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Install hard drive upside down?

I

imported_Swad

Junior Member
Are there any potential bad things that can happen from installing a hard drive in a machine upside down? I'm not finding a whole lot of information when googling. I've seen everything from "no, nothing ill can happen" to "don't change the orientation if the hard drive has been one way for a few years" to "it's ok if the system is formatted while the hard drive is in the orientation it will be kept in." So does anyone have any concrete information on this and not just some guess or otherwise contrived idea?
 
My new PC has HDD's mounted horizontally (Top up), but my old eMachines had the HDD mounted on it's side, so I don't think there would be a problem. I'm so far from being an expert though.
 
There's no problem with using a drive in any orientation anymore. A decade ago it was a minor issue. If you wanted to be sure about it, a full disk wipe (writing all zeroes with the manufacturer's utility) wouldn't hurt, once it's in the final position.
 
Awesome--thanks you much for the speedy reply. I'll keep this information in consideration with my new setup and the potential need to orient them belly side up.
 
Even though most HD manufacturers say it is OK to mount drives in any orientation except more than 5 degrees from horizontal or vertical (can cause excess bearing wear), mounting PCB up is taboo here! And if I find one that way, I FIX IT (even if I have to fabricate a bracket to do it)!

.bh.
 
Plenty of OEM systems have hard drives mounted vertically. It's not any issue anymore. It's not like the head-arms weigh so much that the coil is going to have difficulty positioning it.
 
^ Nice link, orangat... nice humor from the two going at it as well (mostly from the one not backing up claims with any real substance). 😛
 
Will there be any concern for overheating or maybe at least raising the temp (thus shortening its life) when a hdd is installed upside down?
 
going along with the general consensus; the one critical point is try and maintain the orientation of the drive in the same position as it was formatted in. Most factory drives are formatted in the standard horizontal position, but to be safe i usually reformat new drives, while they are in the position that they will be in the case.

It's minor but when you're dealing with extremely small tolerances, why not take a bit of extra time to make sure that the basics are secure.

good luck
 
Users can't change the low-level format (which permanently sets the track location) on a HD anymore anyway. But it couldn't hurt to refresh the data when changing orientation of a drive with data already on it. A thorough Scandisk or Checkdisk is supposed to do that or the higher levels of SpinRite (grc.com).

.bh.
 
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