KRONOS Fan Information

Bertotti · Post by **Bertotti** » Sun Mar 31, 2013 2:27 pm

Sadly today was the first time I have had a chance to fire the Kronos up in two weeks. I travel a lot for work. Anyway now my fan is louder them my old or new Mac book pro. As loud or louder then a couple QSC K10 speakers turned on and sitting in my room. Irritating and now I do t have the money to spend on shipping. So I will live with it, for now. I should have waited for the prophet 12. As cool as this board is now I have issues I was hopeful to avoid. I am disappointed to say the least. I do know I can rectify it it but won't void my warranty.

BobTheDog · Post by **BobTheDog** » Sun Mar 31, 2013 2:41 pm

Surely if it is a warranty problem Korg should pay for shipping?

Bertotti · Post by **Bertotti** » Sun Mar 31, 2013 3:31 pm

We will see. I had decided to return it but sweetwater won't accept a return without original packaging and my wife decided to throw all that out while I was on the road so now I am stuck. And Pissed. Truly I dont think going through Korg will help anything, I'm not convinced it does anything but waste time counting on their replacement fan since it will be the same fan that is in my x61. I don't want to good my warranty but Inwas going to make some wood ends to replace the plastic ones so I might just peek at it to see if anything came ajar.

I might be overreacting a bit but Inwent from virtually silent to being able to hear it when I walk into the room, and that irritates me to no end. For now I will to us on the good qualities and use headphones, which also irritates me because it reminds me I have to wear them be ause of the fan noise and not because I want to. I need to go back through this thread now and see how and what has been done to fix this with the best track record of success.

Bertotti · Post by **Bertotti** » Mon Apr 01, 2013 7:40 pm

Good news a korg repair facility is just 14 miles from me. I just might give them a chance. I'm a tech and I have a tech friend who works there. We will see.

edit to add. I dropped it off and it could be up to a couple weeks. We discussed this and I can come get it when I want if I get disgusted with the wait.

I had been wondering how a big online reseller could tell me they hadn't had any fan issues with Kronos and only one keybed issue ever returned for work. Now I know. They found me the local shop. They apparently always suggest a local service center that way we as consumers don't have to pay shipping and they as the seller don't have to fight over who is going to pay for shipping. I imagine a lot of issues never get back to these guys simply for that reason.

Bertotti · Post by **Bertotti** » Mon Apr 01, 2013 11:33 pm

Retailer offered to pay shipping and replace it with a new unit. They think since there is no service bulletin that that is the best route. I don't mind getting it fixed. What do you all think?

JonSolo · Post by **JonSolo** » Mon Apr 01, 2013 11:37 pm

Replaced is good.

You have a tech friend who works at a Korg center and you were worried?

Hope it works for you.

Bertotti · Post by **Bertotti** » Thu Apr 04, 2013 4:42 pm

New board arrived was actually a bit louder. My original is x61 sn 101xxx range the replacement was x61 sn 100xxx range.

Now I give up I will fix it myself. Does anyone have any problems with the Noctua NF-A6x25 FLX (60x25mm Premium Fan) http://www.nonctua.at mentioned a page or two back? I think I will find one of these and put it in. Maybe make my wood ends while I am at it. Thanks Bertotti

BobTheDog · Post by **BobTheDog** » Thu Apr 04, 2013 5:09 pm

I sent mine back to have its fan replaced and they replaced it with an even nosier one so you may have the right idea!

Petro · Post by **Petro** » Mon May 27, 2013 7:02 pm

Bertotti wrote:New board arrived was actually a bit louder. My original is x61 sn 101xxx range the replacement was x61 sn 100xxx range.

