Two 7,200 RPM Hard Drives in a Compaq Presario 5000?

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Dregon

I've hooked up another drive in the past to transfer binaries for safe
keeping. If both drives were installed and kept running on a full time
basis, will problems with overheating occur?
 
I've hooked up another drive in the past to transfer binaries for safe
keeping. If both drives were installed and kept running on a full time
basis, will problems with overheating occur?
Click to expand...

With adequate cooling, I don't see why. I have two 7,200 rpm drives
right now in my box (which I cobbled together from used parts and an
old Compaq Deskpro case). And my cooling setup isn't even all that
great (just basically the old fan in the Deskpro case, and I've taped
up the unused slots in back). Just make sure they have enough room
between them for air circulation; this is not a problem for me, since
I don't have the original Deskpro case hardware, so one of my drives
is just sitting in one of the internal bays (they need these stupid
Compaq "brackets" to be secure to the chassis) propped up on an old
paperback book with about an inch and a half of space surrounding it
(except for the bottom of the drive, of course).
 
John said:
With adequate cooling, I don't see why. I have two 7,200 rpm drives
right now in my box (which I cobbled together from used parts and an
old Compaq Deskpro case). And my cooling setup isn't even all that
great (just basically the old fan in the Deskpro case, and I've taped
up the unused slots in back). Just make sure they have enough room
between them for air circulation; this is not a problem for me, since
I don't have the original Deskpro case hardware, so one of my drives
is just sitting in one of the internal bays (they need these stupid
Compaq "brackets" to be secure to the chassis) propped up on an old
paperback book with about an inch and a half of space surrounding it
(except for the bottom of the drive, of course).
Click to expand...

Don't have the luxury of an open internal bay or any additional space
cause I have two burners in those slots. The only way to utilize
another drive is mounting it in a bracket right next to the existing.
After transferring data from one drive to the other, I noticed just how
much heat can be produced by a 7,200 RPM hard drive. So I guess two
drives using the standard mounting procedure is definitely out of the
question because they are practically a pair of Siamese Twins.

Thanks for the reply -
 
Don't have the luxury of an open internal bay or any additional space
cause I have two burners in those slots. The only way to utilize
another drive is mounting it in a bracket right next to the existing.
After transferring data from one drive to the other, I noticed just how
much heat can be produced by a 7,200 RPM hard drive. So I guess two
drives using the standard mounting procedure is definitely out of the
question because they are practically a pair of Siamese Twins.
Click to expand...

Didn't imply it would be "out of the question"; it just poses more
problems. And I wouldn't reccommend just dropping a hard drive into
an open large bay anyway; I only do that because I don't have a choice
(proprietary case, don't have the stupid Compaq brackets for
mounting). As long as I have to do that for now, it's just making the
best out of a bad bargain (more cooling space around the drive).

Can you not mount a fan to simply draw air between the drives? I've
never had to do this, so I don't have a step-by-step ready. I do
believe there are fans you can mount, either internally or externally,
to do just that; namely, extra cooling specifically for hard drives.

Or simply add more fans to the case (which will increase noise, of
course), and check your internal air circulation. All that is needed
is for, somehow, air to be drawn past the drives.

Also; if fans totally untenable; since you seem to be using the second
drive for storage ("transferring binaries to"); what about
sidestepping the whole box cooling issue and simply getting an
external mount for the second drive? USB enclosures are relatively
inexpensive, though you'll be dealing with another power supply to
plug into the wall.

I don't know what kind of case and chassis you have, so I can't really
think of anything else. From your context, I would assume it's small,
with only 2 cdrom bays and 2 hard drive bays.

I haven't gone on to suggest liquid-based cooling systems because I
don't know what level of case-modding you are familar with. I haven't
used liquid-based cooling systems myself yet, but from what I read
about them, when I finally am able to build a decent "big dick" box
again, I probably will be using them and eschewing the whole fan
paradigm.

___________________________________________________

"I hate those people who like to tell you,
Money is the root of all that kills;
They have never been poor,
They have never had the "joy" of a welfare Christmas."

-- Everclear, "I Will Buy You A New Life"
 
Silly me; I just noticed the subject header. Yes; this would be a
little easier to solve in a regular non-OEM case.

The truth is out there; it will all come out well in the end, I think.

___________________________________________________

"Black shirted boys in the badlands
play machine-gun rodeo;
the downtown mission's packed too tight,
with folks that got nowhere to go."

--- David Baerwald, "River's Gonna Rise", 1986
 
Don't have the luxury of an open internal bay or any additional space
cause I have two burners in those slots. The only way to utilize
another drive is mounting it in a bracket right next to the existing.
After transferring data from one drive to the other, I noticed just how
much heat can be produced by a 7,200 RPM hard drive. So I guess two
drives using the standard mounting procedure is definitely out of the
question because they are practically a pair of Siamese Twins.

Thanks for the reply -
Click to expand...

I had a Compaq 7ap195 that had the same bracket for the second hard drive.
Well, actually I had to buy it from Compaq. After two months of running a
7200rpm 80g Maxtor, it fried. Now it could have failed for any number of
reasons but I'm betting it was heat. This is a terrible design for a secondary
drive.

When Maxtor replaced the drive, which was under warranty, I moved the system
into a new Chieftec case with 4 hard drive slots, which was on sale at Newegg
for 55 bucks. It now has a proper case and it no longer looks like a Compaq.
There are just too many well designed cheap cases out there to use a case that
was never designed for today's hardware.

Buy this case and, as a bonus, you will also be upgrading your Compaq power
supply. All for $35.00.

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc.asp?description=11-154-017&DEPA=1

Ed
 
I had a Compaq 7ap195 that had the same bracket for the second hard drive.
Well, actually I had to buy it from Compaq. After two months of running a
7200rpm 80g Maxtor, it fried. Now it could have failed for any number of
reasons but I'm betting it was heat. This is a terrible design for a secondary
drive.

When Maxtor replaced the drive, which was under warranty, I moved the system
into a new Chieftec case with 4 hard drive slots, which was on sale at Newegg
for 55 bucks. It now has a proper case and it no longer looks like a Compaq.
There are just too many well designed cheap cases out there to use a case that
was never designed for today's hardware.

Buy this case and, as a bonus, you will also be upgrading your Compaq power
supply. All for $35.00.

http://www.newegg.com/app/viewproductdesc.asp?description=11-154-017&DEPA=1

Ed
Click to expand...
BTW, here is a link to the photo album that includes pics of the system in it's
original case and in the new Chieftec after I moved it. When the system finally
dies I can put wheels on the case and use it for a Humbvee...:)

http://groups.msn.com/DesperadosHome/computerpics.msnw?Page=1

Ed
 
Dregon said:
Don't have the luxury of an open internal bay or any
additional space cause I have two burners in those slots.
The only way to utilize another drive is mounting it in
a bracket right next to the existing. After transferring
data from one drive to the other, I noticed just how much
heat can be produced by a 7,200 RPM hard drive. So I guess
two drives using the standard mounting procedure is
definitely out of the question because they are practically
a pair of Siamese Twins.
Click to expand...

How about mounting one drive right in front of that vertical drive at
the bottom? Drill some holes in its drive cage and use brass mobo
standoffs to position it away from the cage for better air flow. A
drive could also be hanged vertically from the bottom 5.25" drive bay
or directly on top of the bottom of the case. I now mount all HDs
vertically because I've found that this can cool the hottest chips by
10-20C.
 
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