Case fan very close to HDD?

[Gromit57]

I have a Zalman ZM-T3 case and a Caviar Black 1.5TB hard drive. The HDD is pretty loud, and there's vibration noise from the case, which I think is mostly because of the HDD, but might also be because the front of the case is plastic and seems loosely connected.

I tried various things to reduce the noise, and what seems to help the most is letting the HDD hang in the air by attaching it to the bottom of the HDD cage using only the top two screw holes.

1) Is it safe to do this? The HDD seems pretty firmly secured, but probably not as well as when it's fully in the cage.

2) When it's hanging, the HDD temperature rises significantly. When it's in the cage, it's around 40C, but with it hanging, it starts at around 47C, and after a few hours gets to 49C (after discovering this I returned the HDD to the cage).

The case has only one fan in the back. I can add another to the front or the side. If I add it to the front and let the HDD hang, the fan will be very close to it - is that a problem?

BTW, my CPU is an i5-4590 with an Arctic Cooling Alpine 11 Rev2 fan, and there's no dedicated graphics card.

 

[Charlie98]

~50C on a HDD is a no-no. If you had CrystalDisk running it would be throwing up cautions.

I would mount the HDD in the cage properly, using rubber grommets to isolate some of the noise, and mount a front fan.

I would also run a SMART check on your HDD...

 

[JeffMD]

Hanging it like that should be just fine, as for your temp, MOST good cases support a fan mount at the front of the drive cage, either on the cage itself or as part of the front bezel. It is quite normal to have a fan here and clearly your hd makes a lot of heat so it would be wise to buy an extra and put it here. Nothing fast, any quiet fan will produce enough airflow to keep it cool enough.

 

[Gromit57]

It seems (from images I've googled) that for this case, the front fan is at the bottom, below the HDD cage. If I let the HDD hang, the fan will be like an inch away, and will be blowing directly at it.

It will help with the temps, but I wonder if it's safe for it to be blowing air directly at the HDD at such a small distance?

 

[ReignQuake]

As long as the centre of the fan isn't magnetic, your hard drive will love the fresh air.

 

[JeffMD]

Your fear of the fans is misplaced, there is no danger.

 

[Gromit57]

As long as the centre of the fan isn't magnetic, your hard drive will love the fresh air.

The fan I wanted is the Noctua NF-P12-1300 (not the PWM version). From some googling, it seems like it does have a magnet (magnetic axis stabilizer?). Does that mean I can't use it? Is there another fan (has to be 120mm) anyone can recommend?