[washout]

i just put together a new machine with a silverstone KL02B tower, which i love.
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16811163094
the stock rear 120mm fan appears to have two power cables.
the first is a 3pin, which doesnt seem to work when i connect it to the motherboard at the CHA_FAN or PWR_FAN, which i tested both and they both work.
the second is the common 4 prong power connector, male and female ends.

whats the purpose of having the 3 pin?
just to give users flexibility?
and does mine just not work?

i would just rather use the 3 pin to power it from the motherboard instead of having a power supply cable run all the way down to it.

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Not all boards have enough three pin connectors to run fans, its perfectly possible on budget boards to only have one CPU fan connector and nothing else, hence why a lot of fans have the 4 pin molex connectors as well to cater. Which you use doesn't matter as long as the fan goes round. Fans cost next to nothing to replace and a lot of separately available ones are probably quieter than the ones that come with cases anyway.

[Neil Jones]

Not all boards have enough three pin connectors to run fans, its perfectly possible on budget boards to only have one CPU fan connector and nothing else, hence why a lot of fans have the 4 pin molex connectors as well to cater. Which you use doesn't matter as long as the fan goes round. Fans cost next to nothing to replace and a lot of separately available ones are probably quieter than the ones that come with cases anyway.

[washout]

my motherboard has 2 fan connections available, CHA_FAN and PWR_FAN.
the tower's front stock fan is is plugged into CHA_FAN (it works when its plugged into PWR_FAN also).
but the stock rear fan (with 3pin and 4 pin molex), doesnt work when i have the 3 pin connector,
however it does work with the 4 pin molex, why?

lastly, assuming i leave it hooked up with the 4 pin molex, can i physically cut off the 3 pin connector?

[Neil Jones]

Probably wired up wrong for whatever reason. Long as its going round when its plugged in in some form it shouldn't really matter.
As to cutting it off - I'd tape it up and leave it alone, not like you're going to take the side off every five minutes and look at it.

[washout]

actually i want to remove any unneeded wires.
i have a nice fat window, so i want it to look good.