Now I give up I will fix it myself. Does anyone have any problems with the Noctua NF-A6x25 FLX (60x25mm Premium Fan) http://www.nonctua.at mentioned a page or two back? I think I will find one of these and put it in. Maybe make my wood ends while I am at it. Thanks Bertotti

I just finished replacing the original with that Noctua NF-A6x25 advised above on my X73.
Great result! It is quiet, almost absolutely! The wonderfull trick of the Noctua - it won't sound louder when you connect it by any part to the synth body or its place.
The original X-Fan is also quiet while you hold it in air, but as soon as you just touch it to any surface it will start resonating.
I used all 3 original screws for the new fan and place the old one near by duck tape.

The Noctua provides two lower speed adapters (pieces of connectors), I used the faster one (RC-10 2400 rpm) as the closest to the original.
Honestly, I am personally sure it's safe to use Kronos' SSD with even lower speed fan... or even without any...

Paragonista · Post by **Paragonista** » Mon May 27, 2013 8:04 pm

Petro wrote:
Bertotti wrote:New board arrived was actually a bit louder. My original is x61 sn 101xxx range the replacement was x61 sn 100xxx range.

Now I give up I will fix it myself. Does anyone have any problems with the Noctua NF-A6x25 FLX (60x25mm Premium Fan) http://www.nonctua.at mentioned a page or two back? I think I will find one of these and put it in. Maybe make my wood ends while I am at it. Thanks Bertotti
I just finished replacing the original with that Noctua NF-A6x25 advised above on my X73.
Great result! It is quiet, almost absolutely! The wonderfull trick of the Noctua - it won't sound louder when you connect it by any part to the synth body or its place.
The original X-Fan is also quiet while you hold it in air, but as soon as you just touch it to any surface it will start resonating.
I used all 3 original screws for the new fan and place the old one near by duck tape.

The Noctua provides two lower speed adapters (pieces of connectors), I used the faster one (RC-10 2400 rpm) as the closest to the original.
Honestly, I am personally sure it's safe to use Kronos' SSD with even lower speed fan... or even without any...

Nice to hear. It already seemed to me that it can be done by yourself judging the internal foto's I saw from the Kronos inside. Mine is still working noiseless after some months and almost daily use (fixed by a Korg-guy from The Netherlands) and the Noctua I bought I will keep as a remembrance

Maybe I built it in the PlayOn Mediaplayer.... Noisy device!

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Mon May 27, 2013 9:17 pm

Petro wrote:Honestly, I am personally sure it's safe to use Kronos' SSD with even lower speed fan... or even without any...

As has been said earlier in this thread: the fan is NOT there to cool the SSD, but to move air around inside the Kronos.

Petro · Post by **Petro** » Mon May 27, 2013 10:16 pm

This was sarkasm

I knew.. But, I have tried to search the airflow inside while the K. was open with my hand, the hottest place is the furthest from the sucking side. Why did they put it so far?
So I wonder what the use of the fan, it barely sucks really

curvebender · Post by **curvebender** » Tue May 28, 2013 5:55 am

Petro wrote:This was sarkasm I knew.. But, I have tried to search the airflow inside while the K. was open with my hand, the hottest place is the furthest from the sucking side. Why did they put it so far?
So I wonder what the use of the fan, it barely sucks really

Ah sarcasm! Sometimes difficult to spot in a text.

Anyway, it is quite possible that the fan was an afterthought from the engineers, being put there too late in the design process.

Petro · Post by **Petro** » Tue May 28, 2013 9:07 am

curvebender Yeh, exactly what I thought,
Japaneses are very pedantical in engeneering, I know from my own experience. It comes as good for reliability though...
That strange place obviously hints - it was designed initially to airflow throughout ALL the body, but the hottest/most important spot were there then, on HDD.
So maybe the fan placed there is just an archaism. If someone has arguments against that "human body hair coat" theory, please welcome, isnt it an interesting subject to discuss.

...
... BTW What happened if we just reverse the fan to push, and not to suck? won't it be more effective?

SeedyLee · Post by **SeedyLee** » Fri Jun 28, 2013 3:47 am

I would suggest the fan is there to cool the power supply, not the SSD or processor, and is fairly essential.

Korg Forums

KRONOS Fan Information

Congratulations!