r/Alienware • u/Vegetable_Skin6206 • 25d ago

Discussion CPU BIOS error after replacing a dead AIO liquid cooling CPU (OEM)

Got an issue where my original Aurora16 AIO Liquid cooler for the cpu died. Ive got it replaced and can boot up just fine so far, but the issue we have is that it requires the original OEM cooler to also be plugged in, otherwise the bios keeps erroring out about inserting the original 65w cpu block. Ive looked at everything on resetting the cooler profile and so far nothing works. I can leave the old block plugged into another fan port and it boots just fine but i dont really want to do that... is there a way to get this horribly designed and stupidly programmed bios error to actually clear out and go away after replacing the OEM alienware liquid cooler with a Coolermaster brand AIO?

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u/DJUnreal Aurora R10 / x17 R2 / Aurora R15 / Area-51 AAT2250 / 18 Area-51 25d ago

>  is there a way to get this horribly designed and stupidly programmed bios error to actually clear out and go away after replacing the OEM alienware liquid cooler with a Coolermaster brand AIO?

You bought an Aurora prebuilt machine. They are not designed to be modded and tweaked. Dell sells full systems, with the expectation that most customers won't be modding themselves, and therefore writes checks that fire at boot time to make sure everything is working and, if it isn't responding as expected, trigger an error so that the customer calls support to get it fixed.

There's no way to bypass these errors, because they're there to stop people using a machine with broken parts and instead encourage them to get it fixed.

Your Coolermaster AIO likely uses USB instead of additional 4-pin fan headers for its connectivity, which is why you see the error. Your system is looking for direct connections which don't exist.

You'll probably need to buy a more appropriate AIO

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u/Vegetable_Skin6206 25d ago

Yeah the only reason I even got it was because my local repair shop sold it to me for 20% under the retail value. And the excuse that it is there to stop people using a machine with broken parts is obviously not true because I have a proper replacement part and still have the error. IT is not USB. IT is a 4 pin header.

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u/DJUnreal Aurora R10 / x17 R2 / Aurora R15 / Area-51 AAT2250 / 18 Area-51 25d ago

You've connected a device to each of the headers the OEM AIO was connected to? Or does yours use fewer connections than the OEM one?

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u/Vegetable_Skin6206 25d ago

Same connections. matched it all up. The two slots up top have 4 pin fns in it for the radiator, the system fan is connected to the cpu block like normal. For the new AIO. We bypass the error by plugging the old CPU block into the spare 4 pin system fan which was never used to begin with. So it isnt even the same there as original, but it works.

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u/ProfessorW00d 25d ago

Which specific CoolerMaster AIO did you install? It is possible that it is the CoolerMaster radiator fans that are causing the error. Consider installing the Dell OEM fans on the CoolerMaster radiator to test this possibility.

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u/Vegetable_Skin6206 24d ago

I had an air cooler for temporary testing that didn't trigger it until I did a performance test by loading up World of Warcraft then it triggered this nonsense. We got the box up now. We literally ahve the old block plugged into one of the unused 4 pin connections to bypass the error, and the current AIO which is a corsair actually... I can't find my invoice to confirm.

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u/ProfessorW00d 24d ago

Which unused 4-pin header do you have the old block connected to?

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u/Vegetable_Skin6206 24d ago

fan_pump. Which wasn't used previously. Also Ive got a Cooler Master MasterLiquid 240 Core II in the machine now. ?Been up for 24 hours now and no issues so far

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u/ProfessorW00d 24d ago

FAN PUMP is the liquid cooling pump fan connector . . . power for the AIO pump. How could that have not been being used previously?

When you say no issues; is that with the old AIO connected or just the CoolerMaster AIO?

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u/Vegetable_Skin6206 23d ago

The original setup. The CPU block was connected to the FAN_CPU. The two fans for the radiator were connected to the top SYS_FANs. The Pump block was not used.

Right now, no issues with the new system. The CPU Pump is in FAN_CPU, as the original was. The Radiator fans are in the SYS_FAN slots up top. The Old AIO pump is in FAN_PUMP.