I’m getting intermittent alerts that the fan has failed. Has anyone here either tried to “blow out” the fan to clear however much dust might be in it after so many years, or actually replaced the fan? Any tips from experience appreciated.
Hello,
I have never tried this before.
Lets see if another user has tried and can share some experience with us.
i also have the same problem.
i have contacted the service provider and distributor of WD where i bought the item but they cant fix it and because its out of warranty (because of time) they cant replace it. they cant offer me any solution and its been months since i cant use my WDDX4000.
i am looking for a way to replace the fan. help will be appreciated.
i finally have found a way to do this and was able to get the defective fan out.
1- you unscrew the 5 screws behind the case. you pull the black outer case backwards and get it off.
2-get the disks out 1 by 1 and mark which disk goes where.
3- on two sides, there are 4 screw who are holding on to the metal support which your disks sata ports go in, you should unscrew those
4- unscrew the 5 screws which holds on the motherboard on the topand get it out.
5- get the sata ports part down.
6- unpin the fan and get it out.
now i am tryng to find a nice replacement fan. maybe a better one than which i took of.
The fan that it uses is: SUNON MAGLEV 90mmx90mmx25mm DC12v 1.3w 3 pin ME92251v3-000U-G99
i hope this helps. after i succeffully replace the fan and get it working i can maybe take some photos and put it here.
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I asked Digi-Key for a quote, (they carry Sunon)
Almost the same fan, slightly higher CFM. $10.
begin pasted message
Thank you for contacting Digi-Key Electronics. I have been unable to verify the part number ME92251V3-000U-G99. We offer the ME92251V2-000U-G99, but our version comes with a connector attached. Digi-Key part number 259-1658-ND.
The 2 calls out the speed of the fan. In this case, the fan will give 45 CFM, as opposed to 39.5 CFM for the 3 variant.
end pasted message
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Thanks for the reply Alan_Turner.
unfortunately i live in Istanbul/TR so it will be hard for me to get a fan from them.
i went out and found a fan with the same size still not sure if it’ll work. (it says on the fan that its a thermaltake but im not really sure i bought it from a cheap electronics store and payed nearly 5 USD for it.
i ll try to make it work when i have the time.
i am looking for a replacement adapter/power brick to be sure the problem is not caused by it. any one can send me a photo of their brick pls?
Alan hi again thsnks for the reply i ve gone out and found a new adapter too.
i have succesfully put the case back together.
my only problem now is that i ve forgot if the fan was blowing air inside the case or was it an exhaust?
after i know this i think im good to go.
i now set the fan to blow the air outside of the case but i still can see the fan failed error although the fan blows like hell.
So finally with some help my DX4000 runs problem free again. i now can access my old files and set up new backing up plans.
So the FAN REPLACEMENT was a success.
in the process to see if the fan was working or not i had to power the system up when no HDD was inside the case so when i put everything back together and powered up it had to verify all the data. which took more than 60 hours.
since i had no idea what i was doing i was excited and forgot to take any pictures. put i can verify the steps i mentioned in a previous response.
Now i plan to find a better replacement fan with 3 pins because the one i found is really loud. i may take pictures to explain then since now i know what im doing.
if you still have any questions i will try to answer
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The fan blows out the back. I received my replacement fan from Digi-Key, and it has the three wires. I assume the third wire is a signal wire for speed, and your lack of it is why you are still getting the fan failed message.
I checked, and Digi-Key does have a presence in Turkey, so maybe it won’t be so hard for you to get as you imagined.
Altough they have a Turkish website when i try to buy the fan its shipping cost seems an extra 20-30 USD. so i think i may ditch on it.
can you please check on the system working temps? i really dont remember how it was before the replacement. but when i touch the dx4000 it seems a little warm got me a little worried.
is the fan blowing out the back? Place a tissue on it to see 
Does seem too hot
Enclosure is quite ok, CPU seems high even if it is reported as nominal. Of course temperature depends also on external temperature (i.e. ambient)
The drives indeed get too hot but this is due to bad design of the unit. I keep an external USB fan on the one which remains on 24h/24h in order to lower by 3-4°C the enclosure (and drives) temperature.
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Gramps and DTMtech,
i have checked the blowing/sucking again and i can confirm that its blowing out the back. The unit isnt kept in a too hot or airless small space. it sits on a shelf in a halway.
the fan is noisy as hell and was a 4 Pin fan. the salesman told me the exclude the 4th(blue cable) when plugging in the board. the problem might be me sucking at installing it or the fan sucking at blowing(…)
while browsing the forums i bumped into someone who installed a noctua 92mm fan into his ds6100.
so i m thinking of buying one. maybe that will help.
there are 2 types of Noctua fans one is somewhat cheaper redux series Amazon.com
and the other is regular noctua Amazon.com
Noctua NF-A9 Noise Test [PCAXE.COM] - YouTube (heres a test and comparison)
I also got intermittent “fan not working” I bought a replacement will follow your steps . I had to buy a UPS , I couldn’t wait 5 days repairing itself everytime I lost power
I also bought same unit on eBay as a back up. I synchronized with main unit. 2nd unit seems much more stable.
curious, how did you “sync” the 2 units?
Hi, I have a DX4000 from work out of comission basically for the same reason, its fan has stopped working altogether, following this link and checking up on the noctuas alternative I have a few questions maybe you could help me with?
Firstly, is the 92mm format compatible with the original fan? I’m confused as I’ve seen the fan described as a 90mm unit, but I’m guessing the difference doesn’t matter in this case.
Secondly, given the option to use a 3-pin version it would be the go to choice I guess, but I’ve noticed the noctua 3-pin version has a higher wattage (1.32 watts vs 0.96 watts in the 4-pin unit) Which one would work better for the DX4000, given that the rest of the fan specs are basically the same?
Thanks in advance to anyone that have the chance to read this and help out
