[plug] egg cooking hd's

[Brad Campbell]

Shayne O'Neill wrote:
> I get this phenomena too. A reaally reaally almost too hot to touch hard
> drive. Hasnt seemed to of caused problems yet, but it does worry me and I
> wonder if its worth installing a heatsink or fan in it.
> 

The longer a hard disk is exposed to high temps the greater the degradation of the bearing 
lubricant. As the lubricant degrades bearing friction increases, which causes a raise in temperature 
and the cycle to self destruction is underway.

Keep them as cool as possible.
Mine run at or just below 40C which I still think is too hot, but as yet have not managed to drop 
the temps further. It's hard when you have 14 disks in close proximity. I'm waiting on a 170CFM 
blower to try some other case ventilation ideas.

/brad at srv:~$ sudo ./temps
/dev/hda - 38
/dev/sda - 38
/dev/sdb - 38
/dev/sdc - 36
/dev/sdd - 38
/dev/sde - 36
/dev/sdf - 35
/dev/sdg - 37
/dev/sdh - 38
/dev/sdi - 35
/dev/sdj - 36
/dev/sdk - 42
/dev/sdl - 40
/dev/sdm - 34

sd[klm] and hda are stacked at the back of the case, the rest are in supermicro hotswap cages.
I'm thinking about getting a dremel and removing the 2x80mm fans in the back of the case and 
replacing them with a single 120mm. Less noise, more air, greater static pressure ability.

At the moment the 92mm exhaust fans from the back of the supermicro cages empty out onto the 4 rear 
mounted drives, which is then pulled out of the back of the case by a pair of 30cfm 80mm fans 
through restrictive patterned stampings in the back of the case. Not optimal.

I have another 2 80mm exhaust fans under the PSU and the PSU has a reasonable exhaust fan also, but 
it's still a restrictive setup. (noisy too)

The new box I'm building has 3 supermicro cages in it. Each cage has a 92mm 52CFM fan in it, so I'm 
going to need some serious exhaust out the back of the case to keep the airflow up. 15 drives in a 
midi-tower is going to produce some heat.

Brad
-- 
Growing old is mandatory, Growing up is an option I decline.