Are Hard Drive Coolers Worth It?

Geoff

Geoff

VIP Member
It's not really worth it, generally as long as you have decent case circulation, hard drive coolers arent necessary.

I think it would matter but if you plan to get the max out of ocing as possible...
Click to expand...
You can't overclock hard drives :rolleyes:
 
P

PC eye

banned
The four hard drives installed in the case here have something to say about cooling when they are facing the 140mm front intake fan. The following are seen with SpeedFan 4.31 in Vista.
IDE HD0 = 25C XP Home
IDE HD1 = 31C Vista Home Premium
SATA 1 = 29C XP Pro
SATA 2 = 28C Vista Backup and possible Linux/Solaris

If your case lacks the amount of good air flow where temps are higher then the addon cooler can be a good thing. The highest temp there is the drive that Vista is currently running from. For 40C and higher temps you will want something to bring temps down.
 
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oscaryu1

VIP Member
is SPIRE Blackfin 3 a good case? good air flow? and what type of HSF would yall recommend? and how do i chekc my HD temps?
 
PohTayToez

PohTayToez

Active Member
I would say it really depends on what drive you have... right now, all of my drives stay nice and cool, but was using a Western Digital 250GB IDE that would get very hot to the touch, and heat decreases the lifespan of your drive, so I bought a hard drive HSF (something like $8.00)... it looks nice, and my hard drive was definitely much cooler, not to mention it adds airflow to your case, so I would say that my investment was worth it, but if your hard drive does not run hot, then I do not see why you would need one.
 
PohTayToez

PohTayToez

Active Member
oscaryu1 said:
WD 200GB (2.8ghz), Seagate 320GB(sempron), WD40GB(400MHz) , WD20GB1.3GHz)
Click to expand...

The hard drive itself doesn't really matter (unless you have a 10,000+ RPM HDD, then it would probably be worth it in any situation), it only if you notice if it is running hot.

oscaryu1 said:
oh yeah... when you put it on... you attach it to it, do yoy have to install the HDD upside down
Click to expand...

I've never heard of that... I don't think that would even work. Depending on the HSF and the case, you might have to bend some tabs to get the hard drive + cooler in, I did.
 
H

Hass

New Member
Mine is rather warm at 40C :[
Max suggested is 42C :/

Agh, it's getting warmer outside now, so I need to pay attention to see how my computer reacts to an increase of 20-30 degrees in room temp :s
 
onesandzeros

onesandzeros

New Member
holdenssx

holdenssx

New Member
I don't know it this means anything but this is an exert from a study that Google did on hard drive failure...
"We first look at the correlation between average temperature
during the observation period and failure. Figure
4 shows the distribution of drives with average temperature
in increments of one degree and the corresponding
annualized failure rates. The figure shows that failures
do not increase when the average temperature increases.
In fact, there is a clear trend showing that lower
temperatures are associated with higher failure rates.
Only at very high temperatures is there a slight reversal
of this trend."
heres the link {PDF} http://216.239.37.132/papers/disk_failures.pdf
 
Burgerbob

Burgerbob

Active Member
I have a cooler (that i NEEDED) because my HDD is at 40-45C almost all the time. And no, you do not have to install the HDD upside down. You just put the cooler on the bottom.
 
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oscaryu1

VIP Member
OK just bought one.. 6.40... 30 something CFM. and just wodnering, what is a HSF that is around 50 CFM? im gonna overclock. and how much CFM will a SPIRE coolign fan on a aluminum heatsink spinning at 4300/4200 ? how much CFM will it have? thanks
 
P

PC eye

banned
Burgerbob said:
I have a cooler (that i NEEDED) because my HDD is at 40-45C almost all the time. And no, you do not have to install the HDD upside down. You just put the cooler on the bottom.
Click to expand...

I think you need some serious consideration on additional cooling of the case if you are seeing that high of temps on any drives there. With two identical 250gb ide drives and two identical model sata drives in the case here only the drive for the current version of Windows running will even see 31C while the other three are seen at 26-28C. Of course having the drives right in front a 140mm front intake fan also helps! :p

spacedude89 said:
They are for the most part, Not needed.

That is, Unless, You over-clock your hard drive... :p
Click to expand...

That's a new one! :eek: OCing your hard drive? :confused: I'll have to make a note of this. :p
 
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