HDD Cooling needed?

I have two 7200rpm ddrives near each other. They arent getting any airflow across them, and the only "cooling" they are getting is the air blown into the case by fans not near them. I was wondering if I should make some improvments? Is it needed? Im guessing raptors probably NEED cooling. I may be upgrading to watercooling, which would get rid of a few fans in my case, so will I need to add something to my hdd's? thnx.

enz660 said:

I have two 7200rpm ddrives near each other. They arent getting any airflow across them, and the only "cooling" they are getting is the air blown into the case by fans not near them. I was wondering if I should make some improvments? Is it needed? Im guessing raptors probably NEED cooling. I may be upgrading to watercooling, which would get rid of a few fans in my case, so will I need to add something to my hdd's? thnx.

Click to expand...

No its not needed... but it can be nice... Only time you should worry is if your air temp in the case gets hot, or you block your HD off totally from any air circulation

I always have a case where the HDD's are behind a fan sucking air in from the outside over them, I kinda like that, i dunno if its needed though.

I prefer that, but in the HTPC world we are stuck with no fans... so we must just deal with what we got.

Buy Seagates for they have better warrenties.

Mike

GreenJelly said:

I prefer that, but in the HTPC world we are stuck with no fans... so we must just deal with what we got.

Buy Seagates for they have better warrenties.

Mike

Click to expand...

Heck no not stuck with no fans.. My Sflex is far quieter then either my uber quiet PSU or my hdds (also very quiet.. .no hitachis here)


As for adding a fan to your HDDs..

a) try to seperate them... only way you can say you dont have room is if all your PCI slots are full They sell adapters that let you mount up to 2 HDDS in the PCI area

b) enable SMART and check your drive temps. If they are over 40C then yeah they need some cooling. Technically they need cooling over 30C but its not "necessary" just helps with data security and longevity.

It also depends on the drive type. Perp drives run hotter and need more active cooling then regular drives. Stacking them can lead to 50C temps, definitely not healtthy on a platform that compacts more data into a smaller area.

And lastly YUP

Exactly right Seagates have good warranties, but also are acoustically better performers then the other major brands, they are THE best choice for HTPCs (dont get perps I have 2 in mine.. they need active cooling I dont like anything over 40C in my PC) they are quiet and cool and are built to last. So no worries about dumping 500GB of video. Downside they are also the worst performing of the HDDs (perps excluded),but that is not important on a HTPC. Not sure about temps on them.

Order for generic 7.2 drives

Hitachi FAST and loud
WD Not as fast or loud as hitachi
Seagates, very quiet. But also slow.

(differnces in dba and speed are small so in genrality no drive stands out).

Caveat= the above exclude perp drives and raptors. I am speaking only of general HDD perforamnce..
Also MAxtor is generally a nono except for cheap storage. The Maxline series is the exception. They are outstanding drives (server class).

My HDD cooling..
Both currently running @ 19°C

Pic deleted due to duplication....

archilochus said:

My HDD cooling..
Both currently running @ 19°C

Click to expand...

how are you getting sub ambient temps on your HDDs with out some kind of excessive cooling. UNLESS you like living in less then 70F temps.

Any HDD that is running 64F is obviously a fallacy unless its either faulty measurement.. or is sitting outside in winter

how do I measure the temps of the hdd's? through the bios or some program that puts load on them (if thats even possible)

pic of my hdd's:

Neur0mancer said:

Isnt it great when people post proof they are lying?

One of those HDDS the only connection is the power plug.. So

a) how are you getting a temp on it...

b) how are you getting sub ambient temps on your HDDs with out some kind of excessive cooling. UNLESS you like living in less then 70F temps. If so then your temps dont count anyway.


Any HDD that is running 64F is obviously a fallacy unless its either faulty measurement.. or is sitting outside in winter

Click to expand...

How is he lying? I see the black sata cable right there


And to Enz:

Jeez man maybe it's because I am tired but that sound dampening looks really comfortable, lol.

Neur0mancer said:

Isnt it great when people post proof they are lying?
One of those HDDS the only connection is the power plug.. So

Click to expand...

But having HDD temps of 19C is impossible. What are the ambient temps?

I have a 120mm intake blowing over my HDDs. The Maxtor IDE runs idle at 23C (ambient) and the Samsung SP runs at 32C idle.

how do I measure the temps of the hdd's?

Everest

Temp probe on the top or side of the drive... on a metal part of it.
If i remember right... a HDD always spins, thus generating heat all the time... so having it do a really big read and write wont effect its temps that much.

That being said, go ahead and take a temp reading while doing a full format of a drive... IE, not the quick formating.

Oh yeah, I wouldnt worry about HDD temps, they have no effect on preformance or stability as in our chips. Nor do they necisarily effect the life span of the drive.

Sleepy_Steve said:

...I wouldnt worry about HDD temps, they have no effect on preformance or stability as in our chips. Nor do they necisarily effect the life span of the drive.

Click to expand...

While I would agree that the performance degradation of an overheated drive would be negligible, I do not agree that high temperatures have no impact on longevity. Having serviced literally hundreds of customer's machines through the years, we've found that case designs which allow the hard drive to overheat exhibit premature drive failure far more often. Although this evidence is primarily apocryphal, it is nonetheless significant due to quantity.

My totally unscientific method is to feel the drive. If it's HOT to the touch, you'll want to do something about it. Usually, any fan blowing over the drives, even if it's just re-circulating air inside the case, will bring them down to a reasonable temperature.

I too think that hot = bad and warm = normal when it comes to my HDD's.

I suppose if hes really worried about it, maybe make sure there is a quiet fan near the drives, and if hes still worried after that some ram sinks on the sides of the drive.

i don't agree with sticking ramsinks of the side of the hard-drive when most of the heat is on the bottem.

feel the bottem of your hard-drive. its smoking hot. then feel the top. its practically room temperature.


all you need is a 120mm fan blowing onto it. anything more is overkill.

enz660 said:

how do I measure the temps of the hdd's?

Click to expand...

Like Immortal_Hero said, use Everest to check, but you'll need to make sure that S.M.A.R.T. is enabled in BIOS.


I agree that ramsinks on the side of a hard drive are unnecessary, as a fan or two blowing on the drive(s) is really all that you need, but I've been known to separate my drives slightly and place ramsinks on the chips on the bottom (Seagates). Not sure if that helps any but I do it anyways.

To the person who saw the empty 4 pin Molex connector on the HD...

Some SATA HD's come with the new Powercable Plug (its flat, and far to the left), and the old 4 pin that is impossible to pull out.

That reminds me of the old IBM drives, that I use to have to RMA, cause removing the 4 pin molex would damage the drive. Everytime you needed to unplug the thing was like a role of the dice... luckily the smarter companies attached the connector to something other then the circuit board on the bottom of the drive.

Mike

temps....good?

^^^^
Anything below ~50C is fine, and 30-40 is better. So yeah, you're good.