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/electronic/zenereg.html#c1

the temp sensor is that LM75A IC next to the zener, manufactured by philips it's a digital temperature reader that communicates over an I2C bus (which is where the 8 device limit comes from).
http://www.semiconductors.philips.com/pip/LM75AD.html

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MagnusT · Rated PG Joined: 31 Dec 2004 Posts: 1

Integration with LCD displays works with v2.1.1 of TBAN's software Grin

I had some fun testing different variants on my own PC:

Spire · Posted: Fri, 31 Dec 2004 20:21:27 Post Subject:

Thanks for the clarification ragzilla!!!

avantime · Rated PG Joined: 01 Jan 2005 Posts: 2

In the review they said false information on other controllers

- the T-Balancer is able to take a fan from full speed to completely off, something no voltage-varying controller is able to do

I have a sunbeam 4 port rheobus fan controller (a voltage-varying controller) and can go from 0 to 12 volts...

Confused

Spire · Posted: Sun, 02 Jan 2005 00:14:58 Post Subject:

Welcome to BigBruin.com Avantime!!!

My statement is oviously wrong then. I have used 4 different rheobuses and for me at least, the fans will not stop at the lowest setting.

I should not have been so bold in saying that NO rheobus was capable of stopping a fan.

**Jason** · Posted: Sun, 02 Jan 2005 00:22:14 Post Subject:

Welcome avantime!

I have seen a few stop fans... It was the restarting part that was problematic!

Spire... You have 1 or 2 from Sunbeam getting ready for review, right? Maybe you have this type...

What model is yours avantime?

Spire · Posted: Sun, 02 Jan 2005 00:48:21 Post Subject:

Actually, what I have are all lightbusses, I checked real quick after I read avantime's post.

But I do have the one I won here, and its big brother, and another cheap plastic unit. They don't like to stop fans.

**Jason** · Posted: Sun, 02 Jan 2005 00:51:33 Post Subject:

The large silver one you got a while ago was from Sunbeam (definitely could not stop a fan)... the small one was from Noise Isolator.

This Evercool one stopped fans though... http://www.bigbruin.com/html/evercool-scpa.htm Laughing

Spire · Posted: Sun, 02 Jan 2005 00:54:31 Post Subject:

...and motherboards too!!!

I wasn't going to dig into that nightmare, but yea thats the cheap one I spoke of.