Fan noise during recording

vampyre01

Hi All!
I can't believe I havn'e gone on Boards.ie sooner! What a great place!
I will be here to stay!

I was just wondering if anyone knew any magical way of reducing the noise from the fan on my Laptop? Its pretty annoying when I'm recording and my main recording pc is out of comission until I can fix/upgrade it.
The laptop tends to overheat very easily seeing as I use a lot of VST's/VSTI's at once.

MilanPan!c

vampyre01 wrote: »

Hi All!
I can't believe I havn'e gone on Boards.ie sooner! What a great place!
I will be here to stay!

I was just wondering if anyone knew any magical way of reducing the noise from the fan on my Laptop? Its pretty annoying when I'm recording and my main recording pc is out of comission until I can fix/upgrade it.
The laptop tends to overheat very easily seeing as I use a lot of VST's/VSTI's at once.

welcome!

Is the noise just annoying you or showing up on recordings or what?

vampyre01

Thanks for the fast reply!

Unfortunatley its wrecking the overall quality of the recordings. I can use a noise gate but I'd rather someway of reducing it alltogether instead of shutting it out while I'm not playing.
Its only when I'm playing the guitar by the way. I use a drum machine for the drum tracks. Its mainly when distortion is added. It seems to amplify the noise of the fan.
Well, at least thats what I'm sure it is. I can't think of anything else that would be interfering with the sound.

vampyre01

I was already aware of such software but thanks for the idea. My problem was that if the fan is spinning so much (and my cpu usually works around th 70-90% mark with about 3gb's ram filled up during a session) then it must be spinning that fast for a reason, I'd imagine my laptop is getting quiet hot from doing all that processing. If I were to turn the fans off, the system would almost definatley bluescreen.
Perhaps if I got some other way to cool it down (without sitting on my roof top or the equivelant) so I could shut down the fan then?
Any ideas about that?
Thanks for all your help on this guys! Really appreciated!!

DamagedTrax

new fan is your only real option here. you can run a high speed/low noise gaming fan.

vampyre01

Thanks Guys,
I think DamagedTrax might be right.
Ah well.

old gregg

maybe a dumb solution but here goes ......

what about longer cables to move the lappy further away from the recording source .... even out into another room/hallway/cupboard/dog's box?

MilanPan!c

old gregg wrote: »

maybe a dumb solution but here goes ......

what about longer cables to move the lappy further away from the recording source .... even out into another room/hallway/cupboard/dog's box?

This was the point of my first question, but it's my impression that it's not just the sound of the fan, but something more...

If it's just the noise then just move away from the noise.

That's what I do

vampyre01

But the fan is IN the laptop, moving it away from the fan isn't really an option. Its the on board sound card that I am using and it does the job but unfirtunatley it picks up the noise of the fan to much on distorted guitars.

DamagedTrax

if its picking up noise on loud distorted guitars then you've most likely got a problem with interferance.

if it was the external fan noise you'd only hear it on quieter recordings (unless you're running a 747 engine for a fan?!?!).

what kind of cables are you using? are they balanced? are you going direct into your soundcard or using a mic?

i would safely say that your internal soundcard is picking up electrical interferance from somewhere, possibly your fan or harddrive maybe. get a lend of an external soundcard and try it. most likely it should sort your problem. if not the work your way back thru your signal flow to your guitar, checking everything along the way.

vampyre01

Thanks Guys,

I'll see how I get on. I doubt much can be done until I build my new system.

dav nagle

If you set the laptop to power saver the screen led should go dim and your fans should quite down.

madtheory

Are you 100% certain it's fan noise? Do you get the same noise in the recording if you run on battery alone?

Welease

old gregg wrote: »

maybe a dumb solution but here goes ......

what about longer cables to move the lappy further away from the recording source .... even out into another room/hallway/cupboard/dog's box?

If it's your fan, thats your fix... So do this first..

