I have a Dell Optiplex 3060 here, that I used as a backup desktop with Linux, but now I’m trying to use it essentially as a streaming host for games (Fallout, GTA…), unfortunately that means Windows.
And even less fortunate: Windows seems to think, fan speeds only know one direction: up.
Essentially, the machine starts nice and reasonably quite, but after some load (e.g. a game), the fans never spin down again. Even if the temps are fine (all cores at <30°C, GPU at 48°C), it keeps running in turbine mode.
The only “fix” is a sleep or power cycle.
Since this machine is supposed to run relatively long hours and sit in my room, this is quite annoying and I’m kind of out of ideas.
Newest BIOS and all the Dell Magic™ are installed.
Instead my Dell optiplex 3060 has the opposite problem, it downclocks the CPU (i3 8100) to 799 MHz for some reason
Dell knows the problem but doesn't have a real fix https://www.dell.com/support/kbdoc/en-us/000145125/processor-speed-limited-to-0-79ghz-800mhz
Luckily, using a program called throttlestop I can force it back to 3 GHz
Never again a Dell
Yeah, I'm also not entirely what to think about the machine. There are definitely some quirks that are 100% Dell doing its own thing instead of using standard parts. On the other hand, the case is extremely easy to disassemble, you hardly need any tools.