HDD Temperatures

[Sheepish]

Im wondering if one of my hard disks is on its last legs.
The drives in question are a Maxtor 250gb Diamond Something or other and an older 120gb Seagate Barracuda, both IDE. Left to rest, freshly booted and sitting idle the temps of my two drives are 44c and 47c. After a while they rise to 47c and 50c (which HDD Inspector doesnt like) and if i run anything intensive through the Seagate it reaches 53c easily. This is with the side of my case open too

What is an average hdd temp? and are these temperatures safe?
Should I replace the Seagate before it goes tits up and perhaps lose whats on it?

 

[Sagekilla]

Well I have 3 HDs installed, on a fresh boot they idle at 27, 25, and 28. After idling for a few minutes, they stay at about 31. The highest temp I've seen them at was 35 after running a Disk Defrag and a virus scan in parallel. Then again, I have a fain mounted right in front of them behind an air filter, so I have something to help cool them down a tad bit.

Are your drive without any cooling at all? If your computer is stable for the most part (Under heavy HD load) then you shouldn't worry too much. You could always pop a fan in front of them if your case permits, but I have it setup like that because I happen to have a secondary HDD tray where the fan is located.

But, I won't pretend to know fully the implications of having such high temperatures. Maybe someone else has more information for you if this isn't any help.

 

[Sheepish]

I meant to mention sometimes after some strenuous activity and higher room temperature (cold nights are setting in and im thin skinned) the computer slows a good bit... and upon restart im informed the OS is missing hehe. It only boots after being left to cool down a while. The OS is on the Maxtor though. I think i need to invest in a new case with some fans as currently the only onces inside are for the cpu, gpu and psu :roll:

20c difference between your temps and mine is a fair difference though...
I might think about replacing them when I upgrade (as soon as ram prices drop )

 

[Sagekilla]

Where do you live? Ambient temperature can always affect a computer some way, because the minimum temperature in your case cannot dip below the temperature of the room. (Someone clarify me on this?) I happen to live on Long Island, and it was pretty hot this summer but my temperatures never jumped over 31 on idle. It should be much lower soon because my room tends to become quite cold in the winter.

I've never heard of a computer simply refusing to boot up because of low temperatures. How cold does it get in the room?

It's funny you mentioned that... This is the first time i've heard of a computer literally 'freezing' up and refusing to boot.

 

[Sheepish]

higher room temperature (cold nights are setting in and im thin skinned)

hah, i meant the cold nights result in me putting on the fire and heating the room to melting point. It wont boot because the room temp has caused the drive to overheat!

I live in Scotland where the temperature generally doesnt rise above 25c inside. At night i suppose i might raise the room temp to the 30's and the drives have a tendancy to overheat more then.

 

[Mousemonkey]

According to Seagate the operating temp of their drives is 5 - 50 degrees celsius, so it sounds like you need to get some airflow over your drives and if the temp remains high back up all data and start replacing stuff.