US 12,137,534 B2
Fan controller for fans of a multi-node computer system
Hsien-Yang Cheng, Taoyuan (TW); Ying-Che Chang, Taoyuan (TW); Yi-An Chen, Taoyuan (TW); and Yu-Tang Zeng, Taoyuan (TW)
Assigned to QUANTA COMPUTER INC., Taoyuan (TW)
Filed by Quanta Computer Inc., Taoyuan (TW)
Filed on Jun. 16, 2021, as Appl. No. 17/349,715.
Prior Publication US 2022/0408590 A1, Dec. 22, 2022
Int. Cl. H05K 7/20 (2006.01); G06F 1/20 (2006.01)
CPC H05K 7/20209 (2013.01) [G06F 1/20 (2013.01); H05K 7/20136 (2013.01)] 20 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A hardware-based fan controller for controlling a plurality of fan modules in a computer system including a plurality of computer nodes, each of the computer nodes having a service processor, the hardware-based fan controller comprising:
a slave module receiving fan speed commands from each of the service processors; and
a fan speed generator coupled to the slave module and a subset of the plurality of fan modules, the fan speed generator receiving fan speed commands from the slave module and fan speed outputs from the subset of fan modules, wherein the fan speed generator is configured in a normal mode to output a first fan speed to each of the fan modules in the subset and the fan speed generator is configurable to select a hot swap mode to output a second fan speed to each of the fan modules remaining in the subset when a fan module of the subset is detected as being removed, wherein the second fan speed is slower than the first fan speed to prevent reverse airflow through hot swapping the removed fan module.