Heat an issue for disk?

  • Thread starter Thread starter rkruz
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rkruz

I put a Western Digital 120Gig 7200rpm in a USB external case used in a
home office and I would like to leave it on 24/7 to backup up 4 PCs
over LAN. (If I have to remember to turn it on each day, I wont get
consistent backups)
The case has no fan, but good space around it and vents for convection
air flow. Nothing sits on top of it and feet elevate so air can get
underneath.

Is this going to be a heat issue for the unit that would accellerate a
failure? If I leave it on 24/7 how long should it theoritcally last?

thanks for any insight
 
Previously rkruz said:
I put a Western Digital 120Gig 7200rpm in a USB external case used in a
home office and I would like to leave it on 24/7 to backup up 4 PCs
over LAN. (If I have to remember to turn it on each day, I wont get
consistent backups)
The case has no fan, but good space around it and vents for convection
air flow. Nothing sits on top of it and feet elevate so air can get
underneath.
Click to expand...
Is this going to be a heat issue for the unit that would accellerate a
failure? If I leave it on 24/7 how long should it theoritcally last?
Click to expand...

All are difficult to answer. What is your room temperature?
How long will the backup processes run? Still the most central
question is how well the case cools. Impossible to tell without
measurements under load. I bought an IR thermometer some time
ago because of a similar question.

Arno
 
All are difficult to answer. What is your room temperature?
How long will the backup processes run? Still the most central
question is how well the case cools. Impossible to tell without
measurements under load. I bought an IR thermometer some time
ago because of a similar question.

Arno
Click to expand...


Look up the specs for you model disk on the manuffacturers web site
and look at the max and idle wattage heat dissapation. If the
and the recommended max temp. If it stays below that # most
of the day you're OK. At idle it probably uses a fraction of
fullpower.
 
I put a Western Digital 120Gig 7200rpm in a USB external
case used in a home office and I would like to leave it on
24/7 to backup up 4 PCs over LAN. (If I have to remember
to turn it on each day, I wont get consistent backups)
Click to expand...
The case has no fan, but good space around it and
vents for convection air flow. Nothing sits on top of
it and feet elevate so air can get underneath.
Click to expand...
Is this going to be a heat issue for the unit that would accellerate a
failure?
Click to expand...

Very likely.

Really depends on how hot it gets in summer tho.
If I leave it on 24/7 how long should it theoritcally last?
Click to expand...

There are no nice tidy numbers on that.
 
rkruz said:
I put a Western Digital 120Gig 7200rpm in a USB external case used in a
home office and I would like to leave it on 24/7 to backup up 4 PCs
over LAN. (If I have to remember to turn it on each day, I wont get
consistent backups)
The case has no fan, but good space around it and vents for convection
air flow. Nothing sits on top of it and feet elevate so air can get
underneath.

Is this going to be a heat issue for the unit that would accellerate a
failure? If I leave it on 24/7 how long should it theoritcally last?

thanks for any insight
Click to expand...

With decent power and cooling, a modern HD should last for years running
24x7; some HD vendors quote ~1,000,000 hour MTBF, or >1 century. With
inadequate cooling, turning if off when unused won't help, because the
heat produced when unused is a fraction of the heat produced when
seeking and/or writing.

Decent cooling is enough that you can comfortably leave your hand on
the HD's case when in use; in some boxes, passive cooling is adequate;
in most PCs, a case fan or two is enough.
 
What's the surface temp. of the drive after it's been in the case for
hours running hard? - this is the critical factor at play.

You should aim for <50 degrees C (under 45 prefered) under high stress
operations. If it goes above that, then you'll easily fry a drive (eg.
at 60C) in short order.

Most of the time, you won't care what the ambient temp. is outside the
drive, or the airflow through a drive -- drive temp. is the most
important factor to pay attention to.
 
What's the surface temp. of the drive after it's been in the case for
hours running hard? - this is the critical factor at play.

You should aim for <50 degrees C (under 45 prefered) under high stress
operations. If it goes above that, then you'll easily fry a drive (eg.
at 60C) in short order.

Most of the time, you won't care what the ambient temp. is outside the
drive, or the airflow through a drive -- drive temp. is the most
important factor to pay attention to.
Click to expand...


Ambient air is what the gets heated, so the correct way to describe
what's inside any box of electronics is "degrees above ambient", i.e.
if the room is at 72 and the inside is 90 then you can know that if
the room temp is 80 the inside temp will be 98.
 
With decent power and cooling, a modern HD should last for years running
24x7; some HD vendors quote ~1,000,000 hour MTBF, or >1 century.
Click to expand...

While I agree that it "should last for years", it is extremely unlikely that
it could run for "> 1 century", even if it has 5,000,000 hour MTBF.
That is because MTBF does not specify an average life time of an electronic
component, but reflects statistical failure rate in relatively short period
of time, when that rate is the lowest.
That could mean, that on average, for drives which survived the first 6
months, one drive out of a thousand will fail in the next 1,000 hours of
operation.
Remember a bathtub curve. MTBF applies to the "bottom" of the bathub period
only. Other data is not published.
 
thanks....nice insights!

Peter said:
While I agree that it "should last for years", it is extremely unlikely
that
it could run for "> 1 century", even if it has 5,000,000 hour MTBF.
That is because MTBF does not specify an average life time of an
electronic
component, but reflects statistical failure rate in relatively short
period
of time, when that rate is the lowest.
That could mean, that on average, for drives which survived the first 6
months, one drive out of a thousand will fail in the next 1,000 hours of
operation.
Remember a bathtub curve. MTBF applies to the "bottom" of the bathub
period
only. Other data is not published.
Click to expand...
 
Peter said:
While I agree that it "should last for years", it is extremely unlikely that
it could run for "> 1 century", even if it has 5,000,000 hour MTBF.
Click to expand...

So, you agree with what I said and you disagree with what I didn't say. OK.
 
Peter said:
So, you agree with what I said and you disagree with what I didn't say. OK.
Click to expand...

You have implied that MTBF rating describes how long a hard drive will last.
I disagree with that interpretation.
 
Peter said:
You have implied that MTBF rating describes how long a hard drive will last.
I disagree with that interpretation.
Click to expand...

I think your understanding of MTBF is better than your understanding
of English, since I did not say (and do not believe) that MTBF implies
life expectancy.
 
Bob Willard said:
I think your understanding of MTBF is better than your understanding
of English, since I did not say (and do not believe) that MTBF implies
life expectancy.
Click to expand...

Thanks.
 
You are some kinda major dweeboid nerd huh? Is this how you establish your
self worth.? Babbling nonense to strangers who you then believe go away
impressed?
 
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