Macpower DigiDoc 5+ Review
Date : Monday, 29 Sept 2003
Author : Wolfman
Provided by : Jab-Tech
Introduction
The DigiDoc 3/5 fan and temperature controller unit from MacPower was one of the very first of it's kind and during the early days of modding and overclocking, they adorn many of the PC enthusiasts uber modified and overclocked PC. They have 8 fan connectors, each able to handle 12Watts of power-sucking fans and also monitor any 8 chosen hotspots in your rig, CPU, vidcards..etc. An alarm system also notifies you if any of the fans go kaput or if any of the hotspots reaches temperature above your specified safe level. And all that information is displayed on a cool LCD (at the time!) in real time so there's no memory hogging software to install.
As cool a product as it was, the DigiDoc still suffers some setbacks in it's design. First of all, many modders gives a boo-boo to the amber backlit LCD as we are all sick of green and amber and a blue backlit LCD was the only thing deemed worthy of any modified case! The 5.25" bracket design allows you to install a hard drive behind the unit to fully utilize the drive bay but with all the cables and a puny 40mm fan, installation is a tight squeeze and cooling is nothing to shout about. A lot of peeps were wondering why the position for the 40mm fan wasn't used for something else, like a USB/Firewire port instead. These are just some of the quirks but other companies take cue from there and soon, there was a myriad of other controllers/monitoring devices available that the DigiDoc simply got buried and forgotten.
 |
 |
But recently, MacPower revived the DigiDoc in it's latest reincarnation, the DigiDoc 5+. The old schoolers amongst us will rejoice at this but will the DigiDoc5+ delivers what it failed to do before? let's take a look shall we?
Specification
Package
Jab-tech.Com was kind enough to provide us with a review sample and when I took it out of the USPS parcel, I find the familiar DigiDoc package like before. But within the package, there are a few differences from the previous models.
It was a very nice surprise to see the DigiDoc 5+ had it's fan power cables all neatly bundled up in colour-coded sleevings unlike its' predecessor. This will definitely help you in managing your cable jungle in your case. They also provide the converter cables just in case your fans comes with a Molex connector instead of the 3-pin connector type. Another nice addition is the instruction manual which is well written, explaining to you the process of installing and setting up the DigiDoc 5+ from start to finish. Before this, the manual was only available with a CD-ROM. The manual also lets you record down your fan and temperature probes placement at the back of it so you'll never forget your setup
 |
 |
 |
 |
Lots of cables!
And yes, you read the specs correct.. there's USB and firewire cables included as Macpower has replaced the redundant 40mm fan with dual USB2.0 Ports and a Firewire Port. They also provided a USB cable which you can connect directly to the headers on your mobo. Nice touch since a lot of mobos now comes with extra USB headers on them.
 |
 |
Another nice change is that the temperature probes are also colour-coded to match the fan power cables. 6 of them are the flat types so you can use them on your CPU or GPU and the other two are bulb types and you can use them for your case temperature, ambient temp or your water temperature if you're using a watercooled rig.
 |
 |
We've seen the accessories that came with the DigiDoc 5+ so now let's take a closer look at the main unit itself.
Main Unit
If you're familiar with the older models of the DigiDoc then you'll find that this new one has the exact same exterior features, with the LCD on the left side, the control buttons next to it and a vent on the right side. It's mounted on a 5.25" bracket with an internal 3.5" bay behind it.
 |
 |
For those of you are not familiar with the DigiDoc product line, the LCD displays the temperature of your chosen monitored hotspots like your CPU, vidcard, etc. It displays them in either °C or °F, which ever you choose and it during operation, it scans each channel continuosly and emits a warning whenever there's a discrepancy in your temperature. It also displays your fan speed monitoring (provided your fan has RPM Sensing).
 |
 |
Next to the LCD, you have the 5 operation buttons, namely, Up, Down, Set, Force and Scan. The "Set" button is used when you want to enter the Set-Up Mode and determine the setting for the different functions of the DigiDoc. The "Up" and "Down" is used in conjunction with the "Set" button when setting up the DigiDoc and in normal mode, you can use the buttons to scroll thru the different temperature channels. The "Force" button overrides your fan control settings and turns all the fans connected to the unit on. The "Scan" button when pressed forces the unit to scan thru all the temperature channels and then the fan channels.