But, I can't believe you are hearing a laptop fan over a guitar amp with microphone.. (unless your laptop has an issue, and it might be worth an OS reinstall if you are not familiar with the technical workings of your laptop).

vampyre01

Thanks guys, Perhaps I should have said it all a bit better.
The fan is INSIDE the laptop (can't move it away), and the guitar is run straight into the MIC-IN port. I use Guitar Rig 3 so there is no "Amp and Mic" situation, and the sound card is on board.
Like I said, I doubt there is anything that can be done short of turning off the fan but I might try something along the lines of Dav Nagle's advice.

ClutchIt

But if you're plugging your guitar directly into the laptop then the sound of the fan shouldn't be recorded at all should it?

vampyre01

Its not the physical noise I'm talking about. I'm sorry guys, I should have stated also that it was electronic interfearance from the fan.

MilanPan!c

vampyre01 wrote: »

Its not the physical noise I'm talking about. I'm sorry guys, I should have stated also that it was electronic interfearance from the fan.

I think that's what we've all been trying to understand.

I would suggest that you take it to a computer pro as this kind of this is next to impossible to accurately trouble shoot without having the machine in front of us.

For isntance:

Why do you think it's the fan that's interfering?

madtheory

Forget about the fan, it's a red herring:

madtheory wrote: »

Are you 100% certain it's fan noise? Do you get the same noise in the recording if you run on battery alone?

If there's no noise when on battery power, what you have is interference from the power supply. There are solutions. Look on the PC section of the Sound on Sound website for posts by Martin Walker, he has a few solutions listed there somewhere. (What you have is a a ground loop, but knowing what it's called is not going to help you in this case. )

Dravokivich

MadTheory is right, reading through your post, it's very likely PSU related interferance to the onboard SoundCard.

Shouldn't be a problem if you get a somewhat decent external card.

PaulBrewer

vampyre01 wrote: »

It seems to amplify the noise of the fan.

This would lead me to suspect that it's not the fan directly, but rather electrical noise.

Could you post a file for a listen ?

vampyre01

Thanks for all the help guys, I'll see what happens when I get home and let ye all know. Thanks for all the help!

old gregg

which sort of prompts me to ask here rather than starting a new thread .... can anyone suggest where in Ireland I can pick up a decent DI box? Preferably via the interweb I reckon ... I've found this:
http://www.waltons.ie/Product/View.aspx?id=11598
which I reckon would do the job and give me a choice of outputs, necessary when I'm plugging into an unknown pa at a venue.

Or, outside of removing the earth (which I did recently at a gig in Cork and was terrified for the whole performance) anyone come up with homegrown solutions that work?

artvandulet

old gregg wrote: »

which sort of prompts me to ask here rather than starting a new thread .... can anyone suggest where in Ireland I can pick up a decent DI box? Preferably via the interweb I reckon ... I've found this:
http://www.waltons.ie/Product/View.aspx?id=11598
which I reckon would do the job and give me a choice of outputs, necessary when I'm plugging into an unknown pa at a venue.

Or, outside of removing the earth (which I did recently at a gig in Cork and was terrified for the whole performance) anyone come up with homegrown solutions that work?

I use this bad boy...
http://77.72.4.106/~interspa/index.php?page=shop.product_details&flypage=flypage.tpl&product_id=32&category_id=5&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=12&vmcchk=1&Itemid=12

Not in Ireland as you asked, but an excellent little box.

Quiggers

use a directional mic and put the fan in the null, most mics are cardiod so point your mic at your guitar amp and put the laptop at the opposite side of the mic.

vampyre01

Again...I am not using a Mic or an Amp. Just a guitar straight into the line-in on the laptop and using Guitar rig 3.

MilanPan!c

vampyre01 wrote: »

Again...I am not using a Mic or an Amp. Just a guitar straight into the line-in on the laptop and using Guitar rig 3.

Ok, then we can safely tell you it's not fan noise.

dav nagle

Could be a hum from the laptop input remember laptops have fairly low quality inputs for this kind of thing that's why people buy pre-amps. I mean have you considered the fact that your guitar pickups may need to be checked?

madtheory

PaulBrewer wrote: »

Could you post a file for a listen ?

No need. I bet if he runs on battery power alone the noise will stop.