Laptop Hard Drive Upgrade

[Grinder]

A friend has just had her laptop's hard drive go belly up. If we wanted
to replace it with a larger capacity drive, do we have to worry that it
might generate more heat than the previous component, and cause problems?

 

[DaveW]

Your bigger worry would be what the harddrive size LIMIT of the
motherboard's BIOS is. (You said you were going to get a larger size
harddrive.)

 

[Rod Speed]

A friend has just had her laptop's hard drive go belly up. If we wanted to replace it with a
larger capacity drive, do we have to worry that it might generate more heat than the previous
component, and cause problems?

Yes, specially with the low end older Dells that ran the
hard drive right at the extreme max temp that the hard
drive manufacturer allowed. Those died at one hell of
a rate, and obviously using a drive that generates more
heat than the original would only make that problem worse.

 

[Quaoar]

Yes, specially with the low end older Dells that ran the
hard drive right at the extreme max temp that the hard
drive manufacturer allowed. Those died at one hell of
a rate, and obviously using a drive that generates more
heat than the original would only make that problem worse.

Right on: my old i3000's drive was so hot that I had to insulate the
palmrest. The drive never failed, but almost all of the other
non-electronic parts did fail. The hinges were trash. The i3000 was
junk, but it was my junk!

Q

 

[Paul]

A friend has just had her laptop's hard drive go belly up. If we wanted
to replace it with a larger capacity drive, do we have to worry that it
might generate more heat than the previous component, and cause problems?

If you are concerned about that, you can always look up the
original drive specs, and the replacement drive specs,
on the web.

http://sdd.toshiba.com/main.aspx?Path=818200000d3e000000010000659c00002f14

Paul

 

[Grinder]

Your bigger worry would be what the harddrive size LIMIT of the
motherboard's BIOS is. (You said you were going to get a larger size
harddrive.)

I think I'll be alright there. I'll know more soon, but I think it
has/had a 40 to 60 GB drive, and we're looking to replace it with a 120 GB.

 

[Grinder]

Yes, specially with the low end older Dells that ran the
hard drive right at the extreme max temp that the hard
drive manufacturer allowed. Those died at one hell of
a rate, and obviously using a drive that generates more
heat than the original would only make that problem worse.

I guess I should follow up with:

With everything else being equal, will a larger capacity hard drive
necessarily generate more heat? (Speaking to a jump from about 40 GB to
120 GB.)

 

[Mike Walsh]

All other things being equal i.e. same number of platters, same RPM, similar controller card, a larger capacity drive will not generate more heat. Increasing capacity by increasing the number of platters will increase heat (and noise). Increasing capacity by increasing bit density on the same number of platters will not increase heat.

 

[Rod Speed]

Rod Speed wrote

I guess I should follow up with:

With everything else being equal, will a larger capacity hard drive necessarily generate more
heat?

Not necessarily, things have improved over time on the power use.

(Speaking to a jump from about 40 GB to 120 GB.)

The problem is more the higher rpm rate.