Front USB2.0 and Firewire Ports
Next we come to the vent on the right side of the unit. The previous units used to house a 40mm fan behind the vent but many users did not like the idea and requested to have a USB/Firewire ports instead and voila! Macpower finally removed the fan and added dual USB2.0 ports and a firewire port to the location. There's also a switch here to control the alarm buzzer. You can turn the buzzer "Off" completely or just leave it at "On", which reacts automatically to the temperature and fan RPM sensing settings.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Connections
Here you see the colour-coded fan connectors and the Power Supply connector. The 3-pin Male fan connectors are also labelled to help you during installation. Both the colour coding and labelling helps you to identify which channel is a particular fan connected to and since the temperature probes are colour-coded identically, you can match say, the CPU fan and the CPU temperature probe together on a single channel for easy monitoring. At the back of the PCB, you'll find the connections for the fan, power and also the temperature probes. All connections are clearly labelled for easy identification.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Testing
I tested the unit outside of the case with 8 x 80mm Coolermaster fans. Now with all 8 fans connected, you can clearly see the amount of wiring you're left to handle and that's not including the 8 temperature probe cables. I strongly recommend you plan your wiring and also note them down on the back of the DigiDoc manual as well just in case you forgot the arrangements. I also connected the temperature probes and since their colour coded to the fan channels, you can easily tracked them down in your case to the same colour coded fan connector. Of course, it doesn't hurt to label them yourself if you have a different arrangement for them.
Another new feature is a set point for turning off your fans with regards to the temperature setting. For example, you set Temp Sensor 1 at 50°C as a high level and at this temperature, Fan 1 will turn on. Now with the previous model, the fan will be turned on at 50°C but as soon as the temperature drops to 49.9°C, the fan will turn off and as we know, the temperature can fluctuate quite easily in your case and the fan will be turned on and off quite frequently and the beeping of the alarm will also go on/off and really tests your sanity! LOL! The DigiDoc 5+ however has a fan off setting at -5% that of your set point so Fan 1 will only turn off when the temperature reaches 47.5°C (-5%) and turn on when the temperature touches 50°C again.
 |
 |
Once power is turned on and the "Force" button pressed, all the fans spins right up with no problems at all. One very nice change was the LCD backlit which has been changed to Blue. Although it's a little late on Macpower's part since many users have learned to changed the Amber ones to Blue. Nothing has changed since the last DigiDoc and the LCD displays the same information, the Temperatures, your fan status and also the +5V and +12V line of your PSU. Setting up the unit is quite a hassle for some, just like it's predecessors but you can now refer to the included manual rather than having to open up a document from a CD.
 |
 |
But sometimes, things never change and that's the case with the LCD readouts. You'll have to mount the unit close to eye level to be able to see the test displayed clearly. Check out the shots I took from different angles to show what I meant. It's hard to make out the numbers/letters when you're looking at the LCD from the left, right and bottom.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Beige ain't fun!
The good thing is that this new DigiDoc version is available in 3 different colours.. beige, black or silver. So a natural choice for me was the jet black but since the manual that came with all the units showed a Black DigiDoc, mine somehow got mixed up and I received a Beige version. Yucks! Heheh! I did what came naturally though... I stripped the unit apart, though it was a real bia@#$tch to get the PCB assembly off the mounting bracket, laid out the plastic front and got ready to paint it!
 |
 |
If you're gonna do this, make sure you mask off the LCD window area folks... front and back! A quick couple of layers and a few hours of drying time and I have a black DigiDoc! Put the PCB, LCD and buttons back together and reassemble the whole shiznit back onto the mounting bracket.
 |
 |
 |
 |
Conclusion
The last time I reviewed the DigiDoc was in February 2001 and it's been more than two years since then. That's more than enough time to make the necessary changes and improve on the previous design flaws. The changes made have been on many enthusiasts's wishlist since the the DD5 first came out and now we can rejoice with this new version. There's still nothing in the market offers the programmability of the DigiDocs and I would say that the Blue backlit LCD is the most welcomed change. They also replaced the dinky 40mm fan with a USB/Firewire port so it's much easier to connect your USB/Firewire devices now. The colour-coded fan and temperature cables makes installation easier and also makes it easy to track down the channel your fan/temperature cable is connected to. The included manual provides you with a step-by-step guide for setting up the DigiDoc. And for those of you wanting to match the DigiDoc with your case, you can now choose from 3 different colours, Beige, Black or Silver.
The temperature range remains the same as the older models, from 0° - 90° Celcius (32° - 194° Fahrenheit) so if you're having sub-freezing cooling apparatus like a VapoChill or peltier, you'll have to look elsewhere for your temperature monitoring needs. And like it's predecessors, you can only turn the fans off and on, no way for you to control the speed of the fans in your rig.
With all that extra features, one would expect the price of the DigiDoc5+ to be somewhere around the old price or maybe even higher but guess what? The unit costs only S$51.95 over at Jab-tech.Com! And if you use this coupon code "VH" without the quotes, you'll receive a further US$4.00 off! That's a bargain and hard to pass up on folks if you're looking for an all-in-one controller and temperature monitoring device.
A big thanks goes out to John from Jab-tech.Com for the review sample. Thanks to you too for reading. Over and out.