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Left fan connector came off motherboard, can I hardwire?
Well, finally got my backlight problem solved, it turned out to be the left I/O board.
When I was removing the left fan, the connector came loose from the logic board, and I tried to resolder, but it was simply not possible with my iron and skills.
Can I hardwire the fan? I really don't mind if it runs at full speed all the time, I just want it to cool.
The computer runs fine with the fan disconnected, but I have a feeling that long term, it would not be good to only run the right fan, since the GPU is all the way over on the left.
What would be a good source of power and ground to tap into to hardwire the fan?
Edited by: machead3, mayer, and pollytintop ( ) , machead3 ( )
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Well, after trying repeatedly to resolder the connector, without success, I ended up just soldering the fan leads directly to the motherboard, er "logic board"
I know that this isn't the ideal way, and will make for more work if I have to replace the fan, but the machine is working perfectly fine, at last. I am happy to report that I am posting this from my resurrected A1260.
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Yes, I just soldered the wires to the line of dots on the board.
In all honesty, I only soldered the two on the left, and the last one on the right. IIRC, the leads were 12v, ground, tach, and control, respectively. Since the space was so tight, I assumed I could leave the tach wire off and the fan would work as designed.
As a result, the left fan runs at pretty high speed all the time now. Other than a bit of added fan noise, it is not an issue, and the machine is actually a lot cooler as a result. Some might be bothered by this, but I was just so thrilled to have the machine back up and running, I just left it alone. I may go back and complete that 3rd connection eventually, just to get the fan to calm down a little at low load, but it really isn't a big deal to me. My previous machine was about this loud all the time, so it isn't anything that I am not used to.
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remacberli
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Where do you want to hardwire it to? If you don't have the soldering skills to reattach the socket try to ask somebody else. It's really not that difficult and would be the better solution.
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Good to hear that worked!
I have a very similar problem on my A1211. The socket for the right fan broke to bits. Did you just solder the four wires into the four little dots of solder in a row where the socket used to be? Is that all that was needed? It seemed to me there are two other little solder dots at the other end of the socket, and I was concerned it might be some kind of grounding.
Have you tested it with, say, FanControl to make sure it's running?
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is this something a newbie could do? i just replaced the thermal compound on my late-2007 santa rosa black macbook, hoping to help the fan out since it sounded like it was about to lift off the ground and fly into space, but instead i ended up breaking off the soldered fan connector from the logic board.
i've done a few mac fixes (using ifixit guides, like replacing a topcase on a macbook pro, etc) and feel fairly comfortable with computers but i've never soldered anything. it looks like it shouldn't be difficult - there are four dots on the connector and four on the logic board - they just need to be connected again via soldering, right? i guess i'll need a very teeny tip on the soldering iron but other than that, is there something i should look out for?
i would take my computer to a professional but i live in bolivia and there are very few apple repair people here and they'll charge me a ton so if it's at all possible for me to do myself...
thanks very much for any help with this! my computer runs ok but the fan is definitely not working. :(
Edited by: andreahull ( )
