Maxim Integrated Products

As today's systems achieve ever-increasing performance in smaller enclosures, their power dissipation poses an increasingly serious problem. The need to maintain proper temperatures has become critical in preventing thermal shutdown and even system failures. Thus, many systems now require extra fans to maintain an adequate airflow. This application note provides an overview of fan-control modules, and it presents a simple fan-controller circuit that uses the MAX6870 to monitor six fans.