Corsair H150i Pro Buzzing Sound

Hi, is this normal? I provided videos from youtube.

No buzzing

Quiet: [ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JFDKLjBaACA[/ame]

Faint buzzing

Balanced: [ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ao-eegG73hk[/ame]

High pitched/speed buzzing

Extreme: [ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9E813MBL0eQ[/ame]

Yes, those are all normal and the tone is what I expect to hear. Quiet mode has the pump down to 1100 rpm, which is a bit low for any actual real cooling work, but as you've noticed there is no audible sound.

That sound will get progressively louder as you ramp up to 2160 rpm at balanced and 2850 at Extreme. There is no getting around this. It's a tiny mechanical device spinning at 2000+ revolutions per minute. It has to make some higher frequency noise. For most people the Balanced is just that. Not really quite loud enough to hear over quiet fans and plenty of pump pressure to cool everything. The vast majority of people can part their pump on that setting and never change it. The Extreme speed is most certainly audible, but since the gains in cooling are minimal, the only reason to use it for long pre-planned long duration max loads (rending/encoding, etc) where you also crank up the fans and may even leave the room for the 45 minutes it spends working. If you are doing quiet desktop work and the buzz from balanced is bugging you, take it down to Quiet. Just remember to put it back later before you play or do more taxing loads.

Yes, those are all normal and the tone is what I expect to hear. Quiet mode has the pump down to 1100 rpm, which is a bit low for any actual real cooling work, but as you've noticed there is no audible sound.

 

That sound will get progressively louder as you ramp up to 2160 rpm at balanced and 2850 at Extreme. There is no getting around this. It's a tiny mechanical device spinning at 2000+ revolutions per minute. It has to make some higher frequency noise. For most people the Balanced is just that. Not really quite loud enough to hear over quiet fans and plenty of pump pressure to cool everything. The vast majority of people can part their pump on that setting and never change it. The Extreme speed is most certainly audible, but since the gains in cooling are minimal, the only reason to use it for long pre-planned long duration max loads (rending/encoding, etc) where you also crank up the fans and may even leave the room for the 45 minutes it spends working. If you are doing quiet desktop work and the buzz from balanced is bugging you, take it down to Quiet. Just remember to put it back later before you play or do more taxing loads.

Thanks for your reply. So my aio is doing fine? Does it differ from other batch or is it the same? I'll try asking some of my friends who also uses H150i. I thought my pump is starting to fail, btw should I use the AIO_PUMP header or stick with CPU_FAN?

It sounds exactly like my H115i Pro (same pump). Yours might be softer. Hard to tell with recordings.

It doesn’t matter cpu fan vs AIO or W-Pump. I typically use cpu fan since it solves the boot error problem of leaving it empty and would give a bios level warning if it failed on power up. Also specifically for Asus boards, cpu and opt have some hidden behaviors that make them really hard to use as case fan controllers. If you needed it, AIO can be turned back into a chassis fan header (with some limitations) and power other fans.

It sounds exactly like my H115i Pro (same pump). Yours might be softer. Hard to tell with recordings.

 

It doesn’t matter cpu fan vs AIO or W-Pump. I typically use cpu fan since it solves the boot error problem of leaving it empty and would give a bios level warning if it failed on power up. Also specifically for Asus boards, cpu and opt have some hidden behaviors that make them really hard to use as case fan controllers. If you needed it, AIO can be turned back into a chassis fan header (with some limitations) and power other fans.

As long as my temps are fine I think it's good. Sounds are little faint when my side panel is closed.

I see, two of my friends said that theirs are silent. I guess I'll just monitor my temps for now.

Unfortunately, relative loudness is definitely an individual assessment. It should sound faint with the case closed. Clearly identifiable and loud through the case is a problem, whether the pump is up to spec or not. Proximity also plays a strong factor. When we all kept our cases tucked under a solid wood desk, you wouldn't hear a thing. Now we keep our glass cases on top of our glass desks and less than 30cm from your ear. That changes the effect substantially.

For what it's worth, I don't hear anything unusual with your pump. On maladjusted models, I can usually pick out the variance and the underling tone is different. I actually think your tone is quite good. My Extreme is another octave higher. Also, as someone running a 8700K@5GHz/1.30v, I promise you won't get even 1C improvement with the highest pump speed compared to 2160. Flow rate is not the limiting factor for the Coffee Lake CPUs.

Thanks. Can you look at this image for me? I just noticed this now, it's like a crack inside. I don't know if this is related to my issue.

https://imgur.com/a/DZgmpr6

https://imgur.com/a/F5LfjrB

https://imgur.com/a/NkiIBuc

It looks to be some sort of cosmetic defect in the plastic shell. I seriously doubt it has any impact on the performance or even the normal LED radiance. I just too a strong light to mine and there are trace amount of it as well, although not quite as symmetrical as your first picture. I cannot tell it is there without the spotlight.

If you are still within your return window with the vendor you could exchange it, however I think I might want some additional feedback from other Pro owners. It's a relatively inexpensive piece of plastic. I wonder if that effect is common to most coolers.

It looks to be some sort of cosmetic defect in the plastic shell. I seriously doubt it has any impact on the performance or even the normal LED radiance. I just too a strong light to mine and there are trace amount of it as well, although not quite as symmetrical as your first picture. I cannot tell it is there with the spotlight.

 

If you are still within your return window with the vendor you could exchange it, however I think I might want some additional feedback from other Pro owners. It's a relatively inexpensive piece of plastic. I wonder if that effect is common to most coolers.

Oh I thought it's glass. I saw another user here that posted the same problem.

I'll just return it to the vendor then, AIO is only 7 months old.

Please let me know what will the other users say. Thanks!

It looks to be some sort of cosmetic defect in the plastic shell. I seriously doubt it has any impact on the performance or even the normal LED radiance. I just too a strong light to mine and there are trace amount of it as well, although not quite as symmetrical as your first picture. I cannot tell it is there without the spotlight.

 

If you are still within your return window with the vendor you could exchange it, however I think I might want some additional feedback from other Pro owners. It's a relatively inexpensive piece of plastic. I wonder if that effect is common to most coolers.

Hi, the store replaced the cooler but I think I got a much noisy one. The sound is "drrrrrr". Is that air trapped inside?

[ame]https://youtu.be/IqbXSaBLRH8[/ame]

Static-like popping sounds often are air bubbles flitting about. You can try cycling the pump speed from low (Quiet) to high (extreme). Try low for 10 seconds, high for 20, low for 10, high for 20, etc. You get most of the benefit on the switch to high and the immediate pressure change dislodges the bubbles, but then you also don't want to be playing the pump like a yo-yo every 2 seconds.

Aside from that, I don't know what speed you're on and relative loudness is always difficult to discern with recordings. The same rules from above apply.

Static-like popping sounds often are air bubbles flitting about. You can try cycling the pump speed from low (Quiet) to high (extreme). Try low for 10 seconds, high for 20, low for 10, high for 20, etc. You get most of the benefit on the switch to high and the immediate pressure change dislodges the bubbles, but then you also don't want to be playing the pump like a yo-yo every 2 seconds.

 

Aside from that, I don't know what speed you're on and relative loudness is always difficult to discern with recordings. The same rules from above apply.

Hi! I already tried doing that and moving the radiator top and front panel. The preset is Balanced with 2,100 RPM. At first the popping sound is loud and starting to get quiet after 20 minutes of running my pc. But the current sound is not changing now after running my pc for a day(switching from extreme for like every 3 hours).

Yeah, really can't hear the whole sound but I can describe it as a case fan hitting a cable sound.