Patent ID: 8812831

Claim:
A computer-implemented fan control method for an information handling system, the information handling system comprising a device area, a fan for providing an air flow to the device area, an administrator module coupled to the fan, a processor module coupled to a device area bus, a bridge module coupled to the processor module and the administrator module, a BIOS module coupled to the bridge module, and an active power management module coupled to the administrator module, wherein the device area has a plurality of devices installed thereon, the method comprising the steps of: collecting thermal data of the installed devices in the device area when booting up the information handling system, wherein the collecting step includes scanning the device area bus coupled to the device area when booting up the information handling system, identifying the installed devices to obtain a type of each of the installed devices and power consumed, and determining a device number N of the installed devices; determining a threshold power of the installed devices in the device area and a discreteness level of the installed devices in the device area based on the thermal data; adjusting an initial speed of the fan based on the discreteness level; and calibrating the speed of the fan to obtain an optimized speed thereof based on the threshold power and the adjusted initial speed; wherein, after the device number N has been determined, the BIOS module determines the discreteness level of the installed devices in the device area as follows: when N≦1, the discreteness level is a first discreteness level wherein the initial fan speed is a lowest fan speed; when 1<N<(n/2)+1, the discreteness level is a second discreteness level wherein the initial fan speed is a sum of the lowest fan speed and a discrete configuration increment, where n denotes the total number of the connector slots in the device area; and when (n/2)+1≦N, the discreteness level is a third discreteness level wherein the initial fan speed is a sum of the lowest fan speed and a continuous configuration increment (M).