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Best Hard drive cooler?

T

theflux

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Oct 8, 2004
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I recently bought a 200GB seagate drive (it was listed in hard deals), and boy does that ting run hot hot hot. I obviously will be storing a lot of data I don't want to lose on it (I do backup sometimes, but not as often as I should. I am lazy =( ), so I want to invest in a hard drive cooler. I know the best is an 80MM fan, but my case doesn't have room for that and I do have a spare 5.25 drive. I would like one that isn't very loud as well. Does anyone have a personal favorite they can recommend?
 
theflux said:
I obviously will be storing a lot of data I don't want to lose on it,
Click to expand...
first, what you meant to say was, you really dont want to loose your investment in the HDD
because of course your going to backup your data to media (CD\DVD\Tape) a HDD cooler wont protect you from data corruption, power events, impact ect ect ect

well many HDD "coolers" are also hard drive carriers, where you can remove the drive, and those have a less than ideal signal quality in many cases, so Id advise you stick with a direct connect variety, then, most HDD coolers are simply enclosures with dedicated fans
the exceptions being attached heatsinks which are designed to increase the heat transfer interface area, but the rub is that the best heat transfer from the HDD is actually through the aluminum body of the drive, not the "top" so the sides of the drives are the best area of contact

see > http://www.themodfathers.jolt.co.uk/?page=&action=show&id=9490

there are three basic tradeoffs in any thermal solution

interface area, the larger the interface the more heat can be transfered to a given volume of fluid (air\water) the basic principle behind any heatsink, the trick is having the heat efficiently transfered too the heatsink, which is easier said then done

volume of transfer medium, the amount of air, twice the flow is close to twice the heat transfered

temperature differentials, if you have a transfer fluid that is 40C and an object (HDD) that is 41C, there aint alot of heat transfer taking place, but if you double the temperature differential, you double the heat transfer, so a 40C object with a 20C airflow....

Id advise that you consider a cool location that you can seriously ventilate in your case
this is a big part of the cases overall thermal solution, and when you add any new fan your going to alter the previous flow pattern, sometimes for the worse

OEM manufacturers are able to employ Computational Fluid Dynamics software to definatively model a thermal solution, we get trial and error :p

consider ducts, types of fans and ease of access to the drives as criteria
a good airflow will likely serve you better than many an aftermarket HDD cooler

of the options available in DR K13's link above
the Vantec Vortex is a direct connect
and has a pretty high volume crossflow fan which is also a good laminar airflow pattern for a HDD, but is rather "one sided" whereas a larger fan or combination of a few fans able to force air past both sides of the HDD like you see in many cases with drive cages, might keep the drive cooler,

I use the crossflow fan that is in the votex in a few places in my case , if you "must" have a 5.25" bay solution that would be my choice, otherwise Id take a good look at the case and ponder
 
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