Can electronics catch a cold?

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wassi

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Has any one ever had anything damaged do to extremely cold temperatures? Where i live (Toronto, Canada) the temperature can easily reach -20c (-4F) in the winter. Should i be worried about leaving my GPS in my car and not using it for a long time?
 
you can usually check the rated tempreatures of your devices... some batteries might not work or outright fail if they are exposed to extremely low tempreatures
 
if your GPS has a hard drive in it I'd be especially interested in the temperature specifications. LCD displays also typically won't work when they are extremely cold but there's no damage being done AFAIK. Condensation could be a factor if you allowed the vechicle to heat up very quickly and somehow had a source of humidity in the car.

I would tend to think if you located the GPS in the windshield area and used the defroster to shoot warm air at it you wouldn't have any condensation problems and if the display was wonky until warm that would cool it much quicker.

Like FLECOM said, check on the batteries, and I'll say check on the harddrive.. otherwise I don't think you've got much to worry about.
 
like previous poster said, batteries have problems with low temps. But in general, all electronics have problems with them, because cold temps can lead to condensation, and in your case, this condensation might freeze. What i'd do is only leave the gps in the car when I was in there. I don't remember exactly which ones, but i remember that there are some gps units that use actually hard drives to store their maps. If yours is one of those, keep it out of sub-freezing temps at all costs.
 
Peavey told me not to leave my guitar amp in temps below freezing, but I'm not sure if it's because of the caps or tubes.
 
Yeah, don't let that device get below freezing

Though I have little personal experience with the matter, I've been told that, because there is still some air inside of hard drives, if they are allowed to get below freezing, the water in the air will condense and freeze on the platters. then you try to turn it on and it kills the drive. My friend killed his hard drive once trying the "freezer trick," so I'll assume that the danger is real.
 
What about the cars that have the built in GPS, I'm sure they don't get damaged in the winter.
 
Desdichado said:
Yeah, don't let that device get below freezing

Though I have little personal experience with the matter, I've been told that, because there is still some air inside of hard drives, if they are allowed to get below freezing, the water in the air will condense and freeze on the platters. then you try to turn it on and it kills the drive. My friend killed his hard drive once trying the "freezer trick," so I'll assume that the danger is real.
Click to expand...

The great thing about hard drives is that they are sealed at the factory. So, you've been guilty of an internet myth. :) If that was true, I would have lost a lot of laptops over the years from leaving them in my car.

(if your friend put a harddrive in the freezer it (or he) had worse problems then condensation.)
 
The packaging or manual should say what the storage temp range is and the operational temp range.

If it receives no power when not in use the minimum storage temperature will be fine to use.
Be aware, you shouldnt power it on until the cabin temp is at least above the minimum operating temp for a few minutes with the fans circulating air!
You could easily power it on below its operational temp.

The specs are a rough guide and you can risk powering it on when its too cold.
It is a risk though.
 
dekard said:
The great thing about hard drives is that they are sealed at the factory. So, you've been guilty of an internet myth. :) If that was true, I would have lost a lot of laptops over the years from leaving them in my car.

(if your friend put a harddrive in the freezer it (or he) had worse problems then condensation.)
Click to expand...


i dont know what type of hard drive you are using but it sure aint a normale one. those holes in the hd case that say do not block are for vintalation
 
wassi said:
Has any one ever had anything damaged do to extremely cold temperatures? Where i live (Toronto, Canada) the temperature can easily reach -20c (-4F) in the winter. Should i be worried about leaving my GPS in my car and not using it for a long time?
Click to expand...
Only -20? Damn, you're lucky.
 
lozaning said:
i dont know what type of hard drive you are using but it sure aint a normale one. those holes in the hd case that say do not block are for vintalation
Click to expand...

How about we settle in the middle? Here's the relevant wikipedia quote: 'Hard disks have a mostly sealed enclosure that protects the disk internals from dust, condensation, and other sources of contamination. The hard disk's read-write heads fly on an air bearing which is a cushion of air only nanometers above the disk surface. The disk surface and the disk's internal environment must therefore be kept immaculate to prevent damage from fingerprints, hair, dust, smoke particles and such, given the sub-microscopic gap between the heads and disk.'

source... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_disk
 
dekard said:
The great thing about hard drives is that they are sealed at the factory. So, you've been guilty of an internet myth. :) If that was true, I would have lost a lot of laptops over the years from leaving them in my car.

(if your friend put a harddrive in the freezer it (or he) had worse problems then condensation.)
Click to expand...

An excellent point. I was not saying that this damage due to condensation is a certainty with hard drives. My point was just that, should there be any water vapor inside, be it due to poor sealing, or a broken seal, or bad manufacturing conditions, or whatever else, there was a danger. However, you are correct in general.

On rethinking the idea (and looking around) it makes a difference whether the drive is on or off. western digital, on their environmental specification page, states that the operating range for their drives is 41 F - 140 F. However the Non-operating temp range is -40 F - 149 F. This seems to prove your point.

Essentially, I now agree that Chernobyl1 is right. It should be fine, provided you allow it time to warm up. Pardon my previous stupidity ;)

And yeah, my friend was trying to recover data from a dead drive (as in wouldn't read), but it came out even more dead (as in wouldn't do anything) I guess I'll attribute this to broken seals or something, since the drive was a 10 year old Maxtor.
 
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