Cooling a Hard Drive Advice

Tetsu · 12 Jul 2008 at 15:05

Hey all.

If a hard drive cant receive cool air across the whole thing and you had to choose a direction for the air to blow, which would be the best orientation?

fan blowing the bottom (underside of the drive) or the top?, or pulling air away from the bottom or top?

does that make sense?>

thinking of installing a hdd in a 5.25 and thinking about just putting a 120cm fan in the bay above or below.

mangler07 · 12 Jul 2008 at 17:21

far as im aware the most heat is generated from the underside of the hdd where the circuitry is.... i would say fan underneath blowing onto the underside of the hdd

AbsenceJam · 12 Jul 2008 at 18:22

What's the actual temperature of the drive?

Greenlizard0 · 12 Jul 2008 at 18:31

Whatever you do as well make sure there is good flow through the case. There's no point in having lots of fans blowing air in random directions.

Tetsu · 12 Jul 2008 at 19:56

Think i'm just going to mount another 120mm fan intake where the 5.25" bay is instead. better for cooling better for case air flow.

good point green.

thanks guys.

Talrinys · 12 Jul 2008 at 20:08

Unless you're having 50+ degrees on your HD there is no reason at all to cool it

Tetsu · 21 Aug 2008 at 14:30

Greenlizard0 said:
Whatever you do as well make sure there is good flow through the case. There's no point in having lots of fans blowing air in random directions.

Was thinking of doing it in an akasa omega, So a 140mm fan underneith the harddrive blowing towards the top vent with no fan in the vent.

so just blowing out through here

JBod · 21 Aug 2008 at 14:57

I wouldn't worry about cooling it at all. Recent tests have shown that actually they have a lower failure rate at higher temperatures than anyone previously thought.

Monkeynut · 21 Aug 2008 at 15:17

Link please?

JBod · 22 Aug 2008 at 21:06

http://www.engadget.com/2007/02/18/massive-google-hard-drive-survey-turns-up-very-interesting-thing/

A google study

google said:
and there is less correlation between drive temperature and failure rates than might have been expected, and drives that are cooled excessively actually fail more often than those running a little hot.

Monkeynut · 22 Aug 2008 at 23:07

Interesting, but that depends on how they measure "excessively cooled".

JBod · 23 Aug 2008 at 22:43

Monkeynut said:
Interesting, but that depends on how they measure "excessively cooled".

I think having a dedicated fan per HDD is excessive. I doubt google would have gone to the trouble of liquid cooling hundreds of hdd's just for a study.

badbob · 23 Aug 2008 at 22:45

Like Coolermasters 4 in 3 approach, quiet with suitable cooling and customisable depending on the number of HD's.