Toasty HDDs

Aelred89 · 1 Mar 2008 at 01:46

I've just installed 3 new WD5000AAKS drives in my pc but it's really not liking all the heat it's producing

Whilst playing games watching movies from the HDD temps are hitting 55c... is this safe?

It looks like i might have to look into some more powerful fans, 800RPM just isn't cutting it

fobose · 1 Mar 2008 at 09:14

55c is warm but I think its borderline. Does your case have good airflow? You might just need to tidy your cables up a bit. Do you have a fan exausting the hot air?

comatose · 1 Mar 2008 at 09:36

In my experience, the cooler you can keep your drives the longer they last. The old Dell I used to have was poorly designed and the HDD was just screwed flat against the chassis with no fans or ventilation nearby. I had around 3 or 4 disk failures within the first couple of years.

Since then I've made sure all the machines I've built have had good drive cooling with at least a fan blowing across them. Of the 20 or so HDD's I've had, *touch wood* not a single one has gone wrong so far

So to answer your Q, I would recommend trying to drop your temps to more like 40C if possible. Can you not install a fan in front of them, if you already have then fobose might be right you're not venting enough. What case do you have? and are you overlocking?

Aelred89 · 1 Mar 2008 at 10:52

I have a Lian-Li A16 with the 3 bay converter it comes with (120mm intake fan) and a 2 bay converter I had in another case (80mm intake fan

)

I've just swapped my fans around so i have a 120mm 1200RPM noctua intaking at the front and the 120mm 800RPM as the exhaust at the back, this has dropped temps by some way, they dont go over 42c in that cage anymore.

The 2 bay converter is a little higher at around 47c but I've also split the cages up so they're not on top of each other anymore which should help too.

I think I'm going to have to look into getting another 3 bay converter and some more 1200RPM noctuas to repalce the 800RPM and one for me Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme that arrives on monday

Big.Wayne · 1 Mar 2008 at 11:49

Aelred89 said:
Whilst playing games watching movies from the HDD temps are hitting 55c... is this safe?

fobose said:
55c is warm but I think its borderline.

You would need to check the manufacturers website and see what the thermal limits of your drives are, I reckon they start breaking down at 60°C or thereabouts! :eek:

If you did something really vigorous with the drives like a format I'm sure you would be in trouble. Get some better cooling sorted or move the drives around a bit.