Why do larger external drives require more power?

Siberian

Siberian

Member
How come external HDDs of 250 GB+ require their own power supply? I have enough cables lying around...where is the link between space and the need for more power?
 
it's not about space. it's just about power consumption.

Most 2.5 inch drives are 5400rpm drives which mostly don't require extra power to run. The biggest 2.5" hdd right now is like 500gb.

Most 3.5 inch drives are 7200 rpm drives which mostly require extra power to run.
 
All 3.5" drives need 12V which USB cannot provide, 2.5" drives in external casings can either require one or two USB ports or come with a power adapter, usually 1-2 USB connections

However larger size can mean higher power draw. In the same series of drives (Barracuda 12 for example is 500GB per platter) 500GB is single platter, 750GB and 1000GB 2 platters, 1500GB 3 platters and so on, the more platters in a hard-drive the more power is consumed to spin the platters
 